Vantaggi
The actuarial team is extremely talented. New actuaries are given significant responsibility and gain experience quickly. The people are friendly and the company provides a huge amount of flexibility for work accommodations. The chief actuary at Union Standard is one of the brightest and kindest humans I have ever met, and I do feel that I grew professionally with this team.
Svantaggi
The workload can be entirely inconsistent. At certain points I was drowning in work and at others I was almost harassing managers to volunteer for new projects. As a subsidiary of a larger entity (W. R. Berkley), there are certain requirements imposed upon you by the parent organization that sometimes feel like a complete non-sequitur from all of the other work you do. Management also exists as largely a black box. There is a lot of talk about transparency and open communication, but there is a definite air of secrecy about managerial staff and their intentions. I asked from day one if layoffs were common or likely at this company or in the insurance industry as a whole. All communication both private and from management in town hall meetings reinforced the message that no, the company was fine and layoffs would not happen. I walked into a recurring weekly meeting with my manager, was followed in by HR, and was laid off because of premium shortfall that year. There was no advance notice, I was immediately escorted out, and I was not allowed to speak to any of my coworkers. I have been laid off before, but not like this, and it left an extremely sour taste in my mouth, when before I had nothing but positive things to say about this company.