Who will lead the SOA? You decide.

Candidate Questionnaire

Christine Hofbeck, FSA 2000-present, MAAA 1999-2019, EA 1998-2005
On sabbatical from full-time employment
New Jersey

Brief description of current work:

On sabbatical from full-time employment while continuing to present as keynote and general session speaker for organizations within and beyond the actuarial industry

Primary Area of Practice:

I’ve enjoyed 12+ years in Retirement (FSA track), 3+ years in General Insurance, 3+ years in Group Insurance, and 3+ years in Life & Corporate role covering retirement, group, annuities and disability.

Other Areas of Practice

Predictive Analytics and Actuarial Transformation

Professional Background

Provide a brief description of your professional background and the type of work you have performed and explain how these experiences have uniquely prepared you as an Elected Board Member and qualify you in carrying out the strategic direction of the SOA.

I have always been passionate about expanding the knowledge of, roles, and relevance of actuaries. I have a breadth of experience spanning more than two decades—first as a consulting and enrolled actuary (EA) in retirement/employee benefits (Kwasha Lipton/PWC), then moving into the P&C industry to build predictive analytics capabilities in both consumer and commercial lines (AIG), then combining these skillsets to build and lead predictive analytics and the pricing function in group insurance (Prudential). Most recently I spent time in a corporate role as the engagement lead for a complete actuarial transformation, working through complex questions like How can actuaries add the greatest value within an organization? How do we best learn and collaborate? (The Standard).

In 2016, I graduated from MIT with an MBA, further strengthening my ability to create positive change within an organization.

I have built a business of public speaking and can represent well to groups large and small with charisma, clarity and positivity. I also authored a mainstream non-fiction business book (Winning Conditions, Simon & Schuster 2020) that is now sold on four continents, has been shared by countless universities and companies, was named an Amazon best-seller, and is coming soon in Spanish for worldwide release from Penguin Random House.

These varied experiences well position me to understand the diverse people/roles/skillsets in our actuarial space and enable me to bring groups to consensus, identify creative solutions, and effectively communicate outcomes. I believe that actuaries can wear many hats and excel in many areas. I will approach my SOA Board work with creativity, diligence, understanding, enthusiasm, engagement, and a deep sense of responsibility.

Volunteer, Governance and Personal Experience

Describe how your volunteer, governance and personal experiences would strengthen your contributions to the SOA Board, the organization, and strategic plan execution. Please list your relevant volunteer experience. Please include the name of the organization, your role, and approximate dates.

I have enjoyed many years of volunteerism with the SOA that have provided me with a strong background on our strategic plan, long-term growth strategy, governance, etc., most recently:

• Board of Directors 2017-2020 (Long-Term Growth strategy lead 2019-2020)
• Secretary/Treasurer, Leadership Team 2019-2020
• Committees: Finance, Issues Advisory, Cultivating Opportunities (Chair), Admissions 2017-2020
• Development of the Predictive Analytics Certificate Program 2016-2017
• Research projects oversight, exams proctor, exams grader, conferences presenter, predictive analytics advisory group
• Contributing editor of The Actuary magazine 2014-2016
• Outstanding Volunteer Award recipient 2016

Another volunteer experience worth noting due to its global and DE&I perspective is my work with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). When the ICRC launched an innovation initiative to bring affordable assistive devices to persons with disabilities living in rural India, I worked with a team including on-site in Bangalore, India to scale the ICRC model to a broader set of social needs and regions. (2015-2016)

Personally, I have a bit of a “fun factor” through my participation on CBS’s hit reality television show Survivor (2017). The outpouring of support from members, candidates and community has been overwhelmingly positive, and I believe this strengthens my contributions to the Board through positive awareness of the profession and an increase in relevance. Life is good! And fun!

Overall, my history of volunteerism and positive reputation across our communities will enable better outcomes, increased collaboration, creativity and solutioning, and greater traction with gaining support for our most difficult work.

Agility/Change

Describe a significant change that you led in the workplace or in your volunteer activities. Explain what worked well and what could have gone better.

I built (from the ground-up) the predictive analytics capability for two major global insurers. Both efforts included the build out of a skillset/expertise (predictive analytics) AND a mindset and process change from users.

What worked well:

• I built the teams using diverse skillsets of both actuaries and data scientists. Each brought their own expertise to the table and were able to create appropriate and accurate solutions for our users;
• Users were relied upon to provide their expertise throughout the process. Because their opinions were heard/used throughout, and because there were no surprises with the outputs, the users were ready to jump right into using the models;
• Cross-functional experts were engaged including legal, IT, finance, etc. Don’t work in a vacuum, and build a coalition of advocates;
• The size of the projects were thoughtfully considered—small enough to nimbly test and learn, and large enough to make a notable impact;
• Success metrics were identified on the outset and measured often to ensure we continued to point in the right direction;
• I approached the challenges thinking “how can we solve this?” instead of “oh no, roadblock.”

What could have gone better:

• Communicate. Communicate. Communicate. Even when you think it’s enough, people always need more.

Motivating/Influencing

Describe a difficult situation or disagreement that you had in a professional setting during which opinions varied and you worked through the issues that led to a successful result.

My entry to the predictive analytics world began when I was hired into a position and asked to “fix” the following problem: a consultant had been retained to build and deliver a predictive model (they did, exactly according to the directions they’d been given), but upon delivery, the target users refused to use it because they didn’t believe it was accurate or worked.

