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I spent on Marcs Project at home all week

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I bumped into a lady i met at the partners meeting last week today called Lorenza, we started talking and i told her about the project

i was currently doing for Marc. She suggested i spoke to two of her connections she has who use to work at PwC ( Grant Thornton main competitor)

As my only source is their website and they aren't going to state every single service they offer their clients on it. So having the opportunity to

be told an insight of PwC from people whose previously worked their would put my research findings up a level. I also spoke with her about

how i'm trying to get in a client but the guy Steven who i wanted to get the client in for me hadn't responded to my email about my

findings and proposal to give me any feedback and it was coming to the end of my time at GT. She gave me valuable advice which i've been using ever

since to simply send another email saying " hi, just an email to see if you received my last email reguarding..." as before hand i didn't want to come

across rude or annoying by emailing them again and i didn't know what to write if i was to write an email to get their attention. As i found all these

people who work in these companies in these job positions are so busy and you need to know how to go around that fact if you need

something from them fast. So i took her advice and i got an email back the same day and it allowed me to move forward quickly, he was busy

and suggested i spoke to Marc as he had the necessary connections for the job. Also when Lorenzo joint the two networks of hers in a group email

on Linked in and introduced me to them, they didn't respond so i took those same words and inboxed one guy and he replied write away.

By the end of my GT experience i have improved my networking, intrepreneurship, decisive , and people skills the most.

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In the morning I was asked to meet Marc and the team in Finsburys office, which was amazing as the office is very slick! When I got there Marc asked if I could present what I found to the team today however, I was unable to pull up the presentation because my laptop was back at Euston. I still agreed to present as I remembered roughly what I found out and I could easily tell them the main points. I begun to tell Marc about the work I did and he stopped me and told me what I did wasn't right. He meant for to do a presentation this involved me creating a presentation of the services offered by Grant Thorntons main competitors. Marc wanted to know what services our competitors were
offering that GT weren't so he could copy the ones they didn't offer and brainstorm new services to upstage our competitors.

I felt very disappointed in myself for not listening to what he said to me, i thought I was clear on what he said and i understood at the time. This meant all the work i had done was a waste of mine and his time and i couldn't contribute potentially valuable information to the team that needed it for the work they were currently doing. I was given Marcs laptop and i begun to I enjoyed getting stuck into this project I knew it would be a big one

as it's very board and accounting firms offer a lot of services and it was difficult to instantly see what services were offered by one that weren't offered by us.

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Today I was delegated a new project, this involved me finding out about the top 10 accounting firms recruitment services as what they did in terms of recruitment that we don't. Marc wanted to know so GT can copy the things they do that we don't and come up with new ideas to up stage their competitors. I enjoyed doing this project and creating a presentation I found this task quite easy to do. I even went the extra mile by giving suggestions to how I think GT could offer that their competitors don't . I thought of some concepts they could implement to improve their recruitment services.

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Today I was given the same task from Marc that he gave me last week but for a list of different set of companies. I found this time around because I knew where I was looking and I had done it before

I work more efficiently and organised. This meant I got the work done faster and this time I was given a longer list of companies than before but I completed the a lot faster than I did before.

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Today I was back in Euston offices and I began work on a project for Marc Summers. He gave me a list of companies that are competitors with one another and I had to put all there KPI'S in a Exel table so he could see how each of the companies had the same KPI'S or if they differed. This would be interesting for him to see as it may help when he approaches one of the companies to get them as a client for GT. It gives him knowledge that they probably don't know so when he approaches them they will feel like Marc has a lot of knowledge about their industry and he could offer them valuable advice therefore they would be more inclined to want to work with him. What I struggled with was finding the KPI'S as not all of the companies had in their reports a page that is especially for their KPI'S.

This meant I took longer to complete the work and if I was a official employee at GT and I took a long time to complete a task for a partner who wanted to use this information in a meeting they had in a few hours, and I took a long time it would affect GT financially as the partner may be less likely to secure a client in without the information I needed to provide.

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Today, i went back to Grant Thornton in Euston as i was no longer needed at G.Mondiano. I got given a project from Marc Summers, he gave me a list of companies

that were eachothers competitors, he wanted me to produce a table that showed all the KPI's of these firms. This would give him an outlook on if they had the same

KPI'S or if they varied broadly. He would then use this as a potential talking point to one of the companies listed that he wants to make a client of GT.

I found the task itself simple but going through pages of reports to the KPI section was difficult on some companies as some don't include pages stating their

KPI'S. Another difficulty i had was knowing whether one KPI was the same as the other as one company would have the same KPI as the other but

they worded it differently. This really tested my business vocabulary, i did have to google search a few but because of this i improved my vocab and i'm

more clued up on what words mean what. If i knew what each word meant then i would have completed the work quicker for Marc to do his work quicker.

