Find out the top 10 core skills you need to master as a manager actuary and what hard skills you need to know to succeed in this job.
A Manager Actuary is responsible for overseeing all the actuarial related matters that include modeling, valuation, experience study, data analytics, projections, accounting, reporting, corporate transactions, pricing, risk quantification and allocation.
The primary responsibilities include performing all actuarial reviews and valuation of insurance reserves, experiencing study and technical reserves calculation, insurance pricing, and valuation, presents marketing investigation, project management, and business development, reviewing and preparing reports as required, appraising all the cash flows and reserves before they are implemented, interacting with independent actuaries and clients for a better flow in the organization, communicating findings to customers and the management, preparing presentations and reports to table to the management, analyzing statistical data like accident rates to determine potential risks.
Core Skills Required to be a Manager Actuary
Core skills describe a set of non-technical abilities, knowledge, and understanding that form the basis for successful participation in the workplace. Core skills enable employees to efficiently and professionally navigate the world of work and interact with others, as well as adapt and think critically to solve problems.
Core skills are often tagged onto job descriptions to find or attract employees with specific essential core values that enable the company to remain competitive, build relationships, and improve productivity.
A manager actuary should master the following 10 core skills to fulfill her job properly.
Presentation Skills:
Presentation Skills are useful in getting your message or opinion out there in many aspects of life and work, though they are mostly used in businesses, sales, teaching, lecturing, and training.
A Manager Actuary must develop the confidence and capability to offer excellent presentations and captivate the audience when the need arises; it requires a lot of preparation to stand out from the crowd, and a manager should be willing to invest in it.
Inspiring others:
Inspiring is encouraging one to be their best in contributing to the vision of an organization where they are placed and entrusted to work.
A Manager Actuary must create a culture where the staff can use their professional prowess and aspire to be the best by giving them a clear vision and purpose through decisive leadership that motivates and inspires them.
Leadership Skills:
Leadership Skills are soft skills that assist leaders in positively interacting with employees or team members to make the workplace a great place.
A Manager Actuary must be able to lead effectively by learning how to deal with all types of people in a way that motivates, enthuse and build respect in a bid to understand and develop his leadership skills.
Appearance and Grooming:
Appearance and Grooming are the way one presents themselves in a professional environment or the workplace with the aim of gaining positive impression and respect as well.
A Manager Actuary must be an example in proper grooming and professional appearance while ensuring all the workmates adhere to the basic guidelines presented for good grooming in the workplace that represents the company wherever they go.
Realistic Goal Setting:
Realistic Goal Setting is the skill to hone in the specific actions that we need to perform to accomplish everything we aspire to live.
A Manager Actuary should invest his time in planning and set both short and long-term goals that stretch and initiates the growth in every employee causing each to perform at his level best bringing in real benefit to their life and the business as well.
Role Awareness:
Role Awareness is the ability to be informed of your role in a given environment as well as understand the expectations placed on a position and to see how they are met apparently.
A Manager Actuary must assess, measure and quantify his employee's awareness of their roles to see if they are transparent about what is required of each of them and review what kind of results they are delivering from their understanding.
Seeing Potential Problems:
Seeing Potential Problems is the ability to structure the current situations and identify developments that could cause problems in the future.
A Manager Actuary needs to see potential problems before they occur and work to stop them early enough, he also has to stay ahead of the flow not to be caught you by upcoming issues that could be easily prevented if they were noted soon enough.
Managing Details:
Managing Details is the skill of paying close attention to details of every element of your job performance to ensure nothing is overlooked.
A Manager Actuary should be keen to handle every detail using strategic planning and organizational techniques that make it easy to keep track of everything that is happening in the organization consistently desiring to improve their knowledge and skills.
Project Management:
Project Management is structuring a to-do list for your project or company containing tasks and responsibilities as well as creating a roadmap for the execution of those duties promptly.
A Manager Actuary must place emphasis on the application of the project management methodologies and principles by the staff in the daily functions and responsibilities to foster efficiently as well as create a competitive advantage in the heavily competitive business space.
Knowledge Management:
Knowledge Management is the ability to manage knowledge and information that is presented to the company from different sources without overlooking any of them.
A Manager Actuary ought to creatively channel all the new information, tools, input, and methodology mean by actively practicing the art of knowledge management within the business by harnessing the organization's inherent wisdom's platform in one place.
Hard Skills Required to be a Manager Actuary
Hard skills are job-specific skill sets, or expertise, that are teachable and whose presence can be tested through exams. While core skills are more difficult to quantify and less tangible, hard skills are quantifiable and more defined.
Hard skills are usually listed on an applicant's resume to help recruiters know the applicant's qualifications for the applied position. A recruiter, therefore, needs to review the applicant's resume and education to find out if he/she has the knowledge necessary to get the job done.
A manager actuary should have a good command of the following hard skills to succeed in her job.