To Be OR Not To Be An Insurance Agent

In the past, I never believed that an insurer had my interest at heart. My law lecturer, who worked with a major insurance company on a full-time basis, remarked during one of the lessons that we had to be extra careful in taking up insurance cover.

But, those were the days when some insurers were known or mistaken to have made every effort to uncover any oversight or omission of relevant declaration whenever a claim was submitted by the insured.

When it was my turn to consider a second career to boost my income in the 1990s, I pondered over three options - be a remisier ? be a real estate agent ? or an insurance agent ( last in that order of preference ).

Be a remisier was my natural first preference, but I had to decline as I could not be sure that I could restrain myself when the "bull fever" pervaded the trading room. I might get my fingers burned on mistaking my luck for my intelligence. So I opted to be a real estate agent. Regrets ? YES, how I wished I had known about such a lucrative line of business earlier.

When the Asian Financial Crisis, SARS, etc struck, the industry took a tumble, and recovery was no where in sight; I had to pull out to avoid losing all that I had worked for. My official last day with ERA was 9 September 2002.

In 2005, I was getting fidgety and restless again. I started exploring for opportunities to make extra money again. The remaining option was to be an insurance agent.

Could I ? Am I deluding myself ? Perhaps, NOT ! With the public outcry over the years, the relevant authority had stepped in to ensure a higher level of governance and transparency within the industry.

Besides, the younger generations' perception of insurance was more positive. There could be ample opportunities for growth over the foreseeable future.

I signed up for the various modules, and had no difficulty in clearing the examinations. I had planned to join an insurance broker prior to passing my examinations, but decided to take up an offer by a well-established insurer as its mission statement and objectives were more in line with my inclination.

My first year's performance was on target. In fact, I could have moved on to qualify myself as a high achiever. It did not matter to me as I was more concerned with reserving some of my energy for the following year's target.

Time passed, and I soon found myself in my third year of helping my clients in making financial plans for their future. My best achievement was when I pulled in more than S$500,000 worth of premiums for a single product promotion within two weeks.

This, however, did not help when it came to management's review of all agents' year-end performance. I had hit 85 per cent of my target toward the year-end, but I was given prior warning of my possible termination in the event that my performance fell short of management's expectation.

Friends offered to help, but I decided to take up the challenge and await the outcome without doing anything about it. I detested about being pushed to a corner every year. How often could friends help me ? True to their word, the management served the termination without batting an eyelid.

I now wonder whether or not I should move on to another insurer.

Frontline Staff Not Trained In Our Lingua Franca ?

Employment of foreign workers has come under fire again - this time on wait- staff and other frontline staff with an apparent lack of linguistic ability.

Whose fault ?
Blame their employers ?
Must employers ensure that they are adequately trained before deploying them to the frontline ?

"No Way !" say some employers with their all too familiar reasons ( or excuses ? ). "Government should consider literacy test just like what foreign maids have to undergo before they are employed in Singapore" says the public ( some, at least ).

While big players in any industry may have the resources to commit their staff to some internal programme or training by external institutions, many smaller enterprises may have difficulty in substaining such good practices.

As a management consultant, I have always impressed on both employers and employees on the need to realise that communications do not solely depend on human interaction alone.

Indirect communications speak volumes, and if properly implemented may relieve all relevant parties on the arduous and time-consuming tasks of repeating standardised messages and instructions.

Such indirect communication means include proper and effective signages( electronic moving messages, for instance ), sound systems ( repeating promotional packages, for instance ), pamphlets and table-cards/menus ( highlighting time for last order, for instance ).

Finger-pointing is not going to lead us anywhere. Brainstorming will resolve most situations.

How I Was Involved In Caregiving

It was early 2003 when a church leader mooted the idea of establishing a Caregiving Ministry to the parish priest, Father Terence Pereira. Father Terence supported the idea, and has remained as the ministry’s spiritual director to these days.

Implementation was swift, and so was the support from the church. Several members of the pioneer batch of 11 volunteers ( My wife and I included ) were hastily put through a Caring Through Situations Of Loss And Grief course at the Centre For Ignatian Spirituality And Counselling in July/August 2003.

This was soon followed by an intensive 6-month workshop (80 hours) on Pastoral Care And Counselling (Theory and Practice) conducted by Sister Carmen Francis from 16 August to 8 November 2003.

The ministry successfully journeyed through with its first major client in August 2003, and has since gone on to befriend and journey with many more, both within and outside the parish.

Our Mission Statement

"To Befriend And Provide Encouragement Through LOVE And Caring Toward Those In Situation Of Loss, Grief, Despair and/or Hopelessness As Well As Their Caregivers/Family Members"

What is caregiving ? You and I are involved in caregiving efforts in one way or another without our realising it. Nursing our own sick child is a common form of caregiving. Attending to our dying loved one is another. So is helping a physically-disabled neighbour to the polyclinic.

The ministry would love to be directly involved in all referred caregiving situations, but this may not be possible, at least temporarily, given its existing constraints and process of restructuring.

Instead, the ministry will devote most of its time and efforts in befriending and encouraging those in situation of need, and guide the family members along in their caregiving efforts.

That is, the ministry will temporarily act as a focal point in providing information and referral suggestions for those who need caregiving services/arrangements.

The ministry has education and training arrangements with:

• Dover Park Hospice,
• Hospice Care Association ( Skills for Life: HomeCare ),
• Singapore Cancer Society, and
• Other related organisations.

The ministry is looking for more volunteers to roll out the following plans/programmes:

• Support-Groups;
• Intercessory Prayer-Groups;
• Outreach initiatives for welfare organisations within the parish;
• Home-care Nursing Support-Groups; and
• Counselling

Fraser's Hill Resort Has Lost Its Glorious Days, But Not Its Natural Splendours

Having determined that we had insufficient time to travel up to Chiang Mai in Thailand, we drove across the causeway on Thursday, 8 May 2008 at about 6.30am. Our destination being Bukit Fraser or more popularly known as Fraser's Hill Resort.

It was fun driving up the North-South Highway for the first time, saved that we had to cope with what we feared most for the trip - breakdown ( one tyre puncture on the way up, and another on the way back ).

Caution: Never trust your tyres even when the condition of the brand new tyres looked "OK". We even had the assurance of the agent's workshop and a Malaysian tyre-shop that the tyres were in good condition.

Advice: Always have 2 spare tyres on stand-by at any one time, and head for the nearest town as soon as you have used them.

Decline any offer of help to replace the tyre along the way. They are most likely to slaughter you. Despite our prior knowledge of such opportunists from newspaper, we were confused and anxious on the first puncture; and ended up paying double on the price for the first replacement tyre. Besides, there was a charge for the labour of replacing the bad tyre.

We finally reached Exit 118 of the highway, and had to make our exit to proceed with the rest of the journey on so-called Federal Roads and Other Roads ( that is, minor roads when compared to the federal roads ).

It was with sheer determination and much anxieties that we reached our destination at about 5.30pm as there was no adequate directional signs to guide us along the Federal Roads and Other Roads for the resort.

It was a big let-down when we finally made it to the top of the resort. Many inns, pubs, cafes, restaurants, etc have already been abandoned or closed down over the years.

We checked into Shahzan Inn after realising that it was probably the best accommodation at 110 ringgits a night. We were probably the only guests around then. More checked in subsequently ( three or so more families ).

The scenic beauties of the early morning hours were simply irresistible for us to commit them to our memories of Bukit Fraser.