IFoA President, Kartina Tahir Thomson, on the IFoA’s programme of member surveys – now moving to a quarterly schedule.
At the end of 2023, the IFoA ran its last annual member survey and nearly 5,000 of us answered. You probably saw the round-up of results in The Actuary back in April.
I wanted to reach out now to let you know that this annual listening exercise is moving to a quarterly schedule and will be known as the Member Perspectives programme.
From September, there will be four surveys in a twelve-month period. Each member will be asked to respond to only one of these. So every member will be heard, but no more is being asked of anyone.
This approach offers several advantages. Rather than a single, spot-check, and a single, annual source of insight, the Member Perspectives programme will put the views of the wider membership at the heart of more of what the IFoA does day-in, day-out.
Taking a measure of members’ thoughts and feelings at multiple points across the year will build a more robust picture of our needs as members and enable the IFoA Council, Board and the Executive leadership to make more informed decisions.
If you receive an invitation to take part in the Member Perspectives Programme in September, I hope that you will share your thoughts to help IFoA continue to deliver the best experience for all members. And if you don’t receive an invitation, please don’t worry – it means that you will be included in a future group in one of the next quarters.
The feedback received in the last survey was invaluable. Here are some of the ways your feedback has made an impact and created tangible benefits for members:
61% of survey respondents want to see outputs around AI from the IFoA.
The IFoA is developing a new data science examination to become part of the core curriculum put future actuaries in prime position to lead the transition to new technologies across the domains in which actuaries work
78% of survey respondents said IFoA e-learning would be of 'some' or 'great' value.
Our Lifelong Learning team will be launching interactive learning modules on AI in the actuarial on the Virtual Learning Environment (VLE) before the end of the year. This learning content will supplement the CISI course on ethical issues in AI that was made available to all IFoA members for a discount price earlier this year.
Two thirds of you said you weren’t finding what you needed from the IFoA online.
We will be implementing clearer navigation and improved search functionality across our online platforms (the website, the VLE and communities) based on real member user testing. This work begins in January 2025. While that project is underway, we are working to make all member benefits more visible and accessible and to give you greater control over your member experience via the new Member Portal – which is now mobile-friendly.
More than 80% of Students and Associates not already using the communities forums indicated that they were interested in doing so in future.
A Student Support community will be launching on the communities platform in early 2025. This will allow peer-to-peer support for those studying for IFoA qualification as well as access to IFoA support services and IFoA content for Student and Associate members.
An IFoA communities app is currently in development to give our members access to the forums on all devices – something that our survey indicated was particularly important to Student members. This is scheduled to be available in 2025.
I hope you are pleased to see your feedback put into action. I look forward to seeing our survey responses this year and reviewing how these continuous improvements impact our results.