First, I had many conversations to understand the problem. How/why was this project decided upon? What is the problem we are trying to solve? How was the model built? Why did the users believe it was inaccurate? What was their current understanding of the model itself? Etc…

The point of the conversations is not to place blame but instead to understand why positions are taken and how we might be able to promote a compromise or new perspective. They shed light on potential solutioning and promote additional communication opportunities for all sides so this new thing doesn’t feel quite so scary (the exposure effect).

Through conversations and deep model exploration, I discovered a model inaccuracy caused by incorrect underlying data (losses had been unknowingly loaded). Neither the consultants nor the users were at fault for this, and once discovered, I worked together with the consultants and users to tweak the model. All were praised for awareness and ability to help diagnose and correct.

Once the users took part in the solution, they were excited to use and promote the model. By engaging in open dialog and seeking to understand the underlying facts, brainstorming with diverse groups while also acknowledging different perspectives and opinions, and being open to correction without pointing fingers and placing blame, we were able to turn this potential roadblock into successful outcome.

Diversity

What additional actions do you think the Board should take regarding diversity, equity and inclusion?

The SOA is already taking many positive steps toward expanding DE&I within our profession. I’d like us to continue to remain fluid on the definition of diversity, pushing beyond gender and race/ethnicity to also include disability, neurodivergent, mid-career changers, low socio-economic backgrounds, LGBTQ+, veterans, etc. (I know the SOA is already moving into some of these areas and I applaud these efforts).

I do believe that the single biggest issue impacting our ability to create a more diverse membership is the high barriers to entry, namely, learning about our profession early enough to be able to take that first exam, secure an internship, and then get a full-time job. By expanding marketing efforts into the high school setting universally, we can encourage the most diverse candidates into the pipeline.

We need to expand our marketing efforts of our profession overall into mainstream media (i.e., articles in local newspapers, national magazines, etc.) so that more people know our profession even exists. I received so many notes from young people following my time on Survivor, expressing comments like, “Thank you for mentioning that you are an actuary! I didn’t know about it at all, and I’m now looking into becoming an actuarial sciences major.”

Leadership, meeting presenters, social media efforts, exam proctors, other volunteers, etc must include diverse individuals because REPRESENTATION MATTERS. Let’s continue to support employers in creating diverse internship opportunities.

And we cannot overlook the fact that bias still does exist in our profession even for women and others, so we must continue education on especially the equity and inclusion aspects of diversity.

International

What can the SOA Board do to balance the needs of our global membership? How will your experience help the Board accomplish this?

This is obviously a complex topic on many levels:

1. How do we balance educational requirements for different countries when products, regulations, and customer needs can be vastly different?
2. How is the nature of risk changing across the globe, and how does that affect our educational responsibilities in emerging areas?
3. How do we fairly create and grade exams in multiple languages, especially when content is updated frequently?
4. How do we balance growth globally when expansion in a particular geographic area could result in contraction in another (i.e., through outsourcing of jobs)?
5. How does the SOA engage with the international actuarial associations? When is it in our best interests—and the best interests of candidates, members, and the organizations and customers whom we serve as actuaries—to push forward with our own credentialing versus partnering with an existing association?
6. How do we allocate our budget dollars across the globe?

The global topic is not an easy one to solve. Ensuring the Board and members are aware of the many complex issues we face, and continuing to explore, ideate, communicate and engage will hopefully help lead us to some answers. There probably is no one right answer, perhaps we learn as much as we can and make as informed a decision as possible.

During my prior term on the SOA Board of Directors, many global issues were explored and shared, so I’m not coming in without any background. I’ve developed a strong appreciation for global issues through decades of travel through all 7 continents and extensive volunteerism with the International Committee of the Red Cross in India.

Emerging

Recently, the number of new candidates for actuarial exams has been declining. What additional actions should the Board take on this topic in relation to keeping the SOA successful?

One idea is for the SOA to provide credit for exam P for high school students who score a “5” on the AP Statistics Exam. In 2021, 16.2% of the 184K students who sat for the test earned a score of 5 (~30K students). Providing SOA exam credit would result in the following positive benefits:

1. Early awareness of the profession and available resources for interested students—promotion of the actuarial profession occurs universally at the HS level;
2. Early win within the profession encourages continuation of exams for top mathematics students (“I know I can do this”);
3. Charging a minimal conversion fee (i.e., $40-$50?) helps alleviate revenue constraints resulting from the decline in exam fees. Even if only half of the students converted test scores, that’s an increase in revenue of ~$0.7M (offset by fees of students who would have sat anyway);
4. More college students are eligible for actuarial internships, further strengthening the pipeline of candidates. Currently, a college student must decide by no later than sophomore year that they wish to pursue the actuarial career, to likely have a shot at it. That’s because to be hired for a full-time actuarial position following graduation, most candidates need internship experience in the summer following junior year. Internship applications are typically due in fall of junior year and require at least one passed exam. Therefore, that exam must have been passed during sophomore year. This early awareness and action is a significant barrier to entry which would be alleviated by allowing a potential AP Stats conversion;
5. Shorter travel time with no deterioration of mathematics talent.

(I first thought of and recommended this idea in the final 15 minutes of my SOA Board of Directors term in Oct’20. I’d love to explore its feasibility further.)