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This morning of today i engaged in a lil small talk with a guy in the elevator, later on at lunch time we bumped into eachother again

and got on the same elevator. This time he was with his work team, we started talking about what they did and i did. All 4 of them

were involved in a business of their own run by just them. When i started talking about my business plan the guy asked for my

number as he is highly involved within the art industry and has a lot of contacts that may be of interest to me. A women there

called Maria was an artiest so i took her contact details as i've been searching for an artiest to do work for my business. We have been

in contact and we will be meeting on Friday for coffee to discuss business further. If i didn't engage in a conversation or talk about

my business plans then i wouldn't have made the 2 potentially valuable networks i made. If i didn't make those networks then

my business may of missed out on rare opportunities.

Once I got Marias number i contacted her the same day which i feel my experience working within GT has help me to do. Throughout

my time here i've become more proactive with the things i need to do and i do them quick. This skill is key to carry on within

my business as it will be what makes my business run smoothly and take every opportunity that arises.

Today Harold Wilson came into G.Modiano to talk with the client and see how everything was with the work the associates were doing.

Whilst he was here he set up for us to be spoken to by a guy who worked within G. Modiano about exactly the business did.

He spoke about the whole process of the wool they sell and all the stages it goes through before it gets sold to their buyers.

He told us about where they source the wool one place being Australia a farm there produces high quality wall. It was interesting

to hear that they have a massive difference in their price margin for their standard quality wall to their high quality wall. When

they're selling high quality they as a business make a lot more profit.

It was valuable to hear about what the company did as an auditor Harold told us as it makes doing their accounts easier to understand,

without knowing about the company you can't expect to do the best at their accounts. These ladies had been coming to G.Modiano

for 3 years but they hadn't once been given a lesson like that on what they did. After they had been given it, one problem they were

trying to solve become apparent and they knew how they should go about it.

After i had finished all my work i had been delegated, i was allowed to work on my project i had been working on for GT. That was researching

a potential client and pulling together more research, i told Jenny what i was trying to do and she sent me a report that

i wouldn't be able to get otherwise without paying for it.  This gave me a lot of insight and valuable pointers I drew upon, if i didn't tell Jenny

my project then i wouldn't have got that report then i wouldn't have made a strong report on this business to justify my proposal.

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Today

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Today in the morning on the elevator i engaged in a lil small talk with a man on it. Later at lunch time i got back into the elevator at the same time

as the same man i spoke to this morning, this time he was with his work associates. We all spoke and got into the topic of what they did what i did,

they all were involved in a small business run by just them 4 and one of them was a women called Maria who was an artiest and the man i spoke to

initially is involved with the art world and has a lot of networks. I have been looking to work with an artiest for my business to create designs for it.

He asked me for my contact number so he could invite me to an art event he was going to soon of some sort. I also got Maria's contact number

and i've been talking with her arranging a time to talk over coffee about her potentially doing work for me. If i didn't bump into these people

or i didn't engage in a conversation i wouldn't have made 2 new connections that may be able to open doors for my business.

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Day off to attend Action Jacksons and Jr master class.

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Today I continued with the work i did yesterday throughout the entire day in the same room.

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Today was my first day at a clients office in Liverpool Str, it didn't start well as i wasn't told to bring my laptop to the new location so i didn't.

I left the laptop back in Euston, so i had to go back and get it. This didn't give off a good first impression to the team i would be working with

for the week. If i had used my instinct and common knowledge to bring along the laptop this would have saved me time and allow me to

finish more work than i did. When i arrived back at Liverpool street I was set the same type of work i did the first week for Harold, but

these were the accounts for G.Modiano.

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Today was the final day of my first week at GT, today my day was different from previous days. I was invited to a partners meeting

by Marc which was very exciting! Before hand he told me to read through the meeting subject matter.

I fully enjoyed the work I did today it's the type of work I value because i learnt about Grant Thornton as a business. I learnt

what steps/objectives they're currently working on in the business to achieve X target by year end. I learnt what was the most

important aspects within GT, their driving force, and what makes it's successful.

Before the meeting we had lunch and i got a chance to network with the other partners within GT, I spoke to each

individual in the room and got to know about them as people. I was impressed with my networking ability, how I am completely

confident and confident talking to new people regardless of who or how 'powerful' they may be career wise. I think it's because

of the type of person i always have been naturally, I'm genuinely interested in getting to know a individual and that i think

shows to a person.

