The Actuarial Profession : Employer profile

Company profile

Actuaries – the risk experts
Imagine a career that uses maths to model the world and predict the probability and impact of future events – where it’s your job to calculate risk in order to discover the opportunity. This is the career of an actuary. It’s a career where maths finds real life applications, but which also offers breadth of opportunity across corporate sectors and business roles. An actuarial career is one of the most diverse, exciting and rewarding careers in the world.

Work areas
When you join the actuarial profession, you join a highly respected group of individuals whose decisions affect the lives of thousands of people. The majority of actuaries work in finance, investment and risk management, general insurance, life insurance and pensions. Actuaries can also be found in the corporate and public sector and many actuaries work as consultants, with close client contact from an early stage in their career.

Actuaries also have the opportunity to pursue particular areas of interest such as climate change, genetics, energy supply or enterprise risk management. Working abroad is also an option since the UK actuarial qualifications are recognised and respected overseas. The variety and choice of rewarding opportunities available mean that it’s a stable profession, with very few actuaries unemployed.

Roles
As well as working in a wide range of sectors, actuaries also work in varied roles. You can find actuaries working as risk analysts, consultants, and even in marketing roles. They all share the ability to be analytical and strategic thinkers, and excellent communicators who can explain often highly technical and complex areas of their work to non-technical colleagues and clients. There are great opportunities to advance throughout an actuarial career to achieve managerial and board level positions.

What’s required?
Employers generally expect a good record of academic achievement. Maths will be a big part of the job so ideally you should be studying for a degree with significant mathematical content – statistics, maths, engineering, science and economics are all ideal subjects. However, any graduate with strong numerical skills can qualify as an actuary.

Being able to think logically and have strong problem solving skills are also very important, as you will be dealing with real life problems rather than theoretical ones, therefore it is important that you are curious, have sound judgment and are able to think logically and creatively.

Qualification usually takes between three to six years and there are exemptions available for those who have studied relevant subjects. Exams are held twice a year and the timetable is designed to give you the flexibility to manage work and study to suit you. After qualification, professional development continues throughout your career.

That’s what you need. What can you expect?
Responsibility brings rewards. Salary and benefits packages are excellent – even for those starting out in their career. In fact, this is one of the highest paid professions wherever you go in the world.

The actuarial profession is a young and vibrant profession, with 70% of members aged 40 or under. It is also steadily growing, as risk management continues to develop within the financial services sector and beyond into broad areas of business. 


How to apply

Application form and requirements can be found at our website.