Any actuaries on here?

[mincepy]

My DC is considering an actuarial career (it's between that and data science). He is currently studying statistics at uni. I'm wondering what technical tools actuaries use day to day in their work - is it specific actuarial software, or do you use similar analysis tools to data scientists, such as Python, R, advanced Excel.

Hopeful bump

Excel.

Depending on the type of actuarial work, specialist software designed for the task.

R and Python also used for data analytics and building tools for specific tasks.

This matches my experience.

The more senior you get the less technical the tools you use are.

At 20 years PQE I now spend more time producing presentations on PowerPoint than I do doing exciting technical stuff.

Thanks both. Good to know they use similar tools. DC has an actuarial internship lined up for next summer (penultimate year) but wants to make use his technical skills and also keep his options open.

What actuarial area is he looking at? They all have different cultures/level of technical expertise/potential earnings. I would recommend GI or investment as good options. GI particularly if he is also leaning towards data analytics as well.

Thanks. The internship is with an actuarial consultancy, so hopefully he'll get visibility of a few areas, to help him navigate the various options.

Thanks @ThisIsClearlyMe . He will need to check if he might be elligible for any of the route D exemptions. He won't be elligible for the others.

The company that has offered him the summer internship supports graduates along the road to qualification, with 1:1 coaching and time off for tutorials, so it seems attractive.

From what we have read online, actuaries claim to have a relatively good work-life-balance compared to many other finance professionals. Is that your experience? And was it your experience during the years you were training to qualify?

Yes - this is definitely true. More so if you work for a life company than a Consultancy.

The years where you are qualifying are tough - everyone gets fed up and wants to stop. (I always say that the difference between those who qualify and those who don’t is that those who qualify are far enough through when they get fed up that they can’t quite bring themselves to stop.)

But once qualified you can have a pretty nice life. I qualified at 25 (which is younger than average but nothing special), spent the second half of my 20s as an obsessed workaholic. Then I turned 30, had a baby and have worked part time ever since.

Two people report directly to me and both are part time. One has a young child but the other is a childless single man in his 40s who works part time because he wants to.

The work is intellectually interesting, the pay is decent and you are treated well because there is generally a shortage of actuaries.

But the exam years are pretty miserable.

More so if you work for a life company than a Consultancy.

Worth knowing. The consultancy does seem to embrace hybrid working, which is a plus.

Every actuarial employer will give study leave, pay for tutorials, exams etc

There is no work life balance when doing the exams. You are expected to work and study and that leaves very little time for anything else. The exams are very hard to pass but most people get there in the end.

As for the rest of the career - work life balance depends on the type of role you are in, your ambition etc.

The main downside I think is that you are pretty much limited to the insurance or pensions industry. For me that has never been an issue as I love insurance but i can see the attractions of a career in data science from this perspective.

Some insurance companies are fully remote. Think carefully about what balance of working from home and office would be best before choosing a company. Some trainees need a lot of face to face help to progress and really struggle working remotely. In our staff surveys the early career people want to be in the office more whereas people who are established are generally keen to be at home as much as possible. We’ve recruited people who struggled with fully remote roles previously. The option to work in the office when everyone else is at home isn’t helpful. To learn from them you need the other people to be in on a predictable basis.

But once qualified you can have a pretty nice life.

There is something comforting about seeing the route to qualification mapped out.

The data science route would be more meandering, with learning and training on the job (with some employers less generous with their training budgets than others), and requiring the self motivation to keep skills up to date in a rapidly evolving field. DH and I both meandered into our careers as "modern professionals" which worked out ok for us, so we can give DC our perspective on that. He just needs to choose with his eyes open. Hopefully the internship will help the decision.

Can you see the actuarial profession being automated by AI in future?

More so if you work for a life company than a Consultancy.

Now that I've read the employment contract (which contains terms that are generic for all employees) I can see that it's a 35 hour week, but they expect people to work whatever hours are expected by clients for no additional pay. So I can see how that might get outbof hand.

Op, the working hours will vary from consultancy to consultancy. Some, will say 35 hours (say) but actually expect much more. Others, will actively discourage long working hours. He will get a feel for the culture during the internship.

I'd encouraging him to use the internship to ask lots of questions of seniors and people early on in their career.

PP are right that the exams are a slog. It's pretty standard to get c1 day off a week to study and this is roughly half the time you need to prepare for exams so I used to carve out 1 day each weekend alongside the weekday study day (closer to exams I'd probably cram a lot more in!). But the camaraderie in the office on exam results days when lots of people will be waiting for results used to be excellent!

My experience is that working hours very much depend on how you want to work. If you're someone that puts their hand up to help on every interesting project, or opportunity that comes up you will find yourself much busier - but this is in your control. I'm now senior in my career and if I saw a junior in the office late more than a couple of times I'd be investigating why and talking to them about redistributing some work.

I wouldn't worry too much about coding languages. I agree Excel is mainly used. In a consultancy he'll also be spending a fair bit of time drafting reports and presentations too.