When Yuman Chan touched down at Chek Lap Kok in mid-2015, the circumstances could hardly have been more different from his first encounter with the city.
He was back to take on a senior role with insurance firm Cigna Hong Kong, in charge of strategy and international markets and ready to draw on the experience of more than 20 years in the sector.
Chan was keen to take on the challenge of providing more personalised insurance products, offering tailor-made medical cover for different stages of life, and to promote the concept of timely preventive care and generally healthier lifestyles.
“I’m very passionate about making a positive difference in people’s lives and in the broader community,” says Chan, now CEO and country manager of Cigna Hong Kong. “It’s a forcing mission, and being in the health services side opened my eyes to that. I saw that insurance in Hong Kong has a high penetration rate, but the preventive piece and offering the right solutions for individual private medical protection still has a way to go.”
Back in 1979, though, as a five-year-old from rural China on the way to a new life in the United States, arriving in Hong Kong was simply bewildering.
As the youngest of three, Chan had been born into a farming family near Toishan, a couple of hours southwest of Guangzhou, and the images and impressions from those early days remain vivid.
“I remember very clearly the area where we dried rice and my grandfather telling us to walk over it in straight lines to help the process,” he says. “My grandmother had already gone to America with the help of other relatives. My father and brother went next, and the rest of us followed on two or three years later.”
The train journey to Hong Kong was followed by several months living in cramped quarters in Wan Chai, as his mother tried to sort out tickets and paperwork. And, after that, came a leap into the unknown.
“It was a big change for us, moving from a world of paddy fields and farmers to Brooklyn, New York, unable to speak any English,” he says. “My father washed dishes before becoming a chef and my mother trained as a seamstress. Their immediate goal was ‘survival’, but they always talked about having a can-do attitude and I saw how hard they worked to give us a better life. That motivation and drive allowed me to seize opportunities when they came along later.”
The first such occasion was the early weeks at school. Aged six, Chan was scared and confused, unable to tell the teacher what he did not understand. He resolved, though, to observe and follow and quickly realised that knowing the ABC and the related sounds was going to be important.
“I took that very seriously and was determined to learn more and go faster,” he says. “Also, my brother and sister were a big help in explaining things and telling the teacher if I had problems.”
Subsequently, at Fort Hamilton High School, Chan discovered a special interest in finance. It sprang from lessons on the concept of supply and demand, which “just clicked”, and led to an invitation to join the National Academy of Finance. This organisation, backed by some of the big names on Wall Street, was designed to give youngsters classes and internships to help them understand the industry, as well as practical advice on how to conduct themselves in the business world.
“Thanks to that, I was on the trading floor as a 15-year-old summer intern, paid to set up computers for traders and install new PCs, which were quite expensive at the time,” Chan says. “It was a pretty intensive environment, but I enjoyed it. I was taught the basics by the person who became my mentor, and then started going in on Friday afternoons and weekends to update the systems and troubleshoot.”
When his mentor moved to insurance giant AIG, the ties continued, right through Chan’s four years studying management information systems at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. And, on graduation in 1995, he took up a full-time role with AIG, going on to spend, all told, 21 years with the firm.
Starting in credit risk management, he built systems to understand credit exposure to different companies and was determined to be not just a technical expert, but someone trained and trusted to work in other parts of the business.
Stints followed in operational risk and, for 18 months, as head of enterprise risk management in Japan. Next came a spell in Hong Kong, in the aftermath of 2008’s financial crisis, to work on the public listing of AIA, a necessary measure to keep the then-parent company on a firm footing.
A return to the US in 2011 brought further experience in IT risk, security and compliance at a time when all sorts of new regulations were coming in. And though the later role of CIO for global finance centres offered plenty of scope, it also sparked a new outlook.
“As an organisation, AIG had gone through a tremendous amount of change and become a different company,” Chan says. “All the long-term stock things were no longer there to keep me, so it seemed the right time to move on.”
Joining Cigna Hong Kong provided brand-new challenges, highlighting the need for preventive care, driving healthier lifestyles, and creating tailored insurance programmes for employers. It was also a chance to foster a distinctive environment and culture.
“Senior leaders have to understand their teams, inspire people to do the right thing, and remember that loyalty is built on purpose and values.”
With two young children, family time is a priority, but Chan has one longer-term dream.
“I would love to retire one day in a place where I could grow my own vegetables,” he says. “That might be Sausalito in California.”
