We have heard many seasoned investors telling us that we are heading our way into the next financial crisis as many “cans of worms” have been opened around the world. What has happened in the financial markets last few months need no further elaboration from us. Despite all this market turmoil, it is heartening to see SpringBoard continuing to produce success stories!
In this series, we feature success stories of Shane and Sophie, and a testimonial from Rei. Pay special attention to their good mindset and see how their passion drives them to persevere against all odds to achieve what they want in life…
Shane – from a local securities firm to regional brokerage firm
Shane was a young and diligent intern of SpringBoard and was already featured as a success story in our post last year. After he successfully made his career switch, he did not forget SpringBoard’s motto to “Continue Learning and Keep On Networking”. He constantly kept in close touch with his mentors and also came back to provide useful advice to his juniors. Shortly after joining the local securities firm, he was approached to join a regional brokerage firm. He is now covering some large-cap names and confidently speaking with clients.
Sophie- from Trust Associate (back-office) to equity Research Analyst
Sophie started our Mentorship Programme while working as a trust associate in a bank. Given her education in Engineering as opposed to a finance degree, she was perceived to be disadvantaged among our pool of interns. Despite her lack of relevant background knowledge and heavy workload in a back-office job, she diligently worked on assignments from SpringBoard mentors. She was privileged to have learnt from multiple SpringBoard mentors- Jessie, Val, Keith, Ruishan and Yoman. She made up for the difference in the background by working extra hard and sacrificing much personal time to focus on work she is truly passionate about. She eventually received an offer from a securities firm starting as an Equity Research Analyst. We are very happy with her achievement and are confident that she will continue to prove herself to her bosses with her passion.
REI – a good example of Continue Learning and Keep On Networking
I would like to show my deep appreciation to Yoman for your advice when I approached you for help to switch my career from investment operations to an investment analyst.
Two years ago, despite having invested a lot on an MBA and passed CFA level 2 exams, I was still unable to get an internal transfer nor an external position to something more analytical. Yoman not only took his time to look at my resume, gave me career advice but also introduced me to Joyce, a private equity mentor to coach me on her industry over two months.
The experience I had with Joyce was much more than what I expected. Through the mentorship, Joyce has not only taught me many technical know-how that I never get to learn in my MBA, but she also demonstrated to me the work attitude necessary for her success. From the sessions I had with her, I had a clearer understanding of my gap in both knowledge and soft skills to the private equity industry I wanted to get in earlier. With the new attitude to work I acquired from Joyce, shortly after the mentorship program ended, I had an opportunity to a middle office position in another asset management office where I am now.
In this new office, I gradually proved myself with the quality of work I deliver in portfolio analytics and managed to convince my fund managers to allow me to do research for them on an ad-hoc basis. Thanks to Joyce’s technical training earlier, I managed to do up full research reports with little help from my fund managers.
My mentorship from Springboard didn’t end after the two months. Yoman and Joyce continued to give me valuable advice when I met them up. One important lesson Yoman taught me was that research analyst might not be the best route I should go into. It took me some time to figure out the essence of the advice and uncover where I should be to master my success. With this clearer direction, I continue to offer extra analytics work to my fund managers on top of my core work so that I can gain more credibility for myself in the area of analytics and quant where I wish to master.
To all of us in this field, let’s continue to give the best attitude in what we do, stay humble to keep learning while never stop seizing opportunities for ourselves to be better than yesterday. A million thanks to Yoman, Joyce and Springboard for giving me this learning about life that I wasn’t able to find anywhere else but from Springboard mentors.