If I was more introverted and didn't network as easy as i do then it would have left me looking awkward and

out of place which may have rubbed off on someone else in the room. That would create a bad first impression and i wouldn't

have got to know the partners of GT and this may play as a disadvantage to me in future days.

During the meeting I got involved and asked a few questions which were appreciated and said to be good points. I

didn't want to ask a bunch of questions as the meeting isn't for me and it would be selfish to do so. Luckily, i didn't have an

urge to ask any more questions than the ones i made as i listened and they explained things very well.

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The morning of today I got straight to the work I had been working on for Harold. Within this work I got to the point where i had to complete a

reconciliation, this was a method I appreciated I had the opportunity to learn. This method is used for transactions that appear on one side of accounts

and not the other. Once you've listed all of the transactions your next move is to contact the bank about refunding the business is owes or get the business

to. What your aim is at the end of the process is to get both the bank and the business/client to agree to the accounts/transactions in both of their

books.

What became evident today was how I did make sure I understood the work i did but i made a conscious effort to problem solves any

problems that arrived before i jumped for help. This showed that i was building upon my responsibility and making my brain work, i have

in the past been guilty of taking the quick route to solve my problem. One improvement i wanted to make was the paste i did the auditing work

at, on day 3 i was starting to get a real flow of the work. I found myself unconsciously doing the work in a more organised way, now that the

paperwork became familiar and i knew what each paper in front of me was. It became easy to find what i needed confidently. It became clear

the reason i was so slow was that i wasn't confident and that is natural to do new things slowly.

If i was now given accounts to do i know i'd get them done in a day. Then the next time a few hours.  The basics of auditing a businesses finances, will help me when i have my own business because one thing i previously would have stated as my weakness was managing my own finances. Now i know how to do them for my own business and why it's

important. What i recognised I did often was ask a lot of 'why' questions and because of this I know the detail

and reason behind accounting. When I was going through the clients accounts i found myself wondering 'oh that's alot to be spending on that'

' mmm, you could have saved money on that' it was interesting to me because you are basically reading a small story about this business.

I was impressed by my behaviour and attitude during the auditing work i was doing, it is known that completing audits isn't work i'm passionate about.

It isn't exciting work but whilst i was doing the work i genuinely enjoyed the process and i appreciated the work i was given because it's a skill

that i don't have or know much about. If I didn't hold the energy and enthusiasm i had i wouldn't have received the extra knowledge I asked for, being enthusiastic

each day meant i held a sense of curiosity which made me ask a lot of questions and really listen to the answers. I was interested in finding out

as much as i could about what they knew that i didn't.

I spent my lunch with Marc Summers ( partner ) and we spoke about me and my business ambitions and he challenged me with difficult questions

which i liked. I didn't have answers for all his questions and i did struggle but i really liked how he was a straight and direct talking person. When i

struggled on one specific question I felt embarrassed, i didn't completely understand the question and i felt disappointed in myself that i didn't.

If this was a potential investor they wouldn't take me seriously, they would see me as a amateur and child. I wanted to

make a good first impression on Marc as an entrepreneur but i didn't feel like i did, although i was honest i felt i could have conducted myself in

a better more professional and mature manner. I found myself acting a lil dipsy and childish around Marc, i'm not sure why! I'm aware of that now so

this is one aspect of my behaviour i will consciously work on in future days with Marc and other professionals.

I also asked him a lot of questions about what he did and how he got to the position he's in now. When he told me all the things you can do as an accountant it

excited me because it was so relevant to the skills and activities you do as a business owner. It made me realise that i would enjoy and thrive

as an accountant!

After lunch ended, being asked challenging questions left me querying myself on the questions he ask. I feel hungry to come up with the answers for the success of my business.

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The end of day 2 and i had a fantastic day! Today I continued working on yesterdays audits for the day.

I spent lunch with Daniel who straight off asked me "where are we having lunch?" I responded " i don't know, where do you want to go?"

For the mean time we skipped lunch and took a walk around London, he asked me a bunch of questions to think about.

These questions were under the lines of what I would like to get out of my work placement. I listed a few things and he asked how will

I achieve that? What can I do NOW to take a step towards achieving that. After our walk i had a lot of ideas and actions I wanted to take

to achieve those objectives i had, to really seize this opportunity I had been given. David did very well at pulling out information from me and

challenging me so I could challenge myself. Luckily I had lunch with David on day 2 because I believe this lunch is what made me seize all

opportunities possible from working at GT. He pulled all my personal objectives to the full front of my mind and they stuck. If I didn't have lunch

with David until the final week I may not have been so pro active with achieving the aims I wanted. I may have not challenged my mind from the start

to think up what I really wanted to achieve at GT.

