Roy Lim, chief agency officer, Zurich Life Insurance, Singapore, speaks about his insurance career which spans 25 years.
How did you get to where you are today?
I went on to work in investment sales at DBS in 1999 and stayed there for four years. Next, I moved to AIA in Hong Kong as vice president of its Asia Pacific life operations, supporting countries like Australia, New Zealand, India, Indonesia and Korea. It was there that I realised there are certain things that are quite universal about agents, whether they’re in Rajasthan or Melbourne. Successful agents have certain traits – the desire to do well, the humility to accept training, and most importantly being able to put the customer first. If customers can trust you and they are happy with you, they will refer more customers and will continue to stay with you.
I was seconded to AIA Australia, as chief agency officer in 2004 and worked there for another three years. I moved to AXA Malaysia in 2008 also as chief agency officer, before getting two job offers in Singapore. One was with an established insurance firm and the other was with Zurich. The Zurich offer appealed to me because it was a great global brand name and a Fortune 500 company. It meant doing something different and being a pioneer (Zurich Life Insurance was launched in Singapore in April 2012). I also shared similar core values with the firm like sustainability, value creation, customer centricity and teamwork.
What’s the biggest career challenge that you’ve faced so far?
My decision to join Zurich: we’re the 10th firm in the agency space in Singapore, so this means competition with the big boys. As a new player it’s exciting, but there are a number of challenges with that: we needed to be able to attract people to join us and have products which resonate with people.
The easiest thing in the world would be to replicate what other firms have done, but we’ve spent a lot time researching what customers want, and doing customer surveys. A few things came up – most people found insurance products and processes to be very complicated, so we took this into account, by making things clear and simple for our customers.
What is Zurich’s hiring mandate in Singapore like?
We have about 65 agents at present and have been tracking well since the launch of Zurich Life Insurance Singapore; we’re hoping to double this by next year. I’ll like to lay down the foundations, put in the best people we can afford, keep it small and selective for one to two years, and then replicate that success.
