Your career—It's
up to you
by
Kelly Rendek
Career
Development? What is it, anyway? Well, I’m not a human resources consultant,
nor a recruiter, nor a life skills coach, nor in fact any one of the
many different types of professionals involved in the field, so I
can’t tell you what the professionals would say. I can tell you about
what I’ve learned from my own experience.
Opportunity
Knocks
My actuarial career started out as an accident. I wrote the first
two exams because my brother told me to (he was worried about my career
prospects as a mathematician!). I’m from a smaller-sized city, and
the actuarial population at the time was about 15. The actuary proctoring
the exams that day was understandably curious as to who I was, and
what my qualifications were—in case I turned out to be a possible
employment candidate. For my part, I didn’t really know what an actuary
was, so I wanted to pump him for information before I committed myself
to anything. A few weeks after the exams, I called him up and he invited
me down to the office to meet a few people and go out for lunch. It
was only near the end of that day that I realized everyone else thought
it was a job interview! But I was offered a job as a result, and thus
began my actuarial career.
The most important lesson I learned from that experience was that
anything can become an opportunity. I went out for lunch thinking
I could learn what an actuary did and ended up with a job that turned
into a career. I could have thought long and hard about whether or
not it was what I really wanted to do—but what was important was to
take the opportunity that was offered and see what I could make of
it.
In various guises over my career, the same lesson has continued to
be applicable. Sometimes you have to do a bit more of the work yourself,
in order to turn a chance encounter, or perhaps an otherwise uninspiring
incident, into an opportunity that you can take advantage of. But
I believe that opportunity lurks around every corner, just waiting
to be noticed.
Never Stop Learning
It’s a cliché, but a useful one. If you don’t keep
learning and developing as a professional and as a person, your career
will go nowhere. The end of actuarial exams is just the beginning
of your career. Technical skills are necessary, and initially it can
take all of your time and effort to acquire them. However, if you
want to advance in your career, you’ll need to do more. Take a class,
volunteer for a project, learn a new language, join Toastmasters—it
might not be useful right away, or even directly applicable, but can
ultimately add value.
One
of the things that I started a few years ago was to set myself a goal
of learning at least one new thing every year—not necessarily work
related. One summer I took rowing lessons. It’s a bit humbling to
take instruction from an 18-year-old who knows an awful lot more about
the subject at hand than you do, but I spent a number of early mornings
on the lake thinking about the teamwork required in rowing and how
I could apply those principles at work.
My
own opinion is that a traditional actuarial education is focused on
specific technical skills, requiring a great deal of discipline and
self-study, and consequently it ignores many of the skills needed
to work effectively in an organization. To be successful, you’ll need
to expand your horizons, a lot.
Take
Stock Every Once in a While
Even though my actuarial career started out as an accident, it doesn’t
mean I’ve never had to think about it between then and now. In fact,
I believe that you need to regularly assess your career—where it’s
going, and what you want out of it—even if you don’t make any changes
as a result. It’s a little bit like spring cleaning: you find those
long misplaced items that you put away just in case you might need
them someday and you toss out other items that aren’t useful anymore.
Creating
or revising your resume, if you do it properly, is a great way to
analyze your career, even if you’re not actually looking for a new
job. It’s an exercise that I’ve used several times during my career.
There are a lot of tools out there to help you do it—the key is to
spend enough time on it and do it thoughtfully.
Think
about skills that you might already have that aren’t represented in
your resume, and how you might go about using them more in the course
of your work. Think about where you want to go, and the skills you
might need to acquire in order to get there. Think about the type
of environment you like to work in and how well it matches up with
your current job and your “ideal” job. For a fresh perspective, consider
careers and occupations that are completely different from what you’re
doing now—and whether or not any of the skills or aptitudes might
be the same. Evaluate the risks you’re willing to take to advance
your career—and those that you’re not.
Even
if all you do is file your updated resume once you’re done, it’s a
valuable exercise. If nothing else, when the next unforeseen opportunity
comes along, you’ll be ready for it.
Ask
for What You Want
The biggest developments in my own career have come about because
I asked for something I wanted. Sometimes it was a small thing—a chance
to work on a certain project, or an opportunity to go to a conference
or seminar that I was interested in. Other times it was a major request—such
as creating a new position in the company for me so that I could do
the work that I thought needed to be done. You won’t always get what
you want (I certainly don’t!), but if the powers that be don’t know
you’re interested, they’re less likely to think of you when opportunities
do come around. If you make your interests known, and if you get involved
when the chance is there, then more opportunities will come your way.
