William considers the Chartered Wealth Manager award, which he received at our annual awards ceremony at the Mansion House, London on 9 April 2018, to be his biggest achievement to date. He is particularly proud of completing not only our highest-level qualification, but also doing so “alongside a demanding work schedule”. The award follows another exceptional achievement that helped him kick-start his career in finance almost three years ago: a First Class Honours Bachelor of Science in Accounting and Finance at the University of York.
William’s interest in finance was instilled in him from a young age by his parents, who work in the sector. He was further inspired by a mock share trading game he participated in while at university. The game involved identifying macro movements, sector and geographical trends, researching companies and allocating weightings to companies in his team’s portfolio. The game may have been only theoretical, but there were real-life lessons to be learnt from it and it set him on the path to a career in financial services.
While at university, he completed a 14-month industrial placement within UBS Global Asset Management. “I worked within the financial reporting team, responsible for compiling and distributing reports across the many business areas. Realising that I enjoyed working closely with colleagues more than interpreting and refining financial data, I decided I wanted to be in a client-facing role, which guided me towards a role in investment management.”
Realising that I enjoyed working with colleagues, I decided I wanted to be in a client- facing role
He joined Brown Shipley on a graduate scheme in September 2015. “Working within the investment management team, I am heavily involved in the process of managing our clients’ portfolios. This requires a strong understanding of financial instruments and ultimately of the investments that we use to manage our client portfolios, which the CISI qualification provides. What I also liked about the qualification was the application of the knowledge learnt to practical examples and how the objectives of clients can be best met.”
William intends to focus now on moving forward at Brown Shipley, achieving training and competence sign-off and beginning the process of gaining the requisite experience and knowledge to build his own client book. “As part of the process, I am also aiming to become a client manager,” he says.
“Another focus I have revolves around technology and the impact that it will have on our sector. Over the coming years, as the digitalisation process expands, technology will become increasingly influential in guiding the offering and services that firms provide. With this in mind and in the context of my existing good technological knowledge, I have begun to learn Swift code – Apple’s coding language. As the financial services sector changes, I am aiming to help it move forward by developing apps that can be utilised to improve efficiency and the way people work.”
This article was first published in the Q2 2018 print edition of The Review. The print edition is available to all members who opt in to receive it, except student members. All eligible members who would like to receive future editions in the post should log in to MyCISI, click on My Account/Communications and set their preference to 'Yes'.