From Single Mom To ‘Legendary’ Advisor — With Robelynn Abadie

Robelynn Abadie walked away from an abusive first husband with nothing. No home, no car, no money and no job.

She did have two toddlers — daughter Melissa and son Jason. To say the future looked bleak would be underselling bleakness.

“I was a train wreck,” Abadie recalled.

Opportunity didn’t exactly knock at Abadie’s door — more like it waved at her from a distance. But that was enough of a lifeline to pull her into the insurance business.

From there, grit and determination took hold. A single mother working to sell insurance and benefits in Louisiana had to work hard during the 1970s. Abadie had to both work hard and work efficiently.

“I was told repeatedly that I would not make it if I didn’t work at night,” she said. “It was the best time for traditional sales to families. But I couldn’t. I had two children under the age of 5, and it was difficult enough to pay for daytime child care, much less leave them at night with sitters.”

Abadie found mentors, joined trade associations and thrived at serving clients for four decades. Last year, she was named recipient of the 80th annual John Newton Russell Memorial Award, presented by the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors. She is only the second woman to win the award and the first since 1978.

“Robelynn stood out from the many qualified candidates the committee considered for her astounding professional achievement and leadership,” said Keith Gillies, chairman of the 2021 award committee. “A highly respected speaker, thought leader and innovator, she is an inspiration and shining example for every professional in the insurance and financial services industry.”

A Work Friend

Abadie traces her pathway to financial services to a brief job she held in the real estate division of a Louisiana bank.

After marriage to her high school sweetheart dissolved, Abadie knew that she needed a career plan to provide for her children. Years spent studying to become a concert pianist represented her only education and her only skill.

But Abadie remembered a woman she befriended at the bank. The woman had moved on to work for a marketing company that sold nothing but cancer insurance policies, Abadie recalled.

“She said, ‘Look, come ride with me and see what I do; I have more business than I can handle,’” Abadie said. “It was at a time when meetings were mandatory. And these were state agencies and school boards.”

The owner was a former client of the bank and hired Abadie “basically on the spot.” She obtained an insurance license and sold cancer policies for nine months.

“It wasn’t any great plan or big dream or anything like that,” Abadie said of her career choices. “It was just a series of referrals and actions that led me there.”

With a warm personality, punctuated by a lot of Southern charm, and a willingness to do the work, Abadie thrived right away. After nine months, she was recruited to Southwestern Life of Dallas, Texas.

Abadie’s stay at Southwestern was not long either, as the company was bought out in 1980. But she learned more about the business at each job.

“During those nine months at that little cancer company, they taught me all about mass marketing,” she said. “And Southwestern was one of the first companies that actually came out with a mass-marketed universal life product. I understood the concept of doing that. So, it was just learning products and getting out to see clients.”

On Her Own

After Tenneco bought Southwestern Life, Abadie decided to become her own boss. She very quickly learned about all the products she didn’t yet sell — like disability and dental insurance. In fact, benefits sold so well, Abadie remade herself as a benefits advisor while still selling life insurance.

“I learned how to do multiple products from one company and actually design an entire benefit plan for them,” she explained. “My company started getting larger as my referral base got stronger. And then it led me all the way to companies in my market that were really huge, with 1,000 to 1,500 members.”

One thing stood out very early in Abadie’s career: There were not a lot of female role models to learn from and grow with. That there are many such groups today is part of Abadie’s legacy.

She joined the National Association of Life Underwriters — the forerunner of NAIFA — and she was a founding member of the Women Life Underwriters Conference in 1979.

In 1986, she chaired the first national women’s study group for insurance professionals, which continues today as an annual event. Abadie also chaired the development of a national mentoring program for female agents, “Friend to Friend,” copyrighted by WLUC and financially underwritten by several of the largest life insurance companies in the nation.

WLUC, now known as Women in Insurance and Financial Services, “provided me the opportunity to meet other women who helped me through some very tough times,” Abadie said during her John Newton Russell Award acceptance speech. “They gave me great hope and supported me when I thought my possibilities were limited.”

