Actuary at Discovery Limited

Job Purpose

Responsible for

• Leading a team of actuaries
• Creating new and innovating retail investment products
• Integrating the products with the broader Discovery group where applicable
• Ideation of and research into new innovations, and
• delivering the required technical actuarial and documentation work
• for new products and enhancements for product launches,
• from the initial brainstorming to the implementation stage,
• considering all stakeholders and aspects involved.

The role has emphasis on the

• sound actuarial modelling of all proposals, from the high-level exploratory stages to the in-depth scrutinization of the final stages,
• leading and growing all team members from a technical modelling perspective,
• with deep insight drawn from the employee’s experience and specialist knowledge in actuarial pricing
• acquiring and taking into account all of the inputs from the key stakeholders during the product development cycle,
• and providing continual feedback into the direction of the launch proposal.

    Key Outputs may include but are not limited to:
     (Please note that only the first 8 Key Outputs will be entered into SmartPeople)

• Direct and guide skilled actuarial staff to develop new products with well-considered pricing methodologies and bases to quantify the financial and other impacts of new developments with which to produce accurate and on-time results throughout the product development cycle.
• Contribute creatively and critically, and with insight into the decision-making process throughout the product development cycle, ensuring that innovative products are launched which meet customers’ needs and treat them fairly, and demonstrating that the underlying actuarial motivations of these innovations exhibit robustness to all angles of critique, especially the actuarial soundness and actuarial evaluation criteria.
• Produce, and assist all team members with the delivery of, critical documentation involving product launches and rate reviews in the appropriate formats, i.e. Product Specifications, Actuarial Committee documents, TCF documents, final rates and values, test models and policy wording.
• Provide specialist assistance and support to the technical marketing team and distribution teams, including interpreting, reviewing, critiquing, and communicating the results obtained and methodologies followed.
• Complete and address various ongoing requests and queries accurately, comprehensively and timeously to ensure that the relevant parties are optimally enabled with the necessary direction and assistance from our side to proceed in the best way.
• Assist key stakeholders with specialist expertise including, Business Analysts and Systems teams, Testing and Quotes Teams, Legal and Compliance areas, as well as the applicable Discovery businesses outside of Discovery Invest.

 Job / Role Requirements

Work Experience

Required

• 10+ years in a Life (Risk) or Investment Product Development role
• Preferred (would be advantageous)
• Discovery-specific role would be advantageous as our unique products and considerations are complex and takes time to master and obtain deep insight

Education / Qualifications / Accreditations with Professional Body

Required

• FASSA/FFA/FIA (or equivalent)
• Preferred (would be advantageous)
• The above would suffice
• Professional Registration
• FASSA/FFA/FIA (or equivalent)

Technical Skills or Knowledge

Required

• Prophet/ Excel actuarial cashflow modelling
• Preferred (would be advantageous)
• SQL, DCS, MS Access, R Studio, any statistical modelling software (e.g. S+, Emblem etc.)