When Daisy Yao, ChFC, ASEP, was a new manager and recruiting advisors, she looked for specific traits in each candidate — drive, a hunger to succeed, likeability. Now a senior director at Great Eastern Financial Advisers in Singapore, Yao has learned that one characteristic is more indicative of success than any of the others: coachability.
“When I was younger in management, I used to look for things that were more obvious,” Yao said. “One of the first factors that I thought was a good gauge was whether they were likable. Did I trust them? Did I want to do business with them?”
Those factors are still important to Yao, but she considers them the basics to hire someone. Over the years, she has found even the most eloquent and charismatic candidate will fail if they’re not coachable. “The person has to be open to unlearn and relearn,” she said.
It’s more difficult for the brain of a person over 25 to make new connections, Yao said. Recruits who are older than that often need to unlearn the things they have been taught and start working a different way.
“For advisors who are maybe in their late 30s or early 40s, I realize it’s a little bit harder,” she said. “You can still do it, but it’s hard to unlearn things because your brain has become hard wired that way. We choose the path of least resistance and we’ve gotten used to doing things one way.”
Agency leader Lim Ren En, CFP, agrees with Yao. “After recruiting over 100 agents and failing a fair bit, coachability is the No. 1 thing you have to look at,” said Ren En, who leads the Gratitude Corporate Agency of AIA in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. “I’ve recruited managers and directors who come into the business with spectacular spheres of influence, spectacular drive, eloquent, but they’re not willing to learn the business.”
The new advisors don’t always have to be coached by the leader themselves; it may be helpful to recruit another MDRT member if you’re struggling to make the connection, said Ren En, himself an MDRT member.
“But if they’re saying after two or three weeks that it’s just too hard and they give up, that is sad, but we let them go,” Ren En said. “But if a person is coachable, it doesn’t matter what background they’re coming from. As long as they’re willing to learn, willing to put in the hard work and willing to sacrifice, they will make it in this business.”
Contact:
Daisy Yao daisyyao@advisorsclique.com.sg
Lim Ren En limrenen@gmail.com
