Associate, Wealth Advisory Review

My role as an associate within Wealth Advisory will vary day to day as this is a client-orientated role. Typical responsibilities involve communicating and working alongside financial advisers and providers, helping to facilitate investment and pension processes, undertaking mathematical analysis relating to cash management and overall investments and regularly sit in on client meetings.

My technical understanding and knowledge of finance has expanded but most importantly, I have developed my professionalism. I consider myself to have good communication skills and interpersonal skills, which help to ensure I can contribute accordingly to the team and work towards our targets. However, I have noticed a huge improvement within this area of my personality, which makes me much more confident in my ability to deliver a good job. My organisation skills are a priority within this role and throughout my time at Grant Thornton, I have ensured I continue to always remain organised with work and my punctuality, which I have seen a huge improvement in.

The main purpose for my year out in the industry, not only relating to my career prospects but also to learn as much as possible and gain a deeper understanding of the financial industry and how the industry is segregated and work out which areas of finance I consider my strongest and where I see myself likely working within. I have learnt more than I could have imagined, surrounded by professional advisers with many years experience, all willing to help me and guide me through my time here at Grant Thornton. I would say it has been arguably one of the best experiences of my life to date.

Because Wealth Advisory is not as big as most of the teams within Grant Thornton, staff wise, I feel very valued and highly regarded from my colleagues based off the feedback received throughout my time at Grant Thornton and my consistency to always produce a high level of work.

Considering it is a client-orientated role and the time required by advisers to sacrifice towards client meetings etc. etc. I would say the programme is very well organised. I feel this is because of the dedication of my line manager to ensure I never felt out of place. My only experiences from lack of structure have come due to the fact that I'm the first London Wealth Advisory placement student, therefore I can imagine the difficulty for advisers to continuously set me new tasks and projects etc.

I receive a substantial amount of support, when needed. When I started at Grant Thornton, I was trained up by the centralised support staff in the Sheffield office. They spent a week getting me into the operation of Wealth Advisory. Once I started working in London I was then subsequently sent up again and trained more on areas I felt I didn't understand initially. Support is always at hand at Grant Thornton.

My line manager was the first point of contact and would always make himself available to discuss any concerns or issues I had. Grant Thornton have dedicated contact teams for colleagues who may feel their confidential issues need to be expressed. They ensure you are treated well.

The remuneration I have been in receipt of more than meets my expenditure, Grant Thornton pay competitively across the board.

There are vast amounts of opportunities for colleagues to express themselves within the firm, as well as work produced. For example, football tournaments are arranged every year for all offices nationally to compete against each other.

Yes

Because Grant Thornton is one of few firms, in my experience, that like to consider personality as well as academic records and work experience. This aspect of Grant Thornton I believe is the key driver to their success because the work ethic of colleagues and how colleagues converse amongst each other and build rapport with one another makes operations within the firm efficient.

Be yourself always.