From the President

by Robert A. Anker

The early responses to my recent letter to CAS members have been universally thoughtful and generally very supportive. I have received letters, notes, E-mails and voice mails and have monitored at least some of the responses on CASNET. Without question, everyone recognizes that the letter is an unusual event. It is also clear that additional background would be helpful.

There are three related, but individual events that triggered the letters to Dave Holland, president of the Society of Actuaries, and to our membership. The first event was the development of the North American Actuarial Journal itself. As discussed in the membership letter, the SOA was very forthright in presenting to us the idea of the Journal, the invitation for us to join in sponsoring it and the manner in which they would proceed. We were comfortable with our choice not to sponsor, given the assurances we received on the approach the Journal would take. This is not to say that we were pleased with the decision of the SOA to include property/casaulty topics in the Journal.

The second event was the development of a solicitation brochure for authors for the Journal. The brochure is explicit in its solicitation of casualty papers. To the credit of the SOA leadership, they recognized there could be some CAS sensitivity and held up distribution of the brochure to get our reaction. The reactions of individuals in the leadership and on the CAS Board to the brochure were widely varied, from mild concern to significant upset. The SOA leadership expressed willingness to hold up or alter the brochure in response to CAS concerns. Unfortunately, through no fault of the SOA, a miscommunication from me caused them to fairly assume we were comfortable with the brochure and it was mailed. The fact that the SOA leadership flagged the issue to us, even though perhaps later than we might like, was completely consistent with the assurances they provided on the Journal.

The third event came to light during the Board discussion of the Journal in the February meeting of the Board. It was the direct solicitation by telephone of CAS authors to write for the Journal. This was outside the boundaries we understood and led to the Board asking that we protest to the SOA leadership and communicate to the membership. The strength of the response was dictated both by the apparent flagrancy of the solicitation and the desire to clearly evidence the sense of independence articulated in the strategic plan. The speed of the response resulted from the desire to let the membership know what was happening before the brochure arrived.

Many may view this as a sign of weakened relationships between the SOA and the CAS. I do not. In actual fact, we are cooperating more effectively in many ways than we ever have and we should be able to continue to do so.

The new CAS strategic plan is a document in which we define ourselves clearly. The focus in the plan allows us to live the definition and make it real to others. It gives us the framework for asserting our independence and stature as a body of skilled professionals while fully participating with others who share the fundamentals of our profession if not our specialty. Good relationships always come from strength.