Description: Focus on the importance of achieving complete and accurate technical reviews of work products that contribute to decision making. As actuaries, we often face tight deadlines and the demand is high for our team members to provide results in a timely manner. Through investing upfront time into a quality review of our work product, with an added focus on professional excellence and ethics, overall time savings can be gained and an overall higher quality work product can be achieved, not only of the technical work being performed, but of the decision making that is influenced by the result of the work. At the conclusion of this session, you will be able to understand the value of technical reviews and the methods of preparing for and implementing technical reviews across a team.

Description: Dr. Kimberly Harden helps organizations shift from a traditional diversity model to one that emphasizes diversity, interpersonal communication, and talent management. She will discuss topics on bias and how to be your authentic self in the workplace.

Description: In the past months, as COVID-19 has forced the reduced activity in the U.S. economy there has been some very substantial, but varied effects on the U.S. healthcare system. There is a lot of potential for confusion amongst providers and patients with regards to decisions related to which services ought to be rendered and which ought to be deferred. Two specific agencies – the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and the American College of Surgeons (ACS) have put together some guidance to add more clarity towards what types of services should be provided and what types ought to be deferred. In addition, this paper includes a discussion on what types of services are most likely to be deferred, and which ones will accrue pent-up demand to be released when many of the deferred services become available again.

Description: The Society of Actuaries (SOA) Research Institute received a grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) to educate insurance actuaries on the use of wildfire risk datasets and models to be developed by researchers from academia and the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

Description: What relevance does ESG and Sustainability have for actuaries? In the Life and Health space, we know that large protection gaps persist, reminding us of the challenges reinsurers and insurers face in reaching underserved customers who are often lower-income, less healthy, and more likely to suffer impacts of climate change. The Sustainable Actuary is focused on solving these challenges to make life and health insurance more inclusive. This ImpACTful panel will dive into these challenges and provide practical case studies of more inclusive insurance products that balance considerations for people, the planet, and profit. Listeners will walk away with ideas for how to use their actuarial expertise to enable greater social impact and sustainable business value.

Description: Learn from panelists from different companies as they come together to discuss their experiences.

Description: This report presents Phase 2 of the 2024 IDEC Study, analyzing individual disability income (IDI) claim recovery and mortality rates from 2006-2014. It expands Phase 1's scope—previously limited to 90-day elimination and To Age 65-70 benefit periods—to include additional elimination and benefit periods, examining variations by diagnosis, occupation class, claim year, and gender.

Description: The Society of Actuaries announced the six actuarial candidates named as SOA James C. Hickman Scholars. The Hickman Scholars Program provides stipends to doctoral candidates working on actuarial research and education, with this year being the first to include international candidates.

Description: How can we maintain our sanity while staring at the same screen all day, clicking into and bouncing out of meetings? To be successful in today's (remote) world, we must learn how to relate to individuals virtually.

Description: The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) implemented significant changes to the Medicare Star Ratings that are expected to result in cost savings to CMS. The 2024 Star Ratings were recently released in October 2023 which was the beginning of these changes where future changes will impact 2026 and 2027 Star Ratings.