I have worked with both female candidates on volunteer activities and can endorse them both on their leadership skills. Folks can read their candidate pages to determine their views so my comments will be based on personal interactions with them.
I met Sharon Giffen when we were both SOA Section Chairs but got to appreciate her skills fully when we served together on the CIA Board of Directors. Sharon was President for part of my term and skillfully oversaw a transformation of the CIA structure through a governance review. She is an experienced insurance industry executive and board director and she would be a strong SOA President.
Christine is a high energy, non-traditional actuary who got a lot of exposure when she was on Survivor. I supported her as a petition candidate as I thought she could offer a strong option to voters who wanted someone who had a different style and outlook to the endorsed candidates.
I do not know Tim personally but others have spoken highly of his leadership skills.
Christine’s election might challenge some of the public stereotypes of actuaries and get us some media attention? I can see the WSJ story now: “Glamorous star of Survivor to lead staid actuarial profession”. Could be a positive development?
Most nonprofits have a paid Executive director (yes, chosen by the board so vote with that in mind). Anyway that seems normal to me. And I think it’s good that one person doesn’t have complete control on the board.
I might say more later. Having some “it’s not Covid” brain fog.
The SOA have had a very strong ED (Greg Heinrich) for many years in addition to a large support staff. I would also mention that, although the President of the Board of Directors of the SOA has some ability to steer the SOA agenda and direction, he/she still has only one vote on a decision, the same as any other Director.
I agree the SOA Board used to be too large. However I was fortunate to serve on an SOA governance task force about 10 years ago that reviewed the structure of the SOA Board of Directors, including its size. Our unanimous recommendation, which was subsequently accepted by the Board and SOA membership, was to significantly reduce the number of Board Directors. Thus the current Board has only 15 regular Directors plus the three Presidents (President-Elect, Past and Current President). This seems like a manageable size and everyone rotates out over a three year period.
Which, it must be said, also indicates how little the membership know about the leadership. If I’m still harboring “old” views from >10 years ago, what else do I have wrong? If so, whose fault is that, the Board’s? Or mine? I suspect it’s both.
I’ll still posit that having a President who serves a 1-year term is still not enough to actually enact any kind of lasting change. Which may be exactly what the Board wants, but it’s not really conducive to encouraging membership to vote, because their votes don’t really matter when the candidates are hand-picked to basically keep the ship steady and nothing else.
And certainly I am not calling you or anyone else out on not being fully up to date on the workings of their actuarial organization. I just thought it was a sufficiently important fact that folks should be aware of.
The reality is that very few members know or care much about the running of their actuarial organizations. I was totally unaware until I retired as I was too busy to notice during my working years. I didn’t even start voting in actuarial elections until after retirement.
this is very telling, and exemplary of the current state of many professional associations, SOA included. They exist only to gate-keep certain credentials, and as long as members can still put the letters after their name, many don’t give a shit what’s going on. I had one FSA say to me, “I don’t care what I have to do to keep my FSA, I’ll do it. If they want me to hop backwards on one leg, I’ll do it.”
Yes, it’s anecdotal, as is your experience @Cooke and mine, but it’s giving me pause as to whether or not the SOA is really providing value for its members after initiation.
I have a nostalgic relationship with the SOA as it was their exams that I wrote and the FSA was the first credential I received. However, as a Canadian, it has been the CIA that subsequently guided my professional career through its standards, etc. The SOA has not provided practical value to me since accreditation.
I did have a period of intense volunteering with the SOA after my retirement in 2009 and greatly value the friendships that I developed then. I only retain my SOA membership for nostalgic reasons: I however discontinued my AAA membership years ago.
I’ve settled on Ms. Hofbeck for PE. I appreciate Mr. Cooke’s endorsement of both her & Ms. Giffen. I’m choosing Ms. Hofbeck almost solely because she’s a petition candidate.
I have no idea who to vote for in the Board elections. Comments on the candidates?
Should be a close race for President: the second choices might be important this year.
Everybody has their own criteria for picking candidates and my approach might be a bit different from most folks.
I view the SOA as an international organization so, ceteris paribus, I vote for those candidates who have worked outside the US and Canada in addition to having worked in one of those two countries: this brings a broader perspective to the Board imo. The candidates I vote for also have to have a strong volunteering history: preferably both Section and Committee membership in a leadership role.
I had no trouble finding five good Director candidates this year even though there was only one, Ian Duncan, whom I knew. Ian is a brilliant actuary and should bring good insights into our profession’s challenges.
You can view the agreements and find further information on how to apply for mutual recognition using the links above.
Mutual recognition being where a fully-credentialed actuary in one org requests equivalent credentials in a different org.
The SOA seems to still allow mutual recognition going the other way:
HOWEVER, I would not necessarily trust that link. There are no dates anywhere on that and the SOA is notorious in letting stale documents remain on their website. It could be that mutual recognition is one-way… or a case-by-case basis or whatever.
Thanks for this. It is a bit odd that the SOA and IFOA would have a one-way mutual recognition agreement. I know the CIA and IFOA mutually agreed to terminate their MRA.
I have not been involved much with the SOA in the past 8 years but there was a new policy introduced almost 10 years ago by the SOA to not enter into any future new mutual agreements unless there was a very strong advantage to the SOA. For example, a mutual recognition agreement between the CIA and the SOA was sought by the CIA about 7 years ago and that was rebuffed by the SOA. The CIA is moving more and more towards establishing its own education system in any event.
Is there anything on this site recommending any of the Board candidates? I know I’m voting for Kelly Rabin, but otherwise am looking for inspiration. I suppose I’ll break down and look at their bios and statements.