“Robelynn Abadie is a legendary figure in the insurance and financial services industry,” said NAIFA past president Tom Michel. “Robelynn has served and continues to serve as a champion for women in our industry. She is someone all of us can look up to.”

‘Steller Things’

Abadie later obtained her securities license and went on to become a life member of Million Dollar Round Table, qualifying for Top of the Table. She is a member of MDRT Excalibur Society, and in 2004 MDRT Foundation honored her as a Quality of Life Award recipient.
While the trade associations are down in members from those days, Abadie still views association participation as crucial to success. For example, she recalled what signing up for an MDRT phone-a-thon did for her career.

“I got to know the people there and I was invited back for a few years, and then I was invited onto committees,” she said. “Then from the committees, eventually I was selected to serve in leadership and I was on the board. Then I went up the chairs and became the president of the MDRT Foundation, which is just one of the most stellar things that I could have done in my career.”

But while volunteer service can be a good career move, it just comes naturally for Abadie. Following the Hurricane Katrina devastation in 2005, Abadie led an effort to build a $115,000 playground in the city of Baker, La., just outside Baton Rouge.

Abadie had met Sandy Cobden, executive director of Rosie O’Donnell’s ‘For All Kids Foundation” at a Federal Emergency Management Agency event and secured a $25,000 donation from the entertainer. But her powers of persuasion did not end there.

“O’Donnell came down and was at the groundbreaking ceremony and spent the day with us,” Abadie recalled. “So, it got a lot of press and a lot of recognition. But it was just a wonderful project.”

Along the way, Abadie Financial Services grew to include four employees in a 3,400-square-foot, lakefront office building Abadie bought in Baton Rouge.

Stepping Aside

Effective Jan. 1, 2021, after 43 years in the business, Abadie transitioned most of her clients to another firm. She retains a few clients, or, as she describes them, “just people that wouldn’t let me leave them. We may exchange an email or two every month, but that’s about it.”

Retirement means further involvement in the Baton Rouge community where she lives. Her efforts to promote women via the Women’s Council of Greater Baton Rouge began in 1999. Abadie remains heavily invested in the council's annual “Women: A Week-Long Celebration.”

“We have probably served maybe 40,000 women in the Baton Rouge area with this program,” Abadie said. “What we would do for the week is feature different women with businesses — they could be fitness or belly dancing instructors, there was just so much diversity. And we would have up to 60 or 70 workshops within a week.”

After about 15 years as a single mother, Abadie married Wayne Brackin. The pair had known one another growing up in Denham Springs, a small town on the outskirts of Baton Rouge.

“After 15 years of being single and working hard and doing the things that I needed to do and supporting my kids and all their activities, Wayne and I got married six months after we bumped into each other,” Abadie recalled. “We figured out this was meant to be, and it was surprising even to me.”

The couple had some tough times in the beginning blending five children into a family unit. They pressed on and celebrated their 30th anniversary on Valentine’s Day.

“We have six wonderful grandchildren, and all five of our kids are doing well,” Abadie said. “None of them came into the [financial services] business. Not a one. I really had hoped that they might do that. But they had other interests and pursued their own paths.”

Abadie was “shocked” when Gillies called her with the John Newton Russell Award news. John Henry Russell created the John Newton Russell Memorial Award in 1942 as a tribute to his father, an influential leader in the life insurance industry and an early advocate of agent education.

John Newton Russell served as NAIFA (then NALU) president from 1916 to 1917 and was a contributing founder of LIMRA International, The American College, and the Chartered Life Underwriter (CLU) designation.

“It was never on my mind, but I’m thrilled,” Abadie said, “because that award is so significant and so extraordinary. And it just envelops my entire career and everything that I’ve done.

InsuranceNewsNet Senior Editor John Hilton has covered business and other beats in more than 20 years of daily journalism. John may be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @INNJohnH.