A learning profession
The pandemic sped up many of the plans we had in delivery, driving us to become more agile and flexible.
We are proud of the speed with which we shifted to an online delivery solution early in the pandemic, enabling us to continue offering our students the full diet of exams with minimal disruption.
In our 2021 member survey, we asked members to rank eight areas of focus for the IFoA; the highest rated was ‘Delivering actuarial education and lifelong learning, to keep pace with business needs’.
In the same member survey we asked members to indicate which recent improvements they had found most valuable. This is what they told us.
Move to free-to-access online events
New CPD Scheme
Move to online exams
Online view of exam marks breakdown (Subject Access Requests)
Online PPD submission
Improved online account management
IFoA Certificate in Data Science
Digital library resources
Certified Actuarial Analyst
At the end of June 2021 we issued a joint statement with the CAA Global Board and the Society of Actuaries (SOA) announcing the closure of the Certified Actuarial Analyst (CAA) qualification to new candidates.
The decision was taken after much discussion between the parties. While we are proud to have been involved in the CAA qualification, we felt that as the actuarial employment landscape evolves, the time was now right to develop our qualification offering in order to better support early-career students to progress along the actuarial qualification pathway.
Transitional arrangements were put in place to ensure new and existing CAA candidates continued to receive the support they needed to successfully complete their qualification journey, and the CAA qualification will continue to be recognised through membership of the IFoA or the SOA Center.
Learning Change Programme
Our Learning Change Programme is the first step in our ambitious plans to modernise and broaden our qualifications and lifelong learning. It will empower members to keep pace in established areas of actuarial employment, as well as equipping them with the skills and mindset needed to adapt to emerging domains and a rapidly changing professional environment.
In 2021 we announced some major initiatives to continue optimising the member experience even further:
- We procured a new online examination delivery solution to provide a more member-centric examination experience, such as the ability to deal with complex mathematical formulae. Our new system will also enable us to deliver examinations at times convenient to our globally diverse candidates.
- The introduction of objective-based assessment in 2023 will further improve the objectivity and reliability of our assessments. It will do this by assessing not just candidates’ core knowledge but also their ability to analyse and apply it, in line with the need to demonstrate contemporary skills and competencies to employers, regulators and other stakeholders.
Reaching our future members
As part of our early careers strategy, we continued our work to materially shift the perception of the profession among bright and diverse students interested in a career in maths.
We have targeted over 19,000 people through our campaigns, with actuarial work now one of only six areas seeing a growth in graduate job applications this year (The UK Graduate Careers Survey 2022, Highfliers Research).
Lifelong learning
Membership organisations such as ourselves must be proactive in assisting our members to continue enhancing their skills. That’s why our Lifelong Learning strategy is integral to our membership offering, providing opportunities for members to continue developing and advancing throughout their careers.
In 2021 we continued to enhance our lifelong learning, ensuring it remains a compelling and appealing offering to our membership.
To date, over 540 candidates have successfully completed our Certificate in Data Science, with survey feedback showing the value our members see in this Certificate.
In response to the needs of our members, we introduced a new Climate Risk and Sustainability career-long learning programme designed to cover the core concepts, the science behind climate change, and the impact this will have on actuarial practice.
We introduced a pre-Fellowship Banking qualification pathway to enable members to diversify their career path into this key part of the financial services sector.
We undertook a horizon-scanning activity on the learning needs of our members to help shape our future career-long learning offering. This covered topics such as how members want this learning delivered, the sorts of skills and competencies they will need for successful future careers, and their requirements for learning that is accessible whenever and wherever they choose to study.
Our events offering
The pandemic wrought immense changes that impacted us all. We wanted to do everything possible to support our members and demonstrate we were sincere about putting their interests at the heart of everything we do. That’s why we made the decision that, from September 2021, the majority of our online IFoA events would be free to access for our members.
In our 2021 member survey, 68% of members said our free-to-access online events were very or extremely useful.
Throughout 2021 we continued to host a wide range of online webinars and events to enrich our members’ learning, from providing the GIRO and Life Conferences to our inaugural online New Qualifier ceremonies. Our aim was to continue providing the range of career and thought leadership events our members have told us is important to them.
Hosting the Governor of the Bank of England
On 1 December 2021 we were honoured to welcome Andrew Bailey, the Governor of the Bank of England, to Lincoln’s Inn, where he gave a speech on delivering policyholder protection in insurance regulation. This was our first in-person event since the start of the pandemic, and also our first hybrid event, allowing members and non-members from around the world to tune in live and interact with the event taking place in London.
Markets development
Throughout 2021 our Markets Development Group continued to work with stakeholders in our markets to promote the value of the actuarial qualification and the benefit that actuaries can bring to organisations.
Here’s a rundown of some of our achievements in 2021:
Top-to-top meetings with 40 employers of our members in 11 countries, including 12 in the UK and four in Ireland, representing around 8,000 members, a quarter of our total membership.
We put in place a dedicated team in India for the first time with a focus on strengthening relationships with our members and market stakeholders.
Our successful IFoA Asia Conference 2021 Webinar Series attracted over 3,700 registrants delivering 17 workshops over five days.
Members of our Presidential Team addressed conferences in Kenya and Nigeria, reaching over 1,500 delegates.
New early-career members joined our global Voice Group to ensure the views of our future leaders in the actuarial world are heard.
We accredited two further universities in China, two in Malaysia and one in Thailand.
We successfully promoted our university pathways to IFoA qualification in Saudi Arabia.
