The Era of Discovery

2008

January

Turning the clock to 2008, fresh out of university I started a company. Back then, it was a corporate team-building company wherein we would organise outdoor team building activities along with corporate training for companies. This included activities like how to set up, how to build a camp, kayaking and whitewater rafting. Back then, the concept of team building was relatively new. More and more companies were beginning to fork out money for talent retention as well as improving team chemistry.

Whilst I was doing that, I was also taking on consultation for manufacturing projects. Another achievement, amongst others that I was rather proud of, is that I managed to cut down a manufacturing process on operations from 25 hours to just 1 hour.

2009

July

Over the years, I had people approach me asking if I had ever considered a career in insurance. It wasn’t something that I initially saw myself doing but I have always been open to new experiences that lead to learning opportunities. So, I said yes. My thought process at the time was quite simple, I study quite a bit and I have the “book smarts”. However, in business, which is what I have always wanted to be in, it's not enough to just be book smart, you also need to have the “street smarts”.

After spending a significant amount of time in Singapore and later in the UK, the influence and environment I had known was considerably different in contrast to Malaysia, which is why I have never felt ‘normal’ in Malaysia. The fact that I haven’t felt very normal under Malaysian standards, I believe was a big disadvantage for me. My objective at the time was to learn, which then contributed to my decision to go into sales. If you want to do sales, it is said that insurance sales is the toughest to do and so I did insurance sales.

Within just the first month as an insurance agent, I managed to qualify for the Million Dollar Round Table (MDRT), an international award that is awarded to the top 1% of the financial planning industry in the world. Worldwide, only 40,000 to 50,000 people achieve it, with 12 months to qualify for it. I managed to do it in just one month. At the end of December, I was officially recognized for the MDRT Award. At 24 years old, having made sales that entitled me to a significant amount of money, in just a month, it didn’t seem like much of a challenge. Another achievement unlocked; time to move on to the next big thing.

2009

September

A month after qualifying for the MDRT, I decided to take a break and travel. While still working on my Corporate Team Building Company, I travelled through Europe and China for the next couple of months.

2010

June

At the end of May, my unit manager at the time told me to come back and once again qualify for an MDRT in one month to prove it wasn’t just a fluke. Always up for a good challenge, on the 29th of May, I rejoined and started working on it. This time I did it exclusively through cold calls and once again managed to qualify for the MDRT in just one month.

On the 21st of June, 2010, I made the submissions and on the 23rd of June, 2010 it was approved. At the end of the financial year, 30th June, 2010, out of over 10,000 agents at Hong Leong Assurance, I managed to secure the position of 2nd runner-up, only working 2 months, while there were people who had worked 12 months. I felt as happy as that kid that studied right before an exam and got an A.

For this financial year, I won a couple of awards, I was 2nd runner-up as an overall agent, 1st runner-up as a rookie agent, President Club award, National Association of Malaysian Life Insurance and Financial Advisors (NAMLIFA) award and a few more awards.

2010

July

At the end of June 2010, my unit manager suggested I try for a fast-track promotion to become unit manager in July of 2011, which was viable due to my academic background in finance. My unit manager at the time was one of the top 5 unit managers in Hong Leong Assurance. His team did 1.8 million sales on new premium and I achieved half of those team sales. I was one person that had worked 2 months and he was already top 5. Despite the insurance industry being a fairly matured industry, I felt that maybe they aren’t quite doing it the right way. So, I told him I would go for the fast-track promotion to be promoted in July 2011, but in the meantime I wanted to train to be a unit manager, so I offered to take over his team's recruitment as well as sales training. I was lucky that he allowed me to run and implement my many 'crazy' ideas.

My logic at the time was simple, “people pay you to learn”, that’s what my father always used to tell me. If you look at it from the point of view where you think people pay you to do work, you will feel obliged to complete work, because that’s what you’re being paid to do. However, if you shift your perspective and start thinking of it as people paying you to learn, you are bound to be a lot happier because you're winning in every way. Not only will the money be rolling in but you will also be gaining in terms of knowledge.

That is why I was thrilled to be allowed to lead my unit manager’s team without compensation, as for me it was an opportunity to practice and ultimately be better equipped for when I become unit manager.

Through that period, I innovated a lot of systems and practices. Completely reinventing the culture of the whole team, I implemented a modular system, hired only full-timers as well as created a cold call system. From July of 2010 when i started running the team until June of 2011 the team did over 10 million in sales.

2011

July

In January of 2011, six months before my promotion, I started my own office and hired a personal assistant. I did this six months before my promotion because I wanted to learn the ropes of running an office, in order to avoid slips and errors that may eventually occur. I also wanted my personal assistant to be thoroughly trained, before I officially became unit manager. In Hong Leong Assurance, after you reach a certain rank, you are allowed to start your own company, which is how LKK Wealth Management came to be.

2012

June

At the end of the financial year of June 2012, my team submitted over 14 million in sales, out of which over 12 million got approved in time for the financial year. It was recognised as the nationwide record in insurance sales. At the time, I only had 27 agents, while the last person to break the record had over 200 agents, so we made quite a name for ourselves. At this point, I had another achievement unlocked and it was time to move on to the next big thing.

2012

July

Breaking national records at such a young age, I started gaining a lot of publicity. In June of 2012, due to multiple mainstream interviews, I was approached by private equity companies, investment companies, property development companies, unit trust companies and so on. The reason for this was quite simple: I had managed to gather a database, a highly-trained sales force and a strong management system.

I signed the highest level partnership agreement with Hwang Investment Bank to sell their unit trust. I further signed an agreement with Kenanga Investment Bank to carry their stock brokering product.

I signed on with a few property developers as well. We did property projects for them, such as marketing, sales and events that even extended to foreign tours. The tours were set up all across Asia, from cities like Singapore, Jakarta to Hong Kong. In these projects we would handle everything from A to Z, wherein we would send out a sales team to go to hotels and set up conventions. We further took care of the invitations, models of the properties, brochures amongst a couple of other things. Through these projects we would earn hefty commissions.

Taking a step further, I signed a deal with OCBC bank to do their mortgage loans. When I sold a property, as a one-stop solution for our clients, we would handle their mortgage loans. Working with favoured law firms, through establishing solid relationships, we were able to streamline the process and exponentially reduce hassle for our clients. So basically, after selling a property, as a value added service we would help our clients do their mortgage loans through a friendly panel law firm.