Hey there, welcome to ChetChat. We promised to get back to you with jobs and exciting opportunities
And we have with us today somebody from the insurance industry because the way it is
Insurance is the second biggest employer today after the Indian Railways, so what better, we've got with us with Vighnesh Shahane
Who's the CEO of IDBI Federal life insurance so Hi Vighnesh and welcome to the show
Hi, Chetna welcome to IDBI Federal
Oh yes, and thank you so much for agreeing to be with us because this is such a huge industry
And there are so many notions are there because it dates, predates you know for years and years
So tell us about what you see as a future of this industry
You know the private insurance industry in India is about 16 years old and it will be broken on three distinct phases
the first Phase is
seven no eight years of heady growth and
there was a Gold Rush, and the Global Meltdown happened and the next six or seven years was a period of a
Little bit of the degrowth. The last couple of years. I think we're consolidating
The sentiment is very positive and the medium to long-term outlook for life insurance in India
Is very positive. So that's exciting. We've got a positive growth. We've got an under insured population
So what should the youth look out for in this going forward? Should they be here and what is in it for them?
My message to the youth would be definitely this is an industry you should try to be in. If you are interested in an industry
which is which is exciting, interesting challenging thrill a minute and
Keeps turning on its head every three months
it is the right place to be in. I have been a banker longer than I've been an insurance guy I have sold both financial products and
Insurance is one financial product which makes a difference to people's lives
I believe you need to be chosen by God to sell insurance. If that motivates you, you should be here
You've come to the right place if you are motivated by God, but let's understand now within this sector
there is this notion that is only about sales, so let's first talk about sales and as of course a huge
Non-sales portion, so let's look at how do they actually work around different avenues to sell insurance?
Yes, unlike any other industry, any other company, sales is what puts of lunch on the table
And it is no different for insurance, but more than sales, there is is more to insurance than sales. There are as many
Department as a bank would have. There's marketing, there is auditor, their is finance, compliance and we have about 15 departments
Besides sales and even within sales we have a lot of channels. So let's say there is a young graduate
Looking to a career in insurance perhaps in sales
What are the different avenues available to him?
So we have young graduates coming to us either fresh out of college or with one or two years work experience?
We not too fussed about that. I think
Everybody should start their career in sales
If you don't have this perspective on sales you view the world through an excel spreadsheet
And that's what you are left doing. So young graduates showing a lot of passion enthusiasm
attitude, energy can start a career in sales and like I said in sales, we have many channels. We have an agency channel
Where he is the boss . He's not an employee the company. He works
at his pace, at his convenience, and he earns a commission. We also have sales
positions for employees in Different channels
So depending on his aptitude
Attitude and his interest he can forge a career in sales can keep upgrading skills doing other courses. And there are a lot of short-term and medium-term
Courses in insurance available now. I believe success is a culture I
Don't believe you can be a successful sales guy
And if you put a head to it you can't be a successful product or marketing or HR guy. Vighnesh
You drew out this map for us where you said if you're interested in sales they can go the agency route or they can be
An employee for the company and be in sales
So let's talk about agency since that's like a really large chunk of people, so if they want to become a life insurance agent
What is the process for that and Timelines etc
Yes, so if you don't become a life insurance agent you have a choice of 24 insurance company is in front of you including the LIC
The minimum qualifications for life insurance agents are
12th standard, there is a hundred hour
Course after which there is an online examination, so you do 100 hours and you do the online
Examination and your a licensed agent with that company. When you choose to do an examination through a company
You're tied to that company
You can't be your agent for multiple companies although you are an entrepreneur, it's a variable job you have to be tied to that company
Okay, if you do the examination through that company,
So you do the 100 hours through the company and the company sponsors your online exam
And then you're tied to that company,
In Agency you're the boss. There is no ceiling too much you can earn and
even today in my company there are the top three or four agents earn more money than I do, and that's a great
Thing yeah, and I get excited seeing that
So it's all a function of how hard you work, how many people you meet. Because insurance in India, Chetna
is not bought, it is sold
So you have to be eyeball to eyeball with as many people in the day as you can and then you earn commissions
You earn renewal commission. So I sell you a policy I earn front end first up commission
If you renew your policy next year with no effort from me and just probably a phone call to remind you and the year after
That, I earn a renewal commission. If you're willing to bend you back, work hard
work diligently
The Sky is the limit. You could write your own paycheck every month
but there seems to be some sort of
Misconception should I say or some
apprehensions that people feel about
This this career being a life insurance agent. Like I said, you know there are apprehensions about most sales jobs
Most people especially have seen this amongst
Postgraduate students whether they are CA's or MBAs and you know they feel that a cabin is going to be waiting for them
But there are people who love doing Agency because you are your own boss you write your own paycheck
You work timings which are convenient to you, there is a lot of flexibility in the job, and there's no ceiling of the money you can earn
So there is a negative perception about sales, but that's true for sales
Not for agency alone. Probably more so for insurance because insurance is more of a push producti
They feel that you know, it's the best way to lose friends
You know we all need insurance.
