As one enters 2025, in many ways the global actuarial community stands at the precipice of significant directional changes. On the one side, the widespread technology enabled developments in data management and computations is seen as a threat to the profession as many roles that are performed today in this sphere by actuaries is expected to get automated and human intervention in this will become a thing of the past. On the other hand, it is also important to highlight that ‘uncertainty’ is one factor that will always remain, and its complexities are increasing with larger integration of global data and its utilisation across applications. As such uncertainties translate into wider risk sets, which need even greater efforts at managements, there is going to be an increased requirement for actuarial skills across a wider segment of economic activities.  

Today, we are in a phase where the technology driven transforming global economic landscape requires the modern actuary to reinvent oneself. It is imperative for the actuarial community to embrace a culture of continuous learning and adaptability to evolve from being not just a mathematician or statistician but a strategic thinker and innovator who can deal with risk management that goes even beyond the traditional operational domains.

It is also important to highlight that in the post COVID era dominated by rapid adoption of new elements of technology, the workplace is witnessing a transformation. Today, we are already a much more integrated world where even in the field of actuarial science, global collaborations are becoming the norm. In fact, at a global scale, working models involving integrated data analysis and interpretations are evolving at a very fast pace. This has warranted a move to more flexible work arrangements that are often under hybrid models, including a ‘work from home’ structure. An actuary professional must increasingly adopt oneself to working in these evolving conditions.

Essentially, the modern actuary must evolve as a more holistically developed professional that can integrate certain core skill sets. Fundamentally, actuaries have always been at the forefront of data-driven decision-making. However, the rapid use of advanced technology is redefining this role. AI and machine learning allow actuaries to process vast datasets much quickly and with greater efficiencies. This has also led to the potential of uncovering insights that were previously unattainable. In fact, predictive analytics is becoming a cornerstone of actuarial work, enabling actuaries to anticipate risks with greater accuracy. With automation freeing up professionals from routine tasks such as data entry and preliminary risk calculations, there is increasing focus on more strategic activities, such as advising businesses on long-term financial planning and risk mitigation strategies.

So, what are the core qualities that actuaries need to develop?

First, they need to have a reasonable understanding of machine learning algorithms and advanced analytics tools, which can be effectively deployed on the complex data sets to gain deeper insights. This translates into the need to develop proficiency in programming languages like Python, R, and SQL. Essentially, the profession has to widen its adoption of certain key IT tools where there is now a need to develop much better understanding of tools like cloud computing, data visualisation platforms and artificial intelligence-based applications.

Second, actuaries need to transform into becoming key strategic advisers and core partners in the business decision making processes. While traditionally, they are recognised for their strong acumen in crunching numbers, they are now increasingly expected to have a much better understanding of broader business issues and much better integrate their data analysis with business dynamics. On this front, there is also a need to develop strong communication skills to convey the key implications and findings from the complex calculations to a largely non-technical stakeholder community.

Third, the actuary of tomorrow needs to have strong sense of global regulations. There is a lot of activity related to information flows across boundaries and decision-making processes that are affected by local regulations. It is also important to appreciate that with access to extensive personal data, actuaries must navigate privacy laws and ensure ethical use of data in modelling and decision-making. Importantly, with increased data mining use of AI based tools is expected to become more and more widespread. Actuaries will be at the core of understanding the input-output matrix of these AI based tools and will have a major responsibility of ensuring fairness and reliability in the evolving world of automated decision-making processes. Consequently, they need to have a good sense of data and AI governance systems. Much of the credibility of this kind of automated decision making will depend on the governance structures of the underlying models, and actuaries must understand that and be the global supervisors of this.

Fourth, with these developments, the scope of actuarial work is fast expanding beyond traditional industries like insurance and pensions. Today, Insure-Tech companies are also disrupting the traditional insurance industry process chains. Consequently, they are creating demand for actuaries skilled in predictive modelling, pricing innovative products, and optimising customer experiences. The emerging issues of climate risks is another domain where there is considerable activity. This is providing actuaries opportunities to work in a diverse domain of designing sustainable insurance products, pricing carbon risk, and developing resilience strategies for businesses and governments. The health and wellness industry is expanding rapidly at a global level. With divergent focus on quality and affordability, effective population targeting with customised products is increasingly becoming the key challenge where effective analytics is a key tool. In addition, there are increasingly applications of actuarial models for value-based care models and population health trends. In an IT and internet dependant world, cyber threats are growing in sophistication. Actuaries are increasingly playing a critical role in quantifying and mitigating this cyber risk, supporting the development of cyber insurance products, and advising on organisational resilience strategies. Actuaries have an increased role in quantifying Environment Social and Governance (ESG) risks and integrating these metrics into financial reporting, which is a growing norm.

In conclusion, it is important to appreciate that the actuary of tomorrow has much wider opportunities and the profession is set to grow, but it requires the community to upskill and broaden their knowledge horizons by integrating actuarial knowledge with that of evolving technologies and wider strategic implications.