Institutional Sales & Distribution Apprentice Review

- Institutional Sales & Distribution Apprentice within M&G's Fixed Income team. - Keeping a track record of upcoming meetings & pitches and recording the results of these once they've occured and making sure contact and said outcomes are recorded to the CRM. Assisting with the answering of consultant information email and phone requests. - Asking sales directors about their upcoming meetings in referance to their calendar entries and discussing meeting notes and outcomes in order to then add to records as stated above in daily tasks. Communicating with sales support in order to ensure slides are kept upto date and to assist them with turning around pitch packs in time for director's pitches and client updates. Recieving reffered data requests or searching tasks from the directors, and then responding to clients/ consultants. - Recieving and responding directly to eternal consultants regarding data requests or fund queries. - Keeping sales, CRM and consultant databases up to date and assisting sales support and the distribution team where they need. - A CRM database trial I have created, aimed at encouraging the sales directors to input detailled notes, attendees and outcome results to the CRM for all relevant meetings. This is a long term project that I will try to alter over time to make easy as possible for the directors to use. - Update sales trackers and slide update checklists, respond to any consultant request tasks, assit distribution and sales support where needed.

- Currently studying for the IOC and am doing the ongoing NVQ through day to day work. - Attending M&G run auditorium educational lectures regularly, whenever they are available and posted. Organising small group tutorin sessions with various experts in their field when they are available. - Doing the IOC, investment 2020 hosts a few lectures/ training days externally. - Technical skills are developing through my job role, lectures, IOC studying and asking lots of questions. Personal skills are also developing through internal and external contact, for example, communication skills have improved due to responding to external consultants via phone and email. - Have learned the above skills and am undersanding the finaincial industry, and specific terms and practices much more every week.

- The work I have set is good because it is varied and elements of it will be different every day. Some pieces of ongoing updating work eg. checklists, can become a bit tedious, but when they are proved useful, it is fine. - The team is great, very knowledgable but also approachable, offering a very good exposure for me to learn from. Very accomidating with a friendly atomosphere created. - M&G's culture is great, very pro- education and very well geared to accept and develop young learners. They encourage personal development and inspire great team preformance. - Very well, I am enjoying my role as I expected I would. - Yes, however I am very keen and inspired to educated myself quickly and to reach more important roles that require a bit more responsibility and challenge.

- My manager appreciates any good work that I produce or assist him with, and gives credit to work I have completed well, proving value. - Feedback is given to my manager and then passed on to myself if I have worked well for someone or impressed them, this regonition is encouraging. - Consultants that are happy with the answers and responses I reply to them with are very thankful in their calls and emails, valuing my help. - Although new to the company, if I have shown promise in a specific area of work that I have previously assisted on, there is often the chance to contribute to similar future task more often. Challenges and involvement are available if you first earn the responsibility. - Yes, based on praise and thanks I do feel valued and feel tha my work is useful to the company.

- The induction is clear and welcome emails along with manager's guidance set me up well for the start of my scheme. - Education training available internally is brilliant, although the external qualifications provider has been relatively confusing and not structured brilliantly in my opinion so far, however this does now seem to be playing out and making more sense now I am 3 months in to the scheme. - My manager offers great support when I need it, whether it be regarding technical queries, or more personal career questions. - Task delegation and team structure are very good at M&G, making everything clear and everyone's job role and expertise well known so you know where to go or who to ask if you have a query.

- I have received 2 monthly meetings with Kaplan and these are used to get paper work and evidence collecting done. - Email accessibility to a tutor or admin representitive is good and most queries I have had have been answered well and quickly. - Although it felt a bit all over the place initially, the support and attitude has been great and I am now clear on wha lays ahead and what I must get on with before my upcoming exams. - I am enjoying the chance to learn and develop my technical skills, as I know that this is the way I will be able to open doors to process up through the bussiness, into more advanced roles ijn the future.

- My team and manager ofer great support and both are very accomidating and happy to listen to any queries or issues you may have. - HR are good for answering questions and sorting out any career or development realted queries. - HR and my team are always available to go and visit, call up, or email - so are very accessible. - Everybody in my team, HR and my manager are more than happy to help with my questions aslong as they have the spare time.

- The salary does just about cover my monthly living expenditure, but definietly leaves nothing left over. - The salary amount is a lot tighter on people like myself that live away from parents in the expensive city of London, as aposed to people on the same wage that don't have half of my living costs. - There is sometimes pressure from the salary, restricting how much I can get involved with collegues in out of work activities. - However, I am meeting my basic living expenses currently.

- There are great opportunities in London for who ever you are and what ever you enjoy doing. The location of M&G is very good for getting involved with city lfie and also external sports and activities. - M&G offers lots of chances to mingle with collegues at external drinks, events and sports groups.

Yes

- The chance to start work in a leading investment company is a great opportunity for anyone interested in a career in investments. - Education and development are made a top priority by the company, giving you the chance to improve your knowledge and progress through the company's hireachy structure with success. - The working environment is a good balance between effective and enjoyable.

- Be clear as to why you want to take part in M&G's scheme, common meaningless answers are not enough, you have to actually want to develop a career here, as it is hard work and requires motivation to learn and succeed. - Discuss any life experiences on your CV and at your interview that show positive personal or core skills, not just a list of qualifications, often a good set of core communication skills prove much more valuable.