Lights Camera Actuary Shil Patel
Shil Patel is the UK Managing Director at Dynamo Analytics, a firm that provides actuarial services and technology through its Psicle platform. He joined the company in 2012 as the first employee and has since led the UK operations while overseeing the development of their IFRS 17 proposition and international growth. Patel recently took on the managing director role after previously serving as director of Psicle, the software launched in 2016. The company focuses on combining technology with actuarial expertise to build industrialized solutions for insurance clients.
Patel’s career began in 2010 at Towers Watson, a large global consultancy. His defining moment came when he left that established firm to join a colleague who was co-founding a startup. He followed the colleague from a graduate role into a new venture. This move exposed him to commercial and business realities early in his career.
At the time of joining, the software was just taking shape. It started establishing a market presence around the same time that IFRS 17 and broader actuarial transformation programs were taking form. This timing gave Patel the chance to lead significant projects in IFRS 17 and reserving transformations.
His current role requires a blend of technology management and leadership. He notes that the firm’s culture encourages every employee to act like an entrepreneur. When he joined, the team was small, consisting of only four people. This environment allowed him to gain autonomy and responsibility early on, even while he was fairly junior. This autonomy provided a foundation for his current position, though it came with its own set of challenges.
The shift from technical work to management
While the technical actuarial skills are still core to his daily work, the shift to management presents a distinct set of difficulties. Patel says the transition from a largely technical role to a managerial one is difficult because actuarial training does not prepare professionals for leadership duties. He spends his days helping his team build solutions, but the management side of the business requires a different skill set that he has had to learn on the job.
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Technology is also a constant pressure point. The firm works to stay at the forefront of the market while balancing the needs of an increasing user base. This requires keeping up with competitors and evolving software capabilities.
Despite the challenges, Patel believes the foundation laid in those early days was essential. He advises students to constantly take risks and put themselves in situations outside their comfort zones. He also stresses the importance of grit and determination, suggesting that the ability to keep working through complex issues when things get tough makes someone a valuable team member.
Looking beyond insurance
If he could restart his career, Patel would not change his path in insurance or actuarial science. He mentions an alternative path could have involved mixed modeling or mathematics applied to sports. He expresses a specific interest in improving the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern methodology used in cricket. He also spent time building models to optimize fantasy football teams, though he admits the results were mixed.
For trivia, Patel cites the Birthday Paradox, which states that in any group of 23 people, there is a greater than 50 percent chance that two people share a birthday. He finds the concept interesting because it applies to elite sports, where there is a known correlation between performance and birth month. He notes that in the 2018 football World Cup, the 32 squads featured 23 pairs of players who shared birthdays.
