Corporate or Consulting? (1 Viewer)

[RIZAL]

I'm bored and this forum is dead.

Where would you rather work? and why?

I think consulting can offer a broader overview of the industries that Actuaries can work in - which can be beneficial when starting off. Any other thoughts?

 

[ND]

What do you mean by corporate?

 

[flamin']

Think he means non-consulting. Like just an analyst. If you think about it, consulting gives you more project based stuff - clients are different, so you get varying work. But, there are a lot of fields to go into working in a corporate environment. Many of the banks, investment groups, finance groups, trading houses etc. they are non-consulting as well and their work is quite interesting (well I think so anyways).

 

[ND]

Yep IMO: Non traditional roles in finance> Consulting > traditional P&C, life, health etc.

I think that jobs like investment banking, investment management, quant etc would be alot more interesting than actuarial work. Consulting is better than traditional non-consulting for the reasons mentioned by flamin', but also because of the $$$.

Note: i'm obviously not talking from experience, and am basing my judgements on what i've heard/read about the industry.

 

[RIZAL]

Yep IMO: Non traditional roles in finance> Consulting > traditional P&C, life, health etc.

I think that jobs like investment banking, investment management, quant etc would be alot more interesting than actuarial work. Consulting is better than traditional non-consulting for the reasons mentioned by flamin', but also because of the $$$.

Note: i'm obviously not talking from experience, and am basing my judgements on what i've heard/read about the industry.

Yeah IB definitely has its draw cards and a lot of IB stuff is becoming more actuarial based - which is excellent for Actuaries wanting to get into this field. Look at the valuations of mergers and acquisitions. An actuary I talked to said that a lot of bankers will sort of be like

'OK we'll offer you $5 per share for the company'
'No we want $5.40'
'How about $5.25?'
'OK.'

Basically just bantering back and forth until they reach an agreement. So now a lot of the IB houses are getting a second opinion from the actuarial consultants and are getting an accurate actuarial valuation of xyz co - because no one value companies better than actuaries.

In terms of work hours and variability in work hours:
IB>Consulting>Corporate.

 

[flamin']

I agree with ND. Actuarial is pretty piss boring. Wealth/finance/investment is a lot more interesting I think and it will be much more practical coz you can play with your own $$$.

I wouldn't work as an analyst in a traditional actuarial area. The least I'd settle for is consulting, but I put investments above them all.

Also, acquiring your part IIs and IIIs isn't always necessary - only go for them if its relevant for your job. There's no point in going for Part III's if you're working in the finance industry - you're better off going for a Masters or something like that.

 

[ND]

So would you say that for someone not wanting to work as an actuary, it's a waste of time doing Part II? Can you suggest something that could be done instead of control cycles in 4th year? (i want my acst/appl fin double, but i don't wanna be doing 2 subjects per semester or useless units)

 

[bigredboof]

So would you say that for someone not wanting to work as an actuary, it's a waste of time doing Part II? Can you suggest something that could be done instead of control cycles in 4th year? (i want my acst/appl fin double, but i don't wanna be doing 2 subjects per semester or useless units)

For Quant roles, do some courses in Computer Programming.
Otherwise you could always do courses at the Securities Institute

 

[§eraphim]

u can pick up programming on ur own. u just need a MSc or PhD in stats, maths, and maybe comp.

 

[bigredboof]

PhD isnt everything.... A recruiter at my owrk knocked back three different people each with PhD's for an analyst role

I still say computing is the way to go........

 

[ND]

Yeh i don't really wanna become a quant either (don't like programming), i'll look into doing something at the SIA.

Not really interested in MSc or PhD, the only postgrad i'd do is masters at SIA or MBA.

Thanks for the replies.

 

[Mein]

u can pick up programming on ur own

Yes but is having a self-taught knowledge valid in the eyes of a company looking to hire you? I am getting a ACST/Comp Sci double degree for this very reason. I want to be able to use the programming skills I acquire during my Computer Science degree for modelling, forecasting etc.

 

[flamin']

Yes - self-taught is valid. A lot of people pick up and learn VBA on their own because it is very easy to do so (just talk to that crappy paper clip man in Microsoft Office and he helps a lot). Self-teaching isn't that much different from learning on the job...

However, some languages, such as C++ and C# will probably look best if it comes attached to a degree, but the easier ones like VBA, SAS and SQL aren't that hard.

Having said that, a comp combined degree is probably one of the most useful, since as an actuary, you'll be sitting in front of a PC all day and you'll definately be doing crap on Excel.

 

[§eraphim]

i would do a TAFE/Microsoft (maybe CSU distance ed thingys) course in practical programming in C. or one of those financing modelling courses from Macquarie Bank . You don't need to be a comp freek..just good enough to build around existing models (or new ones like old ones).

Also, i think research degrees are a good way to pick up programming. 1stly, MSc costs nothing if ur a local student so u can do some comp courses to prepare you for research. 2ndly, u can refer to online quant code libs to help u in ur research. 3rdly, its a big project - the best way to demonstrate your ability is being able to produce concrete and significant results (thru research).