Description: Read the May 2017 issue of NewsDirect published by the Marketing & Distribution Section.

Description: Provides a summary of key points from the ERISA Advisory Council Report on Outsourcing (2014). The report provides interesting and important perspectives and the article encourages the reader to look at the report and consider the issues raised.

Description: Discusses the insurance and actuarial profession in India.

Description: Actionable tips to improve the readability of business e-mails.

Description: Attempting to define what actuaries do from a student's perspective

Description: This article is a review of the book by Joshua Foer. It covers the history of memory techniques, the way a human brain organizes memory, and various problems and successes in memory recall. The author starts by interviewing memory savants, and learns from them that the ability to perform seemingly impossible memory tricks is simply a matter of studying and practicing proven techniques used for millennia. This review suggests that actuaries can benefit greatly from some of these techniques despite the availability of electronic hand-held devices to recall facts because the person who does not need to rely upon such devices can have a huge perceptual advantage in executive presentations.

Description: A personal account of an international assignment opportunity in Switzerland.

Description: The author discusses how small firms can compete successfully against big firms by cre¬ating a micro-niche business, because other firms—including big firms—cannot compete directly. In this way a small firm can compete against large firms with great success by stepping outside direct competi¬tion, in which it cannot hope to win. From ‘The Stepping Stone’ issue number 43.

Description: Introduction of the Leadership & Development 20th Anniversary Special Edition of The Stepping Stone.

Description: Read the April 2017 issue of CompAct published by the Technology Section. Newsletters provide practical information for the working actuary, articles on trends that impact sections and news about section activities.