We walked back to where we began and he asked me again " where are we going for lunch?" i again responded by saying i didn't know.

He said Sinead you need to be decisive that's one fundamental rule GT value. It was a test from the beginning, i smiled and thought ah he's got me!

I loved that he tested me because i will never forget that day and i will now always be decisive.I've never been tested like that before, small but effective.

Since that i made sure i was decisive on every single opportunity, when I went to lunch with Marc the following day he asked where i wanted lunch

i straight away answered " we're going to PRET!"

After my lunch with Daniel my mind was clear one what I needed to do now to get what i want and it stayed that way. This type of attitude will follow

throughout my career and life,  to be clear in my mind what i want to get and how i will get it.

My first step to achieving one aim was to get some work from the marketing department. So once lunch ended I emailed members of the

marketing department asking if it was possible.

I also sent an email out to a women who deals with school/graduate leaving programmes for GT and told her about my position and interest

in a job. Finding a gap within the firm and making an impact followed throughout the month, it involved a lot more research and thinking but if you refer to

'actions i took to achieve my aims' you can read in depth steps to how I tried to achieve them.

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Day 1

It's the end of my first day at GT and it has gone well, I stayed until 6.30 out of choice as time flew by!

In the morning I met with Harold Wilson ( GT partner) and Ava ( partner- Marc summer's assistant) we went through the work i'd be doing the next 4 weeks and gave me a tour.

The environment of the Audit department was unexpected. Everyone was zoned into their work,as i walked around,

which is completely different to what I'm use to at college/school. Usually the teacher gets everyone to stop what

they're doing to introduce the newbee.

In a work environment time is money and that was clear from the get go.

I was introduced to Tina who works closely with Harold and in Harolds words "she is a one of the nicest and most patient ladies you will ever meet." Tina demonstrated and supported me through the audit work i worked on for the day.

The work was pretty basic but It did take a while for me to complete compare to someone like Tina who would complete it in minutes.

I worked slow as which irritated me a little because I wanted to zip through it ( run before i can walk mind set I need to work on) I'm aware when need to take your time when you're learning something new to avoid mistakes. I learnt to be patient with myself and do the work right.  "There's no such thing as a stupid question." a commonly repeated phrase said to me throughout the day there.

I enjoyed the company of Ava and her work friends at lunch who I quickly clicked with and felt comfortable with. They were all smart, fun and friendly people like the rest of the associates there, they were young and down to earth too. I assumed maybe the audit department would be full of men who are reserved but it wasn't like that at all.

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From day 1 I spent my spare minutes reading their web page

that you can only access on their computers. I didn't look

for anything I learnt about what GT have done, are doing and are planning to do. To find a way to make an impact to the firm I needed to know the firm to date.

I knew once I had their knowledge, my entrepreneurial mindset would puzzle together a strategy to making an impact.

I networked with associates I worked near and asked the right questions to learn more about GT. I needed to know more than what was wrote by GT on their website. I learned about personal experience within GT, what associates did, how the associates think, and their motives/mind-set for working. This also told me know what was expected of me if I was to secure a job there.

One question I asked one associate after he explained his job role was "  Are you allow to bring in your own clients?" he responded " yeah but I don't" I asked why and he said "I don't know, no associates rarely do."

I only asked this initially because if I was an audit associate that's one challenge which would excite me!

I didn't yet know this would be the seed to my later personal project to making an impact.

Securing a job within the marking department was my initial aim because i know my personal strengths/skills were suited to marketing. Marketing is a creative department and would allow me to use my creative way of thinking and my past achievements have involved winning marketing competitions which i strived at and enjoyed.

My month long work placement was agreed under the auditing department so I took it on myself to find out whose the best person to contact. I sent emails and made a few visits to try and secure some marketing work. I wanted to get given a project or help with some work so I had the opportunity to impress and make a good  first impression, to better my chances of a official job.

I emailed Marc Summers one of my work placement employers, about my aim to get work from the marketing department. He invited me to talk over lunch, during this time I got the opportunity to ask a bunch of questions about what he does and how he got where he did. His job role excited me so much! I learned so much more about being an auditor and a partner and what it takes to thrive within that position. I ended up knowing if any department suited my ability and skills the most it was auditing.

Working on audits didn't excite me but everything else which is more valued and important like building trust with clients and knowing strategies of how a business can expand did. More importantly the knowledge and skills i'd learn will support my main goal of starting up my own businesses. After this meeting I decided against my initial aim of getting a job in the marketing department, instead i wanted one within audit.

