How do you get 800 people to love selling a product that is boring?

追加: 2026-05-10

[00:00:07][music] >> How do you build a team that is genuinely happy and loves doing what they're doing and selling insurance?

[00:00:16]What's the secret behind that? Let me first be very honest. I don't think everybody is going to be happy selling insurance. So, there's two parts to it, right?

[00:00:26]I think you have to look at the kind of people that we generally hire.

[00:00:30]And these are people who have never done sales, probably have no work experience, but are generally smart, well-spoken, you know, young folks, right? And when you hire such people, they come with a, you know, boatload of ambition. They they want to grow and and this is perhaps not something they want to do for the rest of their lives. Let's be honest. It's it's insurance, like you said, it's not very sexy.

[00:00:52]>> Yeah. Um, and if you'd asked me maybe 4 years ago, I would have said the same thing, man. I I don't think I want to want to be selling insurance for my, you know, for the entirety of my career. So, so there's there's two ways this can go, right? You have a group of people who come here who really appreciate um that, oh, actually, you know what? There's there's something here, right? Um, there's a certain degree of freedom in the way that you choose to sell. There's no pressure in the same way that other organizations set targets, etc. Um, that doesn't mean it's com- you know, it's not competitive. It is competitive. It is you still there's an expectation to sell, um, still to, you know, explain insurance well. Um, but but but the challenging aspect can be fun, so to speak, right? And and these folks would probably end up doing this a couple years and naturally feel like, hey, man, I could do a lot more, right?

[00:01:43]>> Okay.

[00:01:43]And they have the ability to do a lot more. And and these people will find opportunities then to succeed at Ditto and you're right. And they'll probably feel like hey, like this this is a good place to work. This is something that I like doing because nobody's sort of forcing me to sell insurance to people who don't want a certain product, right?

[00:02:03]We're valuing customers' autonomy, etc. And then there's there's a second kind who'll quickly realize that, you know what, this is probably not what I want to do, right? This is probably not something that that I really want to achieve. So So, to be honest with you, I think I don't think everybody here comes, you know, with the expectation that, "Hey, I I love, you know, insurance." Yeah. And then walk away thinking, "I still love insurance."

[00:02:28]But but what you'll probably gain is is for your first job, if this is your first job, you'll see naturally that there's there's there's a better way to sell.

[00:02:37]And I think that experience can come in extremely handy even if you don't end up loving insurance after your stint here.

[00:02:44]So, I think what you would when you said happiness, right? It's a lot that comes from also contentment factor, like, you know.

[00:02:52]Initially, I know a lot of folks who joined, obviously at that point of time we were starting up, etc. But this no spam and the kind of advisory model was very new at that point of time. A lot of those folks also who joined, they didn't know what to do.

[00:03:05]A lot of them, if you ask, they were planning to leave. After 6 months, they had some plan. They don't know what to do. They don't know anything. But they felt that, "Okay, we have been given leads. We have been given customer, but we are not asking to, you know, missell or let's say we are not telling them to, 'Okay, just push for sales. Why did you No, nothing. Just talk to them, give them right advice, and they will buy themselves.'" So, for them, as Faith was suggesting, right? It was a new experience altogether.

[00:03:28]And a lot of these people uh you can say their perspective changed towards sales or if you can say advisory. And they realized that this is a company that is actually trying to do right thing by the people, you know, trying to actually be true, you know, they're not trying to missell. And all those people who joined us, they inherently believe they don't want do anything wrong, you know, push anything.

[00:03:55]So, inherently a lot of their character is like that and they want to be with a company which at least not do anything wrong. So, a lot of these people who are happy and sticking as somebody obviously would not like to do for forever insurance, but a lot of them sticking and happy just because they're not doing a wrong thing here. Fair enough, but if I take one step back, right? And the reason why I'm asking this question is obviously one of the biggest hurdles that a founder faces is building that strong right? Who actually wants to do what they're doing, right?

[00:04:24]How do you hire for intent in a business like yours, right? You spoke about how once they hear and you sell that no spam and all of it, but how are you getting that first thing off the block and hiring for intent and making sure people are here? So, see I will tell you the live experience that we faced together. So, initially when we were hiring for our advisors, first few bunch of advisors, we had zero clue how to hire them. Just heard some some forwarded resumes, some forwarded on we forwarded on Naukri, etc. Some leads we got. We directly talked to them.

[00:04:54]Some of them we felt, you know, okay, just by conversation you felt initial five six folks I'm telling, "Okay, why do you want to join?" Obviously they don't have no much not much idea, but >> through word of mouth? But some few word of mouth, some we floated uh some Naukri, etc. here and there and uh initially we just took a technical round whether they're smart enough also to read a policy document and tell us what's there. That was the first filter that you have to do. Otherwise you can't. Second of course is just a genuine conversation like in my our case me and Manu used to get a final round.

