LCP continues its tradition of success in the InsuranceERM awards as Jessica Snowball claims the young actuarial professional of the year award.

After joining the consultancy's insurance team in 2016, Snowball qualified as an actuary and was promoted to deputy team leader in 2020 before becoming team leader in August 2023.

Her two biggest projects include working on the statement of actuarial opinion for a large Lloyd's syndicate and advising the Irish State Claims Agency on its clinical negligence and employer/public indemnity liabilities.

In both projects, Snowball acts as the day-to-day lead, which, in practice, includes investigating emerging trends and understanding the impact of Covid-19.

Snowball tells InsuranceERM her leadership role is not "something you can write a job description for "given the wide variety of duties it encompasses from approving staff annual leave to providing support to anybody struggling and dealing with technical questions.

"It's [about] being that presence in the department and making sure people feel welcome and included. It's a very challenging role which I take very seriously and I think it brings a lot to the team."

Snowball is also actively involved as the creator, producer and host of LCP's Insurance Uncut podcast which covers all aspects of the general insurance market with LCP staff and other industry participants. The podcast is now in its fourth season, attracts more than 1,750 listeners per month, according to LCP, and Snowball says it has been key in helping LCP reach new markets.

"Having the platform to explore issues and topics and setting aside time to have that conversation is really important and something I think is really valuable to the team here as well as listeners", Snowball says.

Snowball's journey into the insurance sector began while studying for a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics at the University of Bath when she began an industrial placement at the insurance division of the AA. Her ability to conveniently commute to the AA's office in Basingstoke made the placement attractive while a conversation with a fellow mathematics student also influenced her future career choice.

"I knew nothing about actuarial [jobs] prior to university and I was speaking to one of my friends who was also studying maths," Snowball says.

"We were discussing what placements to look for and he had come across an article saying that being an actuary was one of the best jobs for a work-life balance that was also interesting, challenging and used your maths degree."

She notes actuaries in the industry need to "constantly" be better at communication to translate technical knowledge and avoid "overcomplicating" certain issues.

"You can always continue to help debunk the technical [content].

"At the same time, sometimes I don't think you need to be an actuary to be in the risk function. You need to be able to challenge and you need to be able to understand, but I don't necessarily think we need to see tonnes of actuaries in in the risk function."

She does note "collaboration" between actuaries and other parts of the risk function is essential, particularly when addressing risks associated with, for example, climate change, a topic she described as her "pet project".

Snowball co-leads the climate change work of LCP's insurance team. On a day-to-day basis this has included running roundtable discussions for actuarial and risk professionals to share learnings on climate change risk, and helping to develop an approach for firms to understand litigation risk.

She notes the risk of climate change generally "gets airtime, but doesn't get enough action time because it's a problem that's not impacting us right this second".

"We need to be practically doing more, whether that is talking to business leaders about what businesses we're underwriting and what we're investing in, versus modelling and understanding the possible future uncertainty and transition risk," says Snowball.

"As actuaries we are, although not business makers or business leaders, in a position compared to other people where we can use our voice and I think we should be continuing to do that more and more".

Future actuaries, she explains, must "have an interest in numbers as a storytelling mechanism" and while some requirements of the role may be changing, certain fundamentals of the position will remain.

"Fundamentally we look at data to help predict the future to help understand and manage risk.

"There's always a softer element, but at the heart of it is using numbers to help convey a message or relate uncertainty or explain the risk."

She encourages potential actuaries to get "up to speed with technology", particularly around artificial intelligence, and gain proficiency in different coding languages.