Professionalism Counts, October 2023

A Cornucopia of Resources

Fall is traditionally a time of plenty. Harvests are gathered in and stored for winter. Images of cornucopias, filled with pumpkins and other fall produce, signal an abundance of resources to weather the cold months ahead.

You won’t find professionalism resources among the pumpkins. But you will find them at the Academy. With professionalism at the heart of the Academy’s mission, we’ve created a cornucopia of professionalism resources to help you keep your professionalism knowledge up to date. You can find all these materials on the Academy’s professionalism webpage.

First and foremost, the Academy is home to the actuarial profession’s fundamental professionalism documents:

• The Code of Professional Conduct o Members may request a handy pocket-sized hard copy of The Code.
• Qualification Standards for Actuaries Issuing Statements of Actuarial Opinion in the United States (USQS, amended effective Jan. 1, 2022)
  • Since 2022, actuaries have been required to obtain 1 hour of continuing education (CE) each year on bias topics. For a list of webinars and papers that can help you meet this requirement, see the September Professionalism Counts.
• Actuarial standards of practice (ASOPs) are found on the Actuarial Standards Board (ASB) website.
  • The ASB’s newsletter, Boxscore, announces ASB news, including exposure drafts and new and revised ASOPs.

The Academy has produced several resources to help you use these foundational documents:

• TRACE, a free online tool for tracking CE
• USQS Attestation Form, which actuaries can use to demonstrate how they meet the USQS
• FAQs on the U.S. Qualification Standards
• Which CE Requirements Apply to Me? (infographic)
• Applicability Guidelines, which can help an actuary determine which ASOPs apply to a given assignment

Two regular columns focus on professionalism:

• Up to Code, written by a member of the Actuarial Board for Counseling and Discipline (ABCD), appears in Contingencies.
• Professionalism Counts appears in Actuarial Update and on the professionalism webpage each month

Other popular and useful resources include webinars and discussion papers.

• Academy professionalism webinars feature actuaries with a deep knowledge of professionalism discussing a wide variety of professionalism topics—from the basics, such as the Code and ASOPs, to more specific topics such as reliance, ethics, and uncertainty. Recorded webinars are available free of charge to Academy members. And don’t forget to join us for the upcoming Dec. 19 webinar, “Tales From the Dark Side.”
• Discussion papers by the Committee on Professional Responsibility cover topics such as Professionalism Considerations for Working in Developing Areas of Actuarial Practice, Conflicts of Interest When Doing Volunteer Work, Explaining Professionalism to Principals, and Professionalism for the Solo Actuary.
• Papers providing a deep dive into actuarial professionalism include The Academy and the Web of Professionalism and Structural Framework of U.S. Actuarial Professionalism.

If you have questions after consulting these resources, you can ask for assistance.

• For questions on qualifications, contact the Committee on Qualifications.
• If you find yourself in a professionalism-related quandary, contact the ABCD with a request for guidance.
• To reach the Academy’s Professionalism Department, email professionalism@actuary.org.

We hope you will avail yourself of these resources. The Academy provides them so that you can fulfill your responsibility to your principals—and to the public—with the highest standards of professionalism.