One key point I took from this meeting with Marc which followed my project to make an impact was him telling me about how partners specialise within their own sector of client. He dealt with large retail clients, whilst Harold Wilson deals with a more wide spread type of client that includes small start-up businesses.

Later that day I got my idea of how I can make an impact. My idea/challenge I come up with was to bring in a client for GT before I leave. I knew this would make a financial impact and later i would discover it would create an creative one to. I already knew that associates rarely brought in their own, and that bringing in clients is what is most value/important. If I did it then that would be a big enough achievement for me.

From Marcs chat I begun to think what category of client if I was a accountant would I specialise in. From reading GT's unlocking the growth agenda i found out that their clients say Grant Thornton are at their best when they 'share an experienced point of view.' I interpret that to mean not just that someone is experienced but share a common experience with the client and you've had experience yourself in the clients field. After reading the points their clients made I knew my advantage would be with a type of client that can relate to me that could be having a similar age as each other.

I thought back to my experience pitching for investment for my Youtube channel based business. I remembered how the panel were unaware of making money through Youtube channels. They were shocked when I told them how much existing channels were making.  I knew from research that many young people were making a hell of money through AdSense it is the new emerging business client, which will continue to expand and grow.

At this point, I thought dealing with high earning youtube channel owners would be a suitable type of client. Most are young and probably are earning more money than they know how to manage therefore they need account management. Also as a successful channel it's difficult for most to know how they can expand. These are businesses that need the most help from services that GT offer.

I assumed that this type of client hadn't been fulfilled yet by GT (because they're all mature in age and unaware ;) ) No, i believed that there was a high possibility that nobody had thought of bringing in this type of client.

So i sent emails to people within GT who specialised within digital businesses to find out if they have already covered all the youtube channel businesses or not.

I ended up on my second week in on Tuesday having a informative and detailed phone call with Steven Leith, who deals with digital clients. I found out he has only done work for 2 youtube channels. He gave me many important pointers to what are suitable/unsuitable clients and what i need to figure out before I decide to approach any client.

I asked him to talk me through how he goes about getting a client he told me that he has to think "how can I benefit this business?" i had to think of what I can offer the client because that's all the client cares about. To build a good/trusting relationship with a client I needed to do in depth research, to come up with a strategy to how this business can grow and improve. This I can then propose to the client to get their attention and if they like the idea then this will create that first step stone to get them to sign up to one of our services contracts.

After my call with Steven I had a full action plan of what i need to do. I spent that night deciding my target client and researching into their business, them as a person, their ethics, their objectives, why they do what they do, and finally what they would want the most that i could offer then. This really tested my intrapreneurial skills and i had to think innovatively!

After 1 day i sent Steven an email back with my innovative proposition he could propose to the client. Whilst i waited for his feedback on my initial proposition I continued to gather as much entail on the business that i could use to back up my proposition. Whilst i worked at G. Modiano with 3 lovely ladies one being Jenny, when there was no work more for me to do Jenny helped me with my project by sending me GAME's report. I read through reports, webpages and gathered a solid justification why my scheme would work and why they would benefit from this scheme.

Steven responded on my 3rd week after i sent another email with a lil prompt, he said that it would be beneficial to find someone within GT who has one of the potential clients as a network. He suggested Marc Summers as he presented for a audit with GAME last year. Marc did mention that to me before but i didn't get Marc involved at that point because stupidly i assumed he wouldn't be at all interested and he's a very busy man.

After Steven gave me a heads up to bring the idea to Marc i went and did just that. Since then i had a phone call with Marc he said for me to summarise the proposal and he'll send it to GAME, which is fantastic.

Conclusion:

My three aims at the start were to make a financial/creative impact to the firm,  find a missing gap within the organisation and seek a solution formula for it, and secure a job within the marketing department.

Overall I have gone beyond my aims, I have discovered a gap within the organisation and that is the untapped digital Youtube client and i've created a solution for that untapped market. I haven't finished the job of making a impact by the end of the month but it will continue on until it's finished regardless if i'm on work placement or not. I haven't secured a job within marketing but i discovered that i no longer want to, i found out that i now would like a job within auditing because it will support my dream of owning my own businesses by strengthening my business knowledge and skillset.

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- Make a creative or financial impact for the firm by the time I leave

- Find a solution for a missing gap within Grant Thornton

- Secure a job within the marketing department

- Take full responsibility for everything I do

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Grant Thornton is one of the top 4 account firms in the world alongside PwC, Deloitte, and KPMG.

They're the world’s leading organisations of independent assurance, tax and advisory firms.
These firms help dynamic organisations unