Actuarial science may not be the most well-known area of study, but it’s one that many students should consider. As business development professional Fahim Imam-Sadeque explains, students who love solving business problems using data and math should seriously consider the field.

Actuarial scientists help businesses assess risk for insurance, investments, pensions, and employee benefits. If you’re considering studying the field of actuarial science, here are some of the exciting careers you could pursue.

Business Analyst

With an actuarial science degree, you could serve as a business analyst for companies in any number of industries. The job of a business analyst is pretty generic. Your job would be to examine the company’s operations, policies, and structures, for example, and then recommend solutions to leadership to help them achieve their goals.

Using real-world data and numbers, you could look at the organisation’s structure to identify areas of weakness and/or overall limitations. Your duties could help the company identify if they needed more employees, for instance, or whether one of their processes and/or programs were holding the company back from achieving more.

In this role, you would use high-level and granular data to analyse every aspect of the company inside and out.

Risk Analyst

This is the job that most comes to mind for people familiar with actuarial science. Companies in various disciplines need to constantly, quickly, and accurately assess risk so that they can make decisions that benefit their bottom line. 

A risk analyst helps companies assess risk based on several factors to make good decisions and avoid ones that could negatively impact the business.

Areas of focus for this career include potential risks to operations, such as an interruption of internet service and how that would impact the day to day; risks to compliance, such as whether the company is adhering to all regulations; and risks to finances, such as a sudden loss of a major client.

Underwriter

Insurance companies rely heavily on actuarial science to determine what policies they should write, for whom, and at what cost. For example, using an applicant’s personal information, an actuarial scientist will help insurance companies decide whether they should accept an application for coverage or not. They will do this by analysing a person’s data and comparing it to known risk factors for their demographics.

It’s not all as simple as yes or no, though. The work an actuarial scientist will do will also help set premium prices for those insurance policies. For example, one person may carry greater risk for insurance companies and, as a result, should have to pay a higher premium. Again, the actuarial scientist will help run the numbers and set that price.

Professor

Armed with knowledge and expertise in actuarial science, you could also choose to spread that knowledge to others. Actuarial scientists are always in demand at post-secondary schools, as Fahim Imam-Sadeque explains, which is why becoming a professor could be a good career path to pursue. 

This would give you another unique avenue to put your actuarial science degree to good use. Using your own knowledge — and experience you gained working in the field — you could help teach the next generation what the field is all about and the best practices they should employ.

Gaining knowledge is one thing, but helping to spread that knowledge to other people can be a completely different and rewarding experience.

About Fahim Imam-Sadeque

Fahim Imam-Sadeque is a business development professional with proven experience in the asset management industry. He has a Bachelor of Science in Actuarial Science from the City University of London and is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries. Fahim’s top skills include asset management, hedge funds, investment management, sales, and consultant & client relationship management.