What do you want to do tomorrow / when you grow up / graduate? For many people it seems like the answer to these questions change on a daily basis. Most Tepper students are career switchers and many have little formal business background. As we’re exposed to new aspects of business people’s preference change rather quickly. I think I was born to work in Finance though. I grew up discussing the stock market at the dinner table with my parents. They would talk about the companies they owned and why. I learned a valuable lesson from them, know what you own and own what you know. Instead of getting the usual pair of socks and sweaters from my grandparents I got shares of Gillette now P&G. I thought in undergrad I wanted to go to New York City and work on Wall St. Movies like Boiler Room and Wall St. were constantly in my DVD player. What I didn’t realize was 100 hour work weeks = 68 hours of everything else.
Once I got to Tepper I knew I wanted to be on the “buy-side”. I have taken classes like Investment Analysis and Financial Statements and Fundamental Analysis that are critical for one to be successful in the field. I also took the CFA level I and passed, whew that made mini 4 very interesting. Then I went to my internship at Highmark Inc. I was hired by a recent alum from the program, highlighting the strength of the Tepper network. I was initially going to work on a project related to Asset Management but things change and I was put on a project working with Corporate Development. Wow, I thought I had everything figured out again and now I’m a little unsure again about how to proceed going forward. While Corporate Development and Asset Management are both Finance related jobs they are on the opposite spectrums of Finance.
I can’t say enough good things about my time at Highmark. The work was extremely interesting and challenging and I gained a great insight into maneuvering through a large corporation. My mentor arranged meetings with several high ranking employees ranging from the CEO to the head of their Treasury department. It was a great summer and I am waiting to hear if the positions I’m interested in will have the budget to hire additional personnel next year, keep your fingers crossed. Meanwhile, I can’t stay complacent and am sending out resumes to a few select companies, time to work on my cover letters.

