Daisy D.
About me
| Daisy D. | |
| Mathematics | |
| Mathematics and Finance | |
| Undergraduate | |
| Vanbrugh | |
| 2009 | |
| United Kingdom |
My employment
| Product Consultant - Team Leader - US & Education | |
| Financial Times | |
| United Kingdom | |
| Journalism and publishing | |
| 2011 | |
| £24000 | |
| £38000 |
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A day in the life of a Product Consultant - Team Leader - US & Education in the United Kingdom
My career history
I worked at a small IT consultancy company (London) for 2 and a half years, straight after graduation. I started on the graduate scheme and rotated around a few departments (sales, project management, customer services). After 18 months I was offered a permanent role as Head of Customer Services, which was a challenge as previously there had been no CS team. It was a fantastic opportunity as I was able to build a team as well as have influence over the direction of the business.
I decided to look for new opportunities to keep up the momentum of progression in my career, so towards the end of 2011 I accepted a job at the Financial Times as a Product Consultant within their B2B digital sales team. I was quickly promoted to a Team Leader and now split my time between London and New York.
Where I hope to be in 5 years
I have no idea what I want to do for my ‘career’, but I am happy with what I am doing now, and will likely stay at the FT for a while. The great thing about working for a large company is that there are lots of opportunities for progression or a career move, so I suppose I will just see what happens. Ideally I would love to do some further study and start my own business, I just need a good idea.
My advice to students considering work
For existing students, I would recommend trying to get involved in some group or team activities or organising an event. This should not, however, get in the way of your degree. You could have organised the Fresher’s Ball on your own, but no one will care if you fail your degree. I suppose it’s about having a good balance.
My advice about working in my industry
For journalism in general, print is visibly reducing. The online business is growing very fast, so if you can get any experience working with IT (even writing your own blog) this can certainly help.
What I do
The main responsibility of the Product Consultant team is to provide training and support for FT.com Corporate Clients. My role within the team is to manage the US product consultants, and oversee the service for all Education clients. As my team is in the US, I have recently spent a large amount of time in New York, but I have also visited clients in San Diego, Paris, and Stockholm. The day-to-day of my job involves attending meetings about the strategy of the team or department, talking to my team in New York, or chatting to clients. My whole day is normally taken up by talking to people.
Skills I use and how I developed them
My degree was hugely important in getting my first job. The combination of mathematics and finance was suitable for the role, as it was a fairly complex service being offered to the Finance sector. I think my employers thought that I would be able to grasp the concept quickly, and I had a solid understanding about financial markets. The level of my degree was also important – I have down some hiring and I would not employ someone with a degree grade lower than a 2.1. I was an active part of my college’s JCR and this very simply gave me something to talk about in the interview.
Degree skills:
I definitely developed my problem-solving skills during my degree, which looking back has been very valuable for my career progression. Showing that you can stay cool under pressure and think logically about a problem will impress any employer.
Extracurricular skills:
I developed my presentation skills and my overall confidence by being a part of the JCRC in my first and second year.
What I like most
I most like that I get to travel to some fantastic cities, and can spend all day doing what I love - talking!
What I like least
Working for a large company can have its challenges (FT has around 1,000 employees globally, but Pearson, who own the FT, employs over 40,000). Everyone at the FT has a specific job to do, and it can often be difficult to expand your responsibilities, especially with such fierce competition from my colleagues.
What would I change? I would change nothing! I graduated during the recession, and thought it was all going to go downhill. If I had graduated during a boom, it’s likely I would be working in finance having joined a graduate scheme straight out of university. I can’t think of anything worse now – I just took the opportunities as they came to me and am very happy with the experience I have and the progression I have made.
Next steps...
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