So but it's probably the perception that it needs to be stuffed down people's throat
And we need to con people, it's not so. You know there's a saying in
insurances
There is no wife, who thinks that her husband needs insurance
and there's no widow who thinks husband had enough insurance
Hmm
That just tells you, that insurance. It's probably got the value of sand when you sell it to a persons and you feel that you
he is doing you a favor, but actually you are doing him a favor. Coz when the event does happen
Normally he would wish that he had more insurance
there are so many cases we have in our company where we settle claims of people between the age of 35 or 40
and they have young families single earners, and that's when you realize the
impact
Insurance makes on people's lives. Now looking at an employee within the company a sales function, a fresh graduate
So in that case you said in an agency could be he or she could be 12th pass
that is the minimum. But for being an employee in the sales function in your company
What would be the minimum qualifications ? At least a graduation. You know I
something I interview in my earlier role I used to interview people
I used to know the guy is right, but the way he shook my hand
[wow]
What should come across is a lot of passion, a lot of energy and enthusiasm for sales
Because there is nothing else Chetna, to look for in a graduate, except which college he went to and how much he
Scored in his finally year, which really does count it's not an indicator, right. Tell me once they join you what is the future career path
They can expect. Okay, so there are lot of stories of people here who've
started at a sales level a
graduate, post graduate or probably graduate with two or three years of work experience, and they've gone on to
mid management or senior management levels and different functions functions like product, marketing strategy or
Digital, HR
These are functions
They could branch out into. Some of them have worked in all five functions
Over the period of the last 15 years and having begun the career in sales and
not equipped and not armed with any fancy degree from any fancy college but just the passion to learn
The passion to contribute to the company. So Vighnesh we figured being in sales with you require a minimum
Qualification of a graduate and a whole lot of passion now let's look at people who probably don't want to be in sales
But want to be associated with this growing industry of insurance
what are the kinds of roles available to them and what could be the
Qualifications that they need for those. Ya, so for the non sales roles Chetna, we're a little more stringent in terms of qualification or work ex
We won't take a fresh graduate into a non sales roles like compliance or risk or finance
or investment
But we look for CA's
We look for CFA's, we look for ICWA's , or we could look at some MBA's also
But having said that like I said a lot of people have
graduated shown a whole
load of truckloads of attitude and passion
[and done well and they've not been armed with CA's or MBA's
So there is the way you can grow without all of that absolutely
But let's look at say an actuary, wnad what kind of ... actuarial is a little different
Actually you need a flair for mathematics and statistics, these are the guys who price products and make assumptions on mortality and death
So to be an actuary you need to do 15 exams. The quickest
One who's been
Done these 15 exams was in seven or eight years
But the good news is that you could start appearing for these exams in college
After you pass 15 exams, You become an appointed actuary
And that's stardom. That's interesting. So seven or eight years or a little bit more than that
But you can start right after your twelfth standard and a huge flair for Maths and statistics. And there is a lot of demand for actuaries
Yes, not only with us, but also with health insurance companies, life companies, even overseas
And the Actuary is the highest paid employee of insurance company, sure sure the appointed actuary
Now let's look at the CA's and CFA's who are joining you. What are the kinds of roles they can expect? We look for roles in finance
Risk, which is extremely critical department of Insurance company
audit
These are three functions. We would definitely look at a CA or a CFA. Probably in investments,
because CA's to my mind come with a lot of
ability to go indepth
So Vighnesh, tell us you've been here for a while in this industry tell us about that one moment
Where you actually felt thankful that you were here. To help
These guys get a perspective of what happens to a sales guy, how difficult life is as the field I
Told them to sell a policy to their best friend or relative or parent and come back,
and not
even 15% of them could do it even to their best friend. The best friend was buying policies from somewhere
So I said, that's exactly how tough it is. So you ought to eat what you cook. So you buy a policy from us
You buy a policy from us. Yeah, So you understand, And we had this online
economical term product which was no fuss and
two months after this
There was this employee, a colleague of mine, 32 years of age, just married for two years
Nonsmoker non-drinker
slim
Vegetarian oh my God who had a sudden heart attack and expired
And he had bought this policy for 60 lakhs because I told everybody if you can't sell, you need to buy a policy of 60 lakhs
His wife didn't know it
We knew he had taken this policy becuase
He bought it through us so I got the claim check out and went and presented it to his wife and she had tears in her eyes
Sure it's such a big thing. You know if I had spoken to her two months back and said that you know
Rahul, you know you should buy a policy for Rahul because you know God forbid something happens and she would have felt offended
No he's 32
How can you say this to 32 years fit guy who doesn't smoke and doesn't drink
But the day I gave her the check I'm sure the first thought that
First thought was obviously a lot of gratitude and a lot of happiness, but somewhere she would have thought that I wish Rahul
had taken a policy twice as big. So that's the power of insurance and this happens all the time
It's a myth that the expectancy in India 65 or 70 or whatever number you can throw
But there's a lot of people between 35 and 45 because of the stressful life people lead in metros
who are
Dying of heart attacks and who have young families and they are the sole breadwinners, they have loans to pay and that's where insurance steps in
No, absolutely
I think this puts the whole thing in perspective
That we are not only working for a good paycheck like you said we can write on our own, but we're genuinely
And that's why I said that
Yeah, you need to be selected by God to sell insurance because you're impacting lives
You are so you'll be true and honest to your profession work hard and God will reward you
So tell us before we wrap the show just to put some numbers in perspective
So a few numbers that I read was that they're roughly about 2 million
agents today
Selling life insurance, there were 3 million about five years so there has been this attrition of agents. It's going to pick up again and
Roughly say a
2 to 3 lakh
employees yes
So what what are the kind of numbers that you?
Have within your. So we have about 8,000 to 10,000 agents who are tied with us
I spoke to you about having different
sales channels, so we have about a 1000 - 1200 people or 1100 people in the other sales channels which are
online, group, broking, Bank bancassurance which is about 75% of that for two banks
Or 800 people
in al the other departments, we spoke about. So those are large numbers, and growing, yes
So for all of you out there. You've got job opportunities
We've laid out the path for you, so wish you luck with your future, and thank you Vighnesh so much for sharing this resources
Thank you
Thank you
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