Points of Conflict
There are two main situations in
which conflict arises in the life of an actuary. The first of these situations
is with clients. Clients need to feel like the work they are having done for
them is valuable and being done at a competitive level. They need to have no
reason to feel like they should doubt the actuaries’ abilities. When they do,
conflict arises and it is the actuaries’ job to persuade the client to believe that
the services they are receiving form the actuaries’ respective firm are the
best that they can get. The second situation is when fellow actuaries or team
members disagree on a process of a project or any other type of work being done
at the workplace. Such conflicts arise often and usually end with a negotiation
between team members, both having to make exceptions to let both people
continue working in harmony.
Topics of Invention
An
example of the first of the two situations discussed above is given below.
Client: “I have seen that there are other actuarial firms
offering similar work for less pay, I am thinking about switching to them
because I have heard that their services are quite similar to yours…”
Actuary: “I see. If I had heard that same thing and was in
your shoes, I too would be questioning who I was paying to analyze my risk.
However, I can assure you that ____ services are not only more efficient, but that
the quality of work that is done throughout the whole company at ____ is far superior
to ___. Not only would it be a mistake to switch, but because of how sought
after our services are it might be too hard for you to come back to ___ if you
do decide to leave. It would be wise to stay with ___ where your work is done
at a higher standard and you are able to know personally the people working
with your company’s risk.
Analysis
This actuary defends himself as well as his company well in
this example using deliberative oratory. The special topics of invention of the
advantageous vs the disadvantageous are show within his brief comparison between himself and the competition. He
makes a clear statement and testimony that the client would be wise to stay
with the actuaries’ company.
I feel like there is a little bit of vice and virtue in here, too, when deliberation about which factors of actuary service are desirable. From what you say, it seems that cost efficiency is the virtue.
ReplyDeleteCasey makes an interesting point about virtue. I think that when you talk about your company it is talking about the virtue of your company, that you do things the right way, you are personable etc. That combined with the comparison can have a nice effect of showing why you are the company to go with.
ReplyDeleteI appreciated to your comment on my post and wanted to hear what you had to say. It is interesting that you can classify things so similarly. In thinking of a special invention that one could create for the conversation that you have presented I couldn't help but think of the confidence that is displayed by the consulting firm. Maybe the special topic of invention could be called "playing it up vs playing it down" meaning that there are moments when the firm emphasizes certain points in their company while picking apart those same qualities in other companies.
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