Inverting the Actuarial Pyramid: How Actuaries Go from Turning the Handle to Delivering Strategic Insights Through Automation

Data and analytics capabilities are becoming ‘table stakes’ in insurance. Best-in-class performers are putting distance between themselves and competitors by building advanced data and analytics capabilities that can deliver substantial value.

Actuarial work is becoming increasingly intertwined with data science, analytics, and AI, but legacy systems, processes, and organisational structures present significant barriers to efficiency and effectiveness. Many insurers are struggling to break-down historical silos and bring these capabilities together to optimise actuarial work. This starts with the automation of actuarial workflows.

The 2021 EMEA-wide Life Financial Modelling Survey by Willis Towers Watson highlighted three barriers insurers must overcome in order to meet the expectation of ever increasing and faster reporting: managing costs, shortage of skilled resources, improving governance and auditability. More than 90% of survey respondents recognised that the application of automation technology is a key priority to address these challenges.

Automation enables insurers to ‘invert the actuarial pyramid’ - which currently is focussed most on the low-value operational and production tasks and least on the high-value delivery of strategic insights. Freeing up actuarial resources through automation is the first step, the hardest part is simply starting.

This paper will address how insurers and their actuarial teams can get started on this process, explaining in detail the key verticals and workflows which must evolve and the technology required to make it happen. It will outline both the process and the end goal: insurer’s actuarial teams spending the majority of their time delivering high-impact insights with the technology, culture, and processes to become increasingly data-driven over time.