Year: 2021

My name is Dan Post, and it is hard to believe that I have been an FCAS for 19 years!  I graduated from Lebanon Valley College with a degree in Actuarial Science (and a minor in music) and have held a variety of actuarial positions at several insurance companies.  I have spent the last 16 years at The Hartford, and my current job is a non-actuarial position as a Product Manager for Personal Auto/Homeowners insurance.  Outside of work, my wife and 4 kids keep me busy, and I enjoy editing our home movies and developing game tournaments for the family.  I also have fun hiking with my dogs and training for obstacle course races.

Why did you become an actuary?
Growing up, I always enjoyed math and statistics and wanted a job where I could apply those skills to solve problems.  I was fortunate to hear about the profession early on and focus my education on building those skills.  I met a couple of actuaries along the way who shared their perspectives and helped me realize that this would be a good fit.

What drew you to a career in property and casualty insurance?
I had the opportunity to work as an actuarial intern over two summers – one with a Life insurance company and one with a Property & Casualty (P&C) company.  I was drawn to a P&C role by the creativity needed to solve problems in a constantly changing world.  Vehicle safety features and driving patterns change every year, climate change impacts the severity of catastrophe events, workplace safety evolves over time, and legal patterns change for each local market across the country.  A P&C actuary needs to say on top of these changes and adapt their calculations and decisions.  Covid-19 is the latest challenge that we are facing in the industry, since 2020 patterns look like nothing we have observed in our history.  Actuaries need to adjust their data and forecasts as we come out of the pandemic to appropriately set insurance rates and reserve enough money to pay claims.  If you enjoy using math and data to problem-solve and innovate, a P&C role might be for you!

What can students do now to prepare for a career in the industry?
Take classes in math, business, finance, and economics to learn about topics on the exams and the concepts you will deal with on the job.  Seek out leadership experiences in school or outside of school – this will help you work with others toward a common goal, a valuable skill for an actuary.  Also, connect with people in the industry – this is easier than ever with social media, and you can talk to a teacher or professor if you need help getting started.  BeAnActuary.org has some great information and resources, as well.  Each perspective that you gain can help you determine whether the profession is right for you.

Susana Gisele Zelaya, FCAS, FCIA, works as an Actuary at ICBC in the Product Pricing Team. She graduated from Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) with a bachelor degree in actuarial sciences. Born in El Salvador, her parents moved to Canada where she grew up as French Canadian and recently moved to British Columbia. She recognizes her background as being an advantage and now wants to encourage more diversity in the P&C industry.

Why would you recommend a career in the insurance industry to current college students?
Why would I not? The insurance industry is in constant evolution. In the past few years, the industry has been coming up with new ways to provide and sell insurance, it has been immersed in the world of big data and predictive analytics and keeps on releasing products that better corresponds to the new and increasing needs of customers. This industry is even gaining more and more attention from outsider companies such as Tesla and Amazon. Not only that, the recent pandemic has shown us that the insurance industry provides a safe and stable work environment as many countries deemed it an “essential business” and many organizations quickly pivoted to a work-from-home model.

Why did you become an actuary?
I always had good grades at school and I particularly enjoyed math and science. As many children from immigrant parents have experienced, the career options that were often proposed to me were the classics: doctor, lawyer, engineer, or accountant. Ugh! So boring. One day my math teacher talked about actuaries and the fact that no one around me seemed to know what it was just got me hooked. Don’t worry, I did some research after that and got attracted by how actuaries used math and applied them to real-life issues. Also, the fact that you have to go through a series of exams to obtain your designation appealed to my goal-driven competitive side.

What drew you to a career in property and casualty insurance?
Even through my research of “what is actuary?” I was quickly drawn to the P&C industry because of the range of risks that can be covered. Knowing that actuaries could predict the cost of a natural catastrophe or how much it costs to rebuild a house burned down by fire seemed pretty cool to me. But it was really getting my first internship with a P&C company that cemented my choice. I really loved the atmosphere at work and how much I learned in such a short amount of time that I just couldn’t get away from that.

What can students do now to prepare for a career in the industry?
Learn how to communicate your results to non-technical audiences. It is harder to do than you think and the sooner you learn, the better. Actuaries tend to build great models or perform intricated analysis, but often fail to clearly communicate the result and impacts to others. Another suggestion is to learn to code in as many languages as possible. This skill will be particularly useful in your first few years working as an actuary.

My name is Denise Olson. I currently work at Zurich North America as the Head of New Programs leading a cross functional due diligence team. I graduated from the University of Nebraska – Lincoln (Go Big Red!) with a double major in Actuarial Science and Math. In my 30-year career, I’ve spent about 20 years as a pricing actuary. The other 10 years, I’ve been in multiple non-actuarial roles including underwriting, product development and leading a large systems project. I am a Fellow of the Casualty Actuarial Society (FCAS) and Chartered Property Casualty Underwriter (CPCU).

Why would you recommend a career in the insurance industry to current college students?
Insurance is endlessly fascinating and constantly changing. During my career, I’ve worked on taxis, crop insurance, lawyers professional liability and entertainment insurance just to name a few. There is no end to the variety of roles and types of insurance to learn about.

Why did you become an actuary?
From a very early age, I knew that math was my strongest and favorite subject. As I entered high school, I really didn’t know what I could do with a math major, but knew it was my passion. I talked with my high school calculus teacher and told her I knew I didn’t want to teach. She suggested Actuarial Science. Since I grew up in Nebraska and UNL has such a strong Actuarial Science program, my future was decided. Talk about a life changing 10-minute conversation.

Why did you take a non-actuarial role?
I was fortunate to work with another actuary who moved into a business lead position and thought I’d really like to try that if the right opportunity came along. I was terrified to move into my first underwriting manager role, but knew that I could fall back on my actuarial background if it didn’t work out. Taking that risk has paid off in so many ways for me.

What drew you to a career in property and casualty insurance?
I had no idea that Property and Casualty Insurance even existed when I was in college. We had a very Life/Health heavy curriculum. When I interviewed on campus for full time positions (back before the days of lots of internships), I interviewed with CNA in Chicago. They had a life division and I asked to be placed there when they made me an offer, but they said the offer was only for P&C. My thinking was that at worst, I could switch to Life/Health later if I wanted to. My first pricing role was in Entertainment Insurance and I was hooked on day 1 when I read the underwriting guidelines.

What can students do now to prepare for a career in the industry?
First, be curious – what questions do you have about every situation? Ask. Ask more than one source. Meet people that aren’t like you to find out their perspective. Go deep on what interests you and never stop learning. Second, learn how to communicate in a simple, straightforward way without using technical jargon. I used to practice explaining concepts to my mother, who is a retired dental assistant. No one cares about all the hours you spent or the details of how you did something. They want to know what they should do with the information you’re providing. Finally, learn to fail. You will make mistakes. How will you learn from them? What can you do better next time? How resilient can you be?