Season's Greetings I have many exciting things to share so I am going to get right to this year's industry news and views. Otherwise, this letter will be 5 pages long! EXECUTIVE SOLUTIONS NEWS First, I would like to congratulate Kim McQuinn on having done a tremendous job. She has just completed her first full year with Executive Solutions and her diligence, sensitivity, and passion have gotten her off to a terrific start. She works smart, but always with heart, and I am proud to have her on my team. In addition to her ongoing recruiting efforts, Helene Kugit has assumed the role of Managing Director for Executive Solutions. Helene will be spearheading our continued internal growth by identifying additional Talent Specialists. In order to broaden my perspective, I have become much more involved in the ELFA (the name has changed to reflect a finance product) this year and it has been a rewarding experience. As I begin my second year on the Service Provider's Business Council, I remain committed to finding ways to make the products offered by Service Providers more accessible, understandable, and responsive to the needs of lessors. Any thoughts or suggestions you might have are welcome. The ELFA Membership Marketing Committee is acutely aware of the need to continually seek out the opinions and suggestions of its membership. I have recently joined a subcommittee mandated with finding ways to increase ELFA penetration within member companies. If any of you would like to discuss this, please feel free to call me. Among the many ELFA events I attended, I found the The Executive Round Table to be a great platform for sharing ideas and learning about other companies' perspectives in an informal and congenial atmosphere. I am proud to have been a presenter at the ELFA annual convention where I discussed "Intelligent Use of the Interview Process to Attract, Attain, Motivate, Reward, and Retain Talent." As a result, it became clear to me that few companies have a well-planned process for effectively building their staff. Many people seem to interview by "the seat of their pants" with inconsistent results. Because many hiring managers have not received training for this formidable task, they frequently do not have the skill set to approach this responsibility with confidence. Even fewer seem to recognize that the process is just getting started when a person goes on the payroll. Properly transitioning new hires and then measuring their progress on an ongoing basis are crucial to healthy growth. INDUSTRY VIEWS In 2006 our Industry has experienced a considerable increase in salaries based, in part, on a shrinking talent pool. There are many reasons why the number of quality people has diminished, but I believe the graying of our industry, failure to implement training programs, and the consequences of the frenetic pace of the M&A's of a few years ago are the driving factors. Hiring Managers find themselves with a continually shrinking talent pool, due in part to a narrow field of vision. Many industries require the same skill sets as Leasing, yet our industry consistently fails to tap into these resources. Somehow, we have become stuck in the belief that hiring people who have knowledge specific to leasing is the most important factor. Talent and skills are more important than industry specific knowledge. You can teach people the industry, but you cannot train talent and ability into a person. No one denies that if a person can "bring a book of business or contacts" (I really want to scream every time I hear that!) their ramp up time will be shorter, but this reasoning fails to objectively weigh short-term gain over longer-range benefits. Companies often hire a "connected" person who will never surpass mediocrity rather than give a truly talented person a reasonable amount of time and support to achieve stellar performance year over year. I could go on and on about the damage I believe this kind of thinking causes, but I am convinced that if we don't take some drastic measures, we will soon be spending more time at retirement parties than President's Club activities. Formalized leasing specific training used to be standard operating procedure among the leading lessors, and I believe it needs to be an integral part of employee benefits once more. Internships are a great way to try before you buy. As our leaders move towards retirement, we desperately need to implement succession plans. We are really running against the clock. What many people fail to realize is that candidates take the absence of succession planning very seriously and see it as a threat to their future security. The absence of a succession plan casts doubt on the likelihood that the company they are considering will survive, let alone thrive in the future. Margins continue to shrink, product lines are blurred, and banks aggressively embrace leasing as a viable silo within their suite of products. If we do not wake up and look beyond the daily routine towards the bigger horizon, I am gravely concerned that we risk serious problems going forward. NEW SOLUTIONS It is obviously apparent that I am passionate about training, effective interviewing, process implementation for new hires, mentoring programs, and the establishment and measurement of benchmarks. Therefore, it is with tremendous pleasure that I would like to announce the formation of The Gerson Consulting Group, a separate company that I have formed in partnership with Art Kimicata. Art is a 15+ year leasing industry executive who I have come to know and deeply respect over many years. The Gerson Group will focus on delivering consulting services to our industry. Since its inception in 1989, Executive Solutions has embraced the belief that by working as partners with companies, both sides enjoy tremendous benefits. As a result, over the past several years, I have had numerous requests to deliver the types of services The Gerson Group will provide. With the increased staff in my recruiting business and the addition of Art, I now have both the time and resources to deliver quality consulting services. The focus of our practice will be on helping clients develop and implement effective strategies and programs for recruiting, hiring, transitioning and training new employees, market research, compensation analysis, management development, development and management of an effective sales force, acquisition and growth, and assisting them with a variety of operational challenges. We will be offering project packages, hourly engagements, in person and Internet based programs, among others. As with Executive Solutions, flexibility will be a key driver, so if you think there is an area we may be able to assist you with, we would be more than happy to structure a tailor made solution. I look forward to working with you in this new capacity. In closing, I would like to take a moment to reflect back on our world as it was not so very long ago. In the 70's, no one had a fax machine. I used to sell them in the 80's and I remember telling incredulous business people that one day there would be a fax machine in every office. In the 2000's, they have evolved from the technology of the future to obsolescence. There was no voice mail back in the 70's, and the ability to call your answering machine from a remote location was a real advancement. Of course, email was not even a glint in someone's eye, and if you wanted to find out about something, you went to the library, pulled out the index card box, and tried to find what you needed. When you needed to call someone from the road, finding a pay phone that allowed you to stay in your car was a real luxury. Banking took place inside the bank during limited weekday hours. Blue tooth referred to what happened when you ate blueberry pie. Our world has changed as radically as the world changed when people moved from horse drawn carriages to the car. As we draw to the end of 2006, I invite you to think about how differently you do business now than a few decades ago. Other than technology, has your business model kept pace? On behalf of Helene Kugit, Kim McQuinn, Jon Gerson, and the rest of our staff, I would like to wish each of you and your families a wonderful and safe holiday and a challenging and rewarding New Year. Let's all break some records! With warm regards, Teri Gerson President, Executive Solutions Teri Gerson, President, terigerson@exsolutions.com Corporate Office: 1141 Minisink Way, Westfield NJ, 07090 www.exsolutions.com  T. 908 654-1550  F. 908 847.0377 Providing Talent Solutions For All Facets of the Leasing Industry Since 1990. © 2006 Executive Solutions for Leasing and Finance. All rights reserved.