By Presidential Decree

The new President of the Institute of Actuaries, Michael Pomery, recently gave his Presidential Address. As I am a fully paid up member of said institute, his words are aimed at me. I'd like to quote from his address. So I will. Here I go. Right about now:

"Going forward, I would highlight the potential for each individual actuary to make a contribution towards enhancing the profession's image and reputation. I believe that our greatest chance of success will be if we are all pulling together in the same direction. In particular, individual actuaries can contribute in several ways in their day to day work:
- ensuring customer focus, as advocated by Jeremy Goford in his Presidency;
- improving communication skills, as advocated by Peter Clark in his Presidency, and here I would emphasise simplicity, openness and the need to find better ways of explaining uncertainty; and
- espousing simplicity in design - it is better to be roughly right than precisely wrong."

Three pointers there for me. But I think I'm ok, doing exactly these things already. You want evidence? I give you evidence:

1. Customer Focus
It seems like only yesterday that I gave you all the opportunity to peek into my little life and see "special photos" of anything, absolutely anything, that you wanted to see. I've been wandering around York with my "special camera" getting these exact pictures for you. Some of them, anyway. It's not too late to add more reqests, but it will be soon. You ask for it, I do it. Within some limits.

2. Improving Communication Skills
What better way to achieve this goal than through the gift of writing. Every day I am commnuicating with you, the people of the world. Hello! How are you doing? I will not be the one to judge whether my words are getting better over time (but they are) - after all, didn't a carpenter once say "judge not, lest ye be judged yourself"? Although I'm not sure that is much of a disincentive if it is yourself you are judging in the first place. It's like saying "Don't run in case you end up running". But whether improvement is evident or not, the best way to improve something is to keep on doing it.

3. Espousing Simplicity in Design
Again, the blog is it's own evidence. Simple clean lines, simple colour scheme, uncluttered simple layout (except in IE sometimes apparently). Yes, I could not imagine seeing a website that fulfilled this objective more.

So, Mr Pomery, I hope you'll see how I'm already part of your vision, already doing the things you want actuaries to do. I'm not part of the problem, I'm the solution.

Can I have a discount on my membership fees next year please?