to think there must be a book, or something, out there to help my DD with her Actuary Technician interview

[cakesanyone]

My DD (mathsy type) is in her final year at uni and has applied to a firm of actuaries for an Actuary Technician post (something to do with pensions, I think) - dimwit mother with brainy DD - seems they take on a number of graduates and train them up.

As there's going to be a lot of competition for this DD wanted to swot up prior to the interview. But no one, including the uni, seems to be able (or willing) to share any guidance on what she might be asked in her interview, except that there's likely to be a group execise about the financial issues of the day. Oh, fancy. I'd never have guessed The interview date hasn't been set yet, so DD doesn't even have a letter about that to guide her.

Are any of you of this world? Or had DC who've gone through this? DD has never worked, just studied and socialised and spent my money What are they looking for? let it be my DD, please, please

Thanks to you all - some really great stuff here.

scotsgirl23 What was it about you that got you your job?

(hopes Helenagraces hubby is not marking my papers....!)

I work in actuarial consulting, but I interviewed for lots of places (and got several offers) - one of the big things that I think has changed over the last few years is that everywhere seems to be looking for actuaries that, whilst still "mathsy" are a little more rounded - good communicators, good interpersonal skills etc. I also have really good excel skills so if she has these, get her to emphasize them. We also spend a remarkably large amount of time writing reports or preparing presentations although this will depend on the specific area.

It is almost guaranteed that it will be a competency based interview (all of mine were) so she needs to make sure she has really good, strong examples for all the relevant competencies. She needs to go through the job spec and pull out everything and make sure she has two solid examples for each, I would say. If she has anything she can draw on from outwith uni then that would be to her advantage - I was working full time (as well as doing uni) and I've been told that the fact I had more real life and varied examples helped a lot.

I'd also suggest she is very clear about what area of actuarial work it is - and prepare to be asked why she is interested in that specific area. I've found that some actuaries get a little annoyed when people don't know the difference between life/pensions/investments work. General questions that always pop up are things like "what do you expect to be doing day to day" (because few people actually know what an actuary does!), she may well be asked what she knows about the exams so make sure she is familiar with the general route through.

The Actuary magazine is online, it is possibly worth her reading through some of the more recent articles to get a feel for what is "big" in the industry. The actuaries.org.uk website is also good for this. Solvency II is the biggest thing at the moment by a long way - it involves a lot of detailed modelling work. There are pensions changes as well.

If you want some more specific help then you could PM me with the company name and I might be able to give you some details. I only started last year so my interviews are pretty recent, I might even have been through one with the same company.

I'm an actuary and invoked in graduate recruitment. (Waves at Trixy - we seem to meet a lot on this kind of thread!)

Agree with what everyone else is saying. One thing to add is that when we are looking for a trainee we are after evidence of 4 things really:-

Academic ability to pass the exams
Resilience to carry on with exams when you fail one
Ability to be useful in the office without lots of handholding
Someone we want to spend up to 70 hours a week sitting next to.

As it is an Actuarial Technician role rather than a trainee role then the bottom two are probably more important. It is amazing how many people don't think about the last one during the Group Exercise. "Having an impact" is great but not if the impact is that you bully, interrupt or shout everyone down!

Definitely, we had a real pushy guy in one of my group interviews, he was awful. And didn't get a job offer either!

More thanks to everyone.

scotsgirls23 I will PM you with the name of the company when I figure out how to PM