[00:05:23]For all the advisor till the time who has joined till 500 500 advisor. We personally hired till the final round.

[00:05:29]And we have 800 advisors. Yeah, now 800.

[00:05:31]So, we did that 500 and we used to just ask finally that why do you want to join?

[00:05:37]What do you think what what you're going to do? How's your family? You know, just a normal conversation, you know, just a white check you can say.

[00:05:43]>> Yeah. And intuitively you get a a feeling that okay, you know, some people try to be you know, just something they they're trying to just be something else. You just figure out and it's just So, final round check where always with the founders reserved. We never tried till 5 600 also, we never tried to, you know, delegate that stuff. Mhm. And that made us for sure that this person I have hired or we have hired and I hired for a certain reason. You you get that check.

[00:06:09]You know, and there is no such you know, I can give you the technical question that okay, you should ask how's your family or no, nothing. Just a casual conversation that me and you are having and I get a feeling okay, yeah, Nitin is something like this. Okay, he's fine.

[00:06:19]You get a vibe check. So, that one filter worked really well for us. We did this thoroughly for till 500 advisors.

[00:06:25]We didn't leave anyone till now. Now it's obviously delegated, but those people now who are they are taking our trend by us. Right.

[00:06:32]So, that is very very important. A lot of people think after 100 I would just No, I don't think so that works. And you mentioned that after 2 years they might rethink where they are, right? So, do you have a typical career path because you also mentioned people who are extremely smart, articulate, and all of it, right? Most of them don't want to do a sales job. Forget insurance sales.

[00:06:51]They don't want to do sales itself, right? Um how are you then ensuring that one you're getting those kind of people and after 2 years there is a path forward for them? Like do you have like a structure that you have built? And how is that structure walled?

[00:07:05]Is it something trial and error?

[00:07:06]>> I'll just give you an example. This is a problem and challenge that we right now have started discussing more often.

[00:07:12]Okay. Because what happens as we double the scale, Mhm. you need more managers.

[00:07:18]Yeah. So, what happens, the initial folks that have already learned things, they are able to teach others. Not all, but a lot of them. Mhm. So, most of them will be absorbed as a manager. So, for them it's a role change.

[00:07:31]They are So, it's a training manager. Uh you can say training manager, you can say operations manager, you can say sales manager. Okay. Which we call mentors as who will just train the existing new uh advisors who joined. Right. So, they are happy with the new role now. They are satisfied. So, now they they are lead time increase to two two three years more, right? Because they they are being allowed to do something new to manage folks. So, most of these guys who got bored were almost on the verge of getting bored till two years. Now, they got a another thing. For example, Samarth was here, right? He was an advisor. Two years he did and now he is a influencer marketing manager doing really good great job, you know? So, every two years as this company scales you need more managers. Mhm. So, the in-house advisors have become a source for us to create rather than hiring outside because if you hire outside it's very hard for them to teach the system first.

[00:08:17]>> Yeah. Right? These guys know the system.

[00:08:19]Right. So, yeah. That's the reason why most of them are still able to figure out and stick in the system. Rather than, you know, getting bored. Of course, boredom is the biggest enemy for any company, I feel. Yeah. More than our competitor, I feel the biggest enemy is boredom. Sure. But, is that a promise you can make as a growing startup saying that, "Listen, we'll hire you hire you as an insurance advisor." But, like you mentioned Samarth, he's gone into doing influencer marketing. Is that a promise you can make or >> No, there's such promise. It's just See, it it it it depends on you, right? How you've done, how you've fared, right?

[00:08:48]Not a lot of people will work out, right? They also know like if I am doing well, of course, the company would, you know, if I show some skills they would absorb Of course, it cannot be 100%.

[00:08:58]Some people leave also, right? They could be they were not able to fit in any role though they were they were smart. Maybe they were not able to fit.

[00:09:04]That promise it can't be it can't be blanket promise. So, a lot of other things we are figuring out now. If you ask me, we are thinking how to give guys who are now managers some leadership training to how to be a better manager, how to be a better leader. So, now we are at this stage.

[00:09:18]How to get a better manager which you obviously know the Tatas and etc. A lot of big corporates always, you know, schedule all these things. So, we have started realizing ki what else. So, building this in-house the leadership training is building you're building it in-house or you're getting external?

[00:09:30]Some we are figuring out. Every time the company scales, the problem changes. Sure.

[00:09:36]Initially, you were just figuring out how to sell. Yeah. Now, you're figuring out how to retain managers or train managers, how to upskill them. Mhm. So, yeah, I think this is evolving with company.