How this young Macaulay Club topnotcher reached the top

There are many ways to succeed, but for Owdylyn L. Lee, who at 27 is the Macaulay Club topnotcher, it paid to start early.

“I was in college when I decided to join Sun Life,” she shares, “I decided to do so because I saw the freedom it gave to my mother, Susan Lee, and sister, Zzlleenn Lee.” Both women were already successful Sun Life financial advisors.

It was a Sun Life trip to Brazil with her mother that convinced Lee to go on the same path, even if she was already pursuing a career in law. “I told my mom that I wanted to join Sun Life because I saw what it had done for our lives and I wanted to have a similar way of life,” she adds, “And I wanted to start earning money while still in college.”

After Lee made up her mind, there was no looking back. Seven years later, she finds herself at the top.

It was not an easy climb, especially because she started so young. First, she had to balance her academic and extracurricular activities with Sun Life work. “The transition was difficult, because of the learning curve. I had to open myself up and push myself to be less shy and see the importance of insurance,” she explains. “It really did not help that I was so young. No one would believe a 20-year-old on the importance of insurance because for them, what does a 20-year-old know about the difficulties of life? So the best I could do was to help inform my peers and people I already knew.”

What helped was that Lee was working with mother and sister, who were also her mentors. “I had to ask help from my branch manager and unit manager to understand what I was doing wrong,” she says, “They’re my sister and mother respectively.”

What was it like working with family? “Patience is key,” Lee reflects, remembering that, being young, she initially believed she could learn everything her way by simply reading the necessary documents. “It was a difficult relationship at the beginning. But later on, I realized that experience is the best teacher. No matter what I read, it will never beat the experience that my mentors had. And it is their sharing of their experience that I got to learn how to deal with my frustrations and valuable tips on closing a big sale. Again, I had to learn to be patient.”

Lee attributes her success to her family--specifically her upbringing. “Our family has always had a go-getter attitude. We were raised to have to know everything and to learn everything,” she says. “It was difficult and sometimes it got very frustrating, but I realize now that this is what gave me the drive and ambition to do more and be more. It was the ability to deal with so many things happening and handle an incredible amount of stress that allowed us to juggle so many things at a time.”

Lee sums up her work ethic as a Sun Life financial advisor with this simple line: “If you can do it now, just do it.” We lose so many opportunities by waiting, she adds, or we tend to forget and let the opportunity pass and then it is too late.

To other financial advisors who want to achieve the same level of success, Lee stresses the need to stay in a positive space. “Keep your spirits up,” she says. “I found it very difficult to work whenever I felt down with my surroundings. I think trying to keep a positive attitude or trying to see the good with what you have helps in pushing you to have what you want in life.

Owdylyn Lee is a President of the 2020 - 2021 Macaulay Club.
For more information and inquiries, visit the Sun Life website at https://www.sunlife.com.ph/en/