Hi everyone! My name is Veda and I am currently a Master’s student at the ICMA Centre, studying the brand new MSc Finance and Financial Technology (FinTech) programme. In this blog, I will give you an overview of the careers and extracurricular events I took part in since I commenced my studies in October.

Every day there are several events going on in the business school and at the ICMA Centre. In fact, there are way more events than you can possibly attend. It is hard to choose between one or another actually! The careers team hosts several themed employer panels. This includes consulting, city finance, marketing, data analytics etc. They are all evening events and normally take place after 6pm. So, you won’t have to miss out on crucial lectures to attend these talks. After each session there is a question and answers panel so you can ask all sorts of question about work life, pay, challenges of working in specific industry etc.

Graduate schemes! If I were you, be it an international student or local (EU/ UK) student, I’d apply to graduate schemes prior to starting your course (perhaps 2- 3 companies). The reason is, you will have a better understanding of the UK job market before you begin your studies. There will be quite a few tests (logical reasoning, critical thinking, numerical and verbal skills), so if you apply to a few companies prior to your studies, you can understand where you are struggling and ask appropriate questions to the Henley careers team so that they can help sort out those issues.

The careers consultants, such as Dan Kiernan provide you with several websites and links that can help you with your job application process as soon as you get an offer to study at the ICMA centre! So look out for the Henley Careers’ WhatsApp and Facebook groups once you get your offer and make sure to book an appointment with the consultants.

Thanks to Dan’s inputs and in-house recruitment done by companies at Henley Business School, I already have a graduate role in a consulting company beginning in September 2020. So, yes, utilise the careers team, they are an awesome bunch!! Also, be on the lookout for roles that interest you, for example, in my case it would be consulting, data analytics and technology roles within the finance industry.

Not to brag or anything, but, this course enables you to be extremely employable and a perfect candidate for a lot of sectors like consulting, investment banking, technology, data analytics and asset/wealth management! Lots of banks these days have special technology department which look to recruit people with coding/programming skills (especially in python), so having a Master’s in FinTech is super appropriate for future proofing your career. If you are not into technology, you can always select more modules in pure finance for example in commodities, derivatives or energy finance. You will have the option to select modules for semester 2, so you can tailor course according to your career aspirations and interests.

I recently had interviews for data analytics role in a telecommunications company (no offers yet, they take a while!), and the reason for that is you can transfer the coding knowledge gained in this course to industries other than finance.

If you want to be a trader, then in semester 1, you have the opportunity to take a certification in Bloomberg and Reuters terminals. Other than that, there is also a 10% trading simulation module for stocks, futures and options (SFO)! It’s super fun and you can put into practice the theory you have learnt in lectures to real life scenarios. There is also the finance and investment society which host several influential people within the finance industry to give talks on trends, career advice, application tips, etc. You can find more information about them via the Reading University Students Union website (RUSU).

Find out more about the Master’s in Finance and Financial Technology programme here.