IA second attempt

[Anitha Desai]

For those of you who have had to take the Interim more than once, how long did you take for attempt #2? I just started attempt #2 today, and I feel I could easily submit next weekend (the 19th). Am I being too hurried? Or is this normal?
Thanks in advance.

[JoeSpo]

I think speaking in terms of hours is more appropriate.
If I take off work the whole week and submit it this weekend, would that be equivalent to you submitting it next weekend?

[jansder]

I re-submitted in four days. Worked on it about 4-6 hours each day. I did do a little prep work before starting it over as in going over the questions they told me I should re-look at.

[Anitha Desai]

I'm planning on spending about 15-18 hours this time around. I guess that's not too bad.

[its_me]

I am on EOM4, so please take my question for what its worth.

Isn't the first attempt itself 30-60 min per question effort level?
That would mean the 2nd attempt is lesser time per question?

[newhaircut]

Originally Posted by its_me

Isn't the first attempt itself 30-60 min per question effort level?

NO. From my experience, and based off most people I've talked to, the average time spent on a first IA is 35-45 hours. Some go longer, some shorter - like exams, everyone is diff. The SOA is full of sh*t when it gives this guidance imo. Best of luck

[Anitha Desai]

Originally Posted by its_me

I am on EOM4, so please take my question for what its worth.

Isn't the first attempt itself 30-60 min per question effort level?
That would mean the 2nd attempt is lesser time per question?

Some take longer. Some take less. Most of them I easily spent more than an hour on, especially because I reviewed them over and over....
And of course, add the time I just sit there staring at the pdf, hoping the answer materializes, and you have another 5-10 hours spent for the IA, while nothing got accomplished.

[Rainula]

Anitha,

I am not comming from a perspective of having to take the IA twice, but I can give you some advice which may assist in your task. Firstly, I would not rush the second attempt at all. The turn around time on the IA, other than early March of this year, is a long time. It is worth your time to put your best possible work forward, even if it means redoing many of the tasks completely. If I was in your shoes, this is what I would do. I know that you probably followed most of these points in your initial submission, but I thought I would say them anyway, incase they are good advice.

1. Look over the 3 parts which lead directly to your first failed attempt, figure out why those questions were chosen and fix them.
2. Try to find ways of checking your work. If there are two ways to do the work, check that they produce the same results.
3. Be kind to the grader, the formatting of your IA should be as user friendly as possible. I found that looking at the previous EOM solutions and the practice IA provided good guidance for me on this front.
4. Defend your position. If you are providing a position, explain why it makes sense.
5. Do the balancing act of keeping sentences simple and the complicated concepts clear. A long, complicated sentence explaining a trickey issue is probably better described in several simple sentences.
6. Reread everything for clearness and completeness of communication. The most accurate calculations are worthless if you can't clearly explain them to your target audience.
7. Spend a few hours ensuring that you have answered every single component of every task. Forgetting to provide an answer is one of the easiest way to make a mistake in the IA.

Good Luck

[Anitha Desai]

Thank you so very much for your advice and suggestions, Rainula! Appreciate the time you took to write them out!
Fortunately, I know exactly why the 3 worst components were chosen. I can fix those. It's the others that I think are already as good as I can make them that I'm worried about. But I will attempt to make them clearer as you suggested.
Thanks again!

[Actuarialsuck]

Here's what helped me (and I'm not sure if others mentioned this):

1) I believe in module 5 there's a sample IA, read through those questions and read through their solutions.

2) Bullet point as much as possible.

3) Don't write huge paragraphs; walls of texts are not fun on message boards or on reports.

4) If you're writing a memo, it's not supposed to be bigger than a page, maybe a page and a half; depending how high up the corporate ladder the person is.

5) Rainula pointed this out but make sure you answer the question. A few times I felt like I did but looking back on it, I just wrote statements that defended my position without ever stating it. When the question asks you for an opinion, make sure to state that opinion as well as the support for it.