Tired of your eight-to-five job? Try selling insurance policies

Being an insurance salesman has taught me how to interact with people.

Photo | Shutterstock 

By  Ramsy Wanyama 

What you need to know:

• A lot of the men in suits are not as well-off as they look.
• Being an insurance salesman has taught me how to interact with people, accept rejection, and be persistent.

Financial advisor. A fancy term used to describe a person whose work primarily is to walk office to office, call uninterested individuals and try to convince them to take up an insurance policy.

As a newly recruited financial advisor at a multi-national insurance company, I have learned a lot from interacting with people from all walks of life.

My typical day begins at 5am. After looking at the mirror and calling myself a winner several times, I head to the shower — my second win of the day. The first is being able to see the new day.

Then comes breakfast and a long commute to the CBD while listening to morning radio shows or maybe an audiobook by Dale Carnegie — “How to win friends and influence others”.

After a motivating speech from our agency manager on how to believe in yourself and win more clients, we are done. Now it’s out to the streets. Go ye and get customers or, in the exact words of our manager, “Endeni mlete biashara (Go bring business)”.

Mental fatigue

That’s where the hard work begins. If you think mjengo (construction work) is hard, try convincing an absolute stranger to take their hard-earned money and buy an insurance policy.

Psychology has to be in place, engaging conversations must be brought up. Physical fatigue is bad but mental fatigue is even worse.

After a long day of internal tension and rejection and maybe getting a contact or two, my day is done and I make my way back home.

An actuarial science graduate, joining the insurance sales industry has helped me realise a lot of the men in suits are not as well-off as they look.

Many earn just a few thousands a month for their daily toil. 

But on the flip side, being an insurance salesman has taught me how to interact with people, accept rejection, and be persistent. I will always respect insurance salespersons.

Ramsy Wanyama, 20, an actuarial science graduate, works for a leading insurance company in Nairobi.

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