Successful Meetings - December 2007 - (Page 48)

Speaker Report > When Crime Pays An Offer He Couldn’t Refuse A former mob captain and a former cop walk into a ballroom. No, it’s not a joke; it’s the beginning of a keynote by Michael Franzese, once named by Fortune magazine as the 18th biggest Mafia boss in the United States, based on wealth, power, and influence. The former cop is Robert Name: Michael Michaels, who often introduces Franzese Franzese; the two teamed up about Crime: Racketeering five years ago, at a time when nei$10,000 ther knew the other’s background. Franzese made the unprecedented move of abandoning the Colombo crime family without testifying against other members or accepting government protection. He ended up making a deal to plead guilty to racketeering, and served 10 years in prison. Near the end of his incarceration, Franzese agreed to participate in an antigambling film—an area in which he had particular expertise from his time in the mob. After his release, the film led to speaking engagements with professional athletes, followed by corporate groups who saw a message of encouragement and an ability to change. “I can always tell the level of interest by how many people in the room stick around and introduce themselves [to the speaker]—he had quite a long line at the end,” says Tony Versaci, chairman of the Burger King Celebration! convention for franchisees at which Franzese spoke in 2006. Versaci had no compunction about hiring someone with a past for his group. “The best way I can analogize this is that there are many preachers with dark pasts who’ve turned their lives around and now help people—this is the same situation,” he says. “Be it addiction, or compulsive behavior, or womanizing, or gambling, or whatever—they see the light and they turn their lives around, help other people, and prove that even if you have fallen and made mistakes, you move forward and try to make life better for yourself and your family.” But in a post-Sopranos world, Franzese has come to understand that attendees are as interested in stories of reallife Tonys and Uncle Juniors as they are in learning to change their lives. “I spent seventeen and a half years actively in that life. It’s what I lived. I never realized how much of a fascination and an intrigue there is with people around that world. I’m fortunate that I can get people’s attention that way and then use it to deliver a message,” says Franzese, who considers himself disengaged from the mob since the early 1990s, although organized crime continues to impact his life. “You The combination of an intriguing underworld connection and success reinventing himself has made Michael Franzese a hit with audiences. don’t hand in a resignation or anything like that,” he says. “I don’t live in fear, and people aren’t actively coming after me, but I have to be cognizant of the fact that people are unhappy with what I did.” Down the Garden Path For Pegine Echevarria, her three years as a member of a Bronx, NY, gang was a part of her history, not something to share with audiences during her presentations on empowerment and motivation. But a chance invitation to speak informally following a talk at Mississippi State University gave Echevarria an opportunity to freely discuss her past, and she was startled to discover the Name: Pegine Echevarria Crime: Gang member (no time spent incarcerated) $10,000 impact it had on people. Echevarria often speaks about sales and leadership now, drawing on her experiences working as an “escorter” for the gang, walking people into situations in which they will be beaten (“Let me tell you, you haven’t done sales until you’ve done that,” she says), then extricating herself from the gang and beginning a new life by moving to Spain. mimegasite.com DECEMBER 2007 SUCCESSFUL MEETINGS 48 http://mimegasite.com

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Successful Meetings - December 2007 Contents Editor's Note Special Report Research Industry Trends 2008 Meeting Events Planner Spotlight Websites of the Month Mouth for Sale Technology Talk Food & Beverage Pre-Event On Site Pre-Event Tools of the Trade Goodbye, Booth Babes Five Tips to Improve Your Golf Events When Crime Pays Office for Hire More Miles for Your Money Places & Spaces South Florida Biloxi / Mississippi Gulf Coast Fort Worth Monterey Beijing Gurus Special Supplement: Hawaii Island-by-Island Guide

Successful Meetings - December 2007

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