Meet the Candidates: Tetteh Otuteye

Candidate Information

  • ACAS: May, 2011
    FCAS: November, 2013

    Education:

    B.A – Major: Math/Economics; Minor: Philosophy
    Lawrence University, 2003

    Current Employment:

    Vice President, Risk – Cruise Autonomous Vehicles
    Member of Cruise Senior Leadership Team reporting to CEO
    https://www.getcruise.com/about-us

    Other Actuarial Organizations:

    International Association of Black Actuaries (Member and volunteer - 2011 to present)

  • Employment History - Prior Employers:

    Waymo – Director of Risk & Insurance: 2018 – 2020
    Aspen Insurance – Head of US Actuarial – 2016-2017; Chief Actuary: 2016 - 2018
    Riverstone LLC – Actuarial Manager – 2013-2016
    Guy Carpenter – VP: 2011-2013
    One Beacon Insurance – 2004-2011

    Civic Activities (volunteer, elected, appointed):

    iMentor Volunteer – 2011-2013
    Lawrence University Alumni Mentor – 2013 to 2018

  • I was born in Ghana, grew up in Papua New Guinea, completed high school in Ghana, attended university in Wisconsin, and have been fortunate enough to have gained work experiences across the Northeast of the US, from NH to Boston to NY, on the west coast in California and across the pond in the UK. I’ve priced and managed reserves and liabilities across a wide range of complex risks and have been able to leverage and derive great value from our wonderful profession and credentials, and I’m eager to apply my broad range of experiences to help empower future generations of actuaries to lead the profession even further than we have already come.

    I was humbled to be nominated to serve on the CAS Board. The CAS has helped pave the way for many actuaries to have successful careers adding value and playing a critical role in many industries related to the management and evaluation of risks, most notably within the insurance industry. For the CAS to bring its envisioned future into reality, namely a future in which “CAS members are sought after globally for their insights and ability to apply analytics to solve insurance and risk management problems”, it is imperative that the CAS be guided and led into this future by a range of actuaries with a broad range of risk management experiences (both the management of enterprise and corporate risks, within insurance companies and without), diverse business environments and a global perspective. I have been privileged and fortunate enough to have all the above and wish to apply these diverse experiences to serve the profession.

    My eagerness to serve on the CAS Board of Directors rests on the premise that while the CAS has done a tremendous job over the course of its history demonstrating the value of actuaries to insurers and reinsurers in our ability to hone the skills required to price, reserve for and otherwise quantify and manage a wide range complex risks, we have now committed to transforming and reinventing ourselves to serve a broader, global set of industries and risks. This transformation will require creativity, a willingness to disrupt ourselves, and a need to reimagine the requirements of future actuaries. I was thrilled to read the CAS 3-year strategic plan, as it dovetails perfectly with my own path as an actuary, and my belief that actuaries are uniquely qualified to rise to the analytical and problem-solving challenges that will face both insurers and the businesses they serve into the 2nd half of the 21st century. As an actuary who has been fortunate to acquire a wide range of experiences including pricing and reserving for a number of insurance portfolios, designing and pricing reinsurance alternatives and related risk transfer solutions (from CAT bonds & index based indices to loss portfolio transfers of complex and long-tailed risks – from Asbestos & Pollution to construction defect, Workers’ Comp and other liabilities), built and deployed capital models both for ORSA as well as internal ERM purposes, and having recently made the leap from the insurance industry to quantifying and managing the risks of Autonomous vehicles (first with Waymo and most recently with Cruise), I feel well positioned to help the CAS shape the versatile actuaries of the future. I have successfully used and sold the actuarial qualification and profession to add value to several companies, and I wish to empower future generations of actuaries to add value to and lead a range of businesses through the application of our unique skillset and professional capabilities to help insurers and businesses mitigate, control, transfer and finance many of the new and emerging risks of the 21st century.

  • The CAS is at a critical moment in its history where it must both preserve the quality of its credentialing process in developing high caliber actuaries that are essential to the business of insurance and risk management while also reinventing itself in order to serve a broader range of global risks through the cultivation of actuaries able to lead at the cutting edge of new & emerging risks, applying our skillset creatively to prospectively shape the future of risk management into the 21st century. This is not a trivial task. With the emergence of data science as a competing path to the evaluation of risks both within the insurance industry context as well as industries generating numerous new risks from new mobility, the sharing economy, Internet of Things, energy, finance and beyond, it is imperative that actuaries rise to this challenge by reinventing ourselves as nimble, creative, insight generating and problem solving risk executives able to add value across a wide range of business environments, including but not limited to the insurance of traditional and emerging risks.

    Often barely hidden beneath the surface of historical debates around credentialing requirements and the long path to fellowship, is the unspoken truth that in addition to ensuring that future actuaries live up to the profession’s reputation for high quality analytics and insights delivered by leveraging our unrivaled skills and credentials, our strenuous qualification requirements also serve to control the supply of actuaries. This ensures the profession remains lucrative for current and future qualified actuaries. The fear implicit in this concern is valid in a finite game in which, with the size of the pie static, controlling the number of actuaries competing for a slice preserves the value and prestige of the credentials. However, for the CAS to fulfil its vision and to successfully reinvent and broaden the range of risk and insurance problems which actuaries are sought after globally to solve, we must shift our thinking to that of an infinite game. In the infinite game we are playing, the opportunities for future actuaries are limitless, and the challenge for the CAS is to efficiently develop a range of creative, problem solving actuaries who can lead businesses through the application of both technical and soft skills to new risks for which no playbook exists to manage.

    When explaining why he wrote the book “the infinite game”, Simon Sinek wrote: “I wrote this book not to convert those who defend the status quo, I wrote this book to rally those who are ready to challenge that status quo and replace it with a reality that is vastly more conducive to our deep-seated human need to feel safe, to contribute to something bigger than ourselves and to provide for ourselves and our families. A reality that works for our best interests as individuals, as companies, as communities and as a species… if we believe that leaders are the ones who can deliver on that vision, then it is our collective responsibility to find, teach and support those who are committed to leading in a way that will more likely bring that vision to life.”

    I am deeply committed to helping the CAS achieve its vision, and to ensuring actuaries are as valued across all industries in which the management and exploitation of risk is a prerequisite for success.

  • Candidates Respond to Member submitted questions