Goth girl at heart Annaliese Lincoln, insurance protection adviser at Cura Financial Services (pictured), speaks to Health & Protection about overcoming self doubt, taking inspiration from Cura MDs Alan and Kathryn Knowles and why lacking prior experience should not be a barrier to entering the protection sector.
How did you get your start in the sector?
I was looking for a new challenge, something completely different to my previous employment that I could really get stuck into and carve out a career in while making a difference and helping people.
I applied for the role in the hope I would be considered, Alan and Kathryn gave me the opportunity and I have been here over three years now and not looked back.
What do you enjoy most about your current role?
I love speaking with clients; really getting to know them on a personal level and finding suitable cover for their needs.
Clients who come to us sometimes feel they won’t be able to obtain insurance due to complex medical disclosures so knowing I can help and put their minds at ease is really rewarding.
It’s a really good feeling to make such a difference to someone and their family to know they are financially protected should the worst happen, as we understand the impact it has when people can’t get insurance.
Who is your role model – in life or in work?
In work, I would say Alan and Kathryn as they have so much knowledge on the products we offer and have made such a big difference within the insurance industry fighting for clients to have better access to available policies.
In my personal life, I admire my mum and dad a lot. They always know what to say and offer the best advice. They have helped me through challenging times and I will be forever grateful.
In particular, my mum was running her own successful business while raising me and my sister. She also looked after the house and my dad who became ill when I was a teenager.
If I am able to do half of what she did and continues to do for our family, I will be proud of what I have accomplished.
What advice would you give to people thinking about a career in the sector?
Don’t be put off thinking you have to have previous experience or knowledge within the industry.
I had no prior experience of working in insurance when I came to Cura, but with the training provided to me and a willingness to learn, I have been successful in passing my exams and becoming an adviser.
I have also attended national insurance events, featured in articles about my journey in becoming an adviser and developed a career I can be proud of.
What has been your biggest setback and how did you overcome it?
Doubting myself. From when I first started this job until probably only in the last year or so have I felt my confidence grow.
I went from having a job I knew everything there was to know about it, to starting a new job with barely any knowledge about the industry and it was really difficult not to doubt myself in the work I was doing.
I think changing jobs to a completely new industry can feel like a setback as well as a step forward sometimes as you’re starting out from scratch, learning the basics of something completely new.
I knew I had the right intentions for the clients but I wasn’t used to having to double check my work against supporting documents available to me or asking my colleagues for help, as I didn’t have in-depth knowledge about the products at the start of my adviser journey and that was the hard part.
Just when I felt like I understood the basics of the products we were offering and had got the hang of things, there were the more complex details to learn and each insurer did things slightly differently, using slightly different terminology which was a minefield to learn at times.
It would have been the easier route to give up and say this isn’t for me but I had to overcome it and push through with my studying and exams.
Even after passing my exams, I still doubted myself a lot when I had to then put my learning into practice.
I would always be checking things with our compliance department as well as my colleagues as I wanted to ensure I was always doing what was best for my clients. And usually, what I was doing was right, I just didn’t believe in myself.
Through time, my experience grew and that was the biggest confidence booster.
Laugh or cry – what did your most memorable client or case make you want to do and why?
I have a client who is currently living with HIV and chronic hepatitis B and trying to obtain life insurance for them was challenging.
Very few insurers could consider an application at all and the ones that could had a maximum term for a policy of 25 years which was shorter than what the client needed.
Other brokers had previously confirmed to my client that the 25 year term was all that was available.
Through extensive research, I was able to secure a policy with an insurer who had recently extended the maximum term on their policies for customers with these conditions, meaning their full mortgage liability could now be covered.
Due to previous experience, my client was sceptical of the cover I had found for them as no one else had been able to help so far.
I reassured them this wasn’t too good to be true and they put their trust in me to complete the application.
When the cover was then offered, the joy and relief the client expressed made me realise just how important it is for us as advisers to be doing our research fully and accurately.
It also resonated with me that the insurance industry is one where changes happen often and just because something couldn’t be done before, doesn’t mean we won’t be able to help in the future.
It’s scary to think that had this client not come to me, they may have ended up with cover that didn’t fully meet their needs.
This made me determined that what I was doing as an adviser was the best way to conduct myself for my clients and get the best possible outcome for them.
What’s your ultimate goal for your career?
To make a difference within the industry for clients who struggle to get cover by having the knowledge to help people have more access to protection policies.
As people are living longer and recovering from illnesses quicker it’s important to continue to fight for people where modern treatment is changing the outcomes of people’s diagnoses so that they can access insurance that they previously may have been unable to.
How would your boss describe you?
Like a sponge; I am always ready to soak up new information, building my knowledge and, in turn, becoming the best adviser I can be for my clients.
What’s your biggest talent away from work?
I can play the guitar- only just but I’m still counting it.
What mantra do you live by?
Worrying won’t stop the bad stuff from happening, it just takes away today’s peace and happiness.
What song would you regard as your theme tune?
The Addams Family theme tune- I am a goth girl at heart and would say my family are hands down mysterious and spooky, and all together ooky.