(And
just remember—“you can’t always get what you want, but sometimes you
get what you need”!)
The
choice is yours
Sometimes you end up feeling like you’re going nowhere, and you don’t
know how to fix it. You know you want something more out of your career,
but you’re not sure what. Even going through a thoughtful analysis
only seems to highlight the problems, without offering solutions.
Or, sometimes you know what direction you want to go in, but there
are obstacles in the way.
Sometimes
all you need to move your career forward is to realize that you do
have a choice. The choice might well be to stay where you are, because
it meets most of your needs at the moment. The choice might be to
stay where you are for now, but go to evening classes and work on
developing different career options for the future. Or, it might be
that it is time to make a change, but you need to spend some time
on research before you can make an informed choice. The first step
is to identify that there are options open to you, even if you can’t
see them right away.
Early
in my career, I was told that I couldn’t apply for a job in another
department because the project I was on was too important. I was furious,
because I had been waiting for an opening in that area. My response
was to fire out resumes in all directions, which netted me a couple
of interviews. Ultimately, I ended up getting the job I had originally
wanted, but it was a choice between several alternatives, rather than
a default option. It was also satisfying in that I had reclaimed the
power to determine my own career regardless of what obstacles had
been put in my way.
Your
career is yours, and no one else’s. You need to create the choices
in your own life and then act on them. No one else can, or will, do
it for you.
Take
Risks
Sometimes you just have to take a risk. If that scares you, practice
taking smaller risks that don’t matter so much, and work yourself
up to it. Be willing to fail or even just to look silly. Most actuaries
are risk averse, whether by nature or by training, and it takes practice
to break the habit. But if you want to succeed, you have to be willing
to go out on a limb, once in a while. (If necessary, start by standing
next to the tree and looking at the limb).
After
practicing with smaller risks, I recently decided to go all out: I
packed up all of my belongings and moved from Canada to Ireland. In
fact, I also switched from life insurance to P&C at the same time.
It’s a lot of change in the middle of a career, but hey, why not?
Surprisingly, the reaction from most people was that it was something
they wished they could do. We get stuck in a rut, and then we get
comfortable in it. Even if we want to change, we become afraid to
take risks that will move us away from what we know.
You
have to be willing to take a risk now and again if you want to move
your career forward. It might be as simple as volunteering for a project
that takes you out of your comfort zone. Or it might be as dramatic
as moving to another country. Whatever it is, be willing to take the
risk and make the most of it.
As
I said to begin with, I’m not an expert. But I have had a varied and
fulfilling career up until now, and I expect it to continue that way.
It’s up to you to determine where you want to go, and then figure
out how to get yourself there. There are lots of good resources available,
but it won’t happen by itself. What you make of your career is up
to you.
Kelly
Rendek, FSA, FCIA, ASAI, is assistant vice president and actuary at
Centre Reinsurance International Company in Dublin, Ireland.
Editor's
Note: This article was reprinted from the January 2005 issue of The
Stepping Stone, newsletter of the SOA's Management and Personal Development
Section.
Why
now? Why ever?
It
is clear that this study is unbiased and well thought out, but why
does “actuary” have such a high ranking? Well, to begin, the compensation
is exceptional. Starting salaries have a wide range, but are generally
between $41,000 and $55,000 a year. They also have a growth potential
listed at 288 percent. Other nice things about the job are a low unemployment
rate and opportunity to earn a promotion. Although those in the process
of taking exams might disagree, actuary is one of the least stressful
jobs as well, often cited in the top five (it was fourth in the latest
rankings). The normal work week for actuaries is about 40 hours, and
offices are generally pleasant and comfortable. Physical demands are
also very low, as most of an actuary’s time is spent at his or her
home office. All in all, this adds up to an excellent career
with the fully continuous premium 
or confusing q[x]+1 with q[x+1].
It helps to keep a notebook of notations that you can stare at. Be
aware of the similarities and differences in the notations so that
you are sensitized to their differences.
In
my experience, the rewards of volunteering greatly outweigh the sacrifices.
For example, I spent an hour every week with a 5th grade class as
a math mentor through the Actuarial Foundation's Advancing Student
Achievement program. We shared our knowledge about math and built
relationships with the students as we played math games (typically
one mentor per every group of 4-6 kids). It was a reward in itself
to see the students' faces light up when they understood something
with which they had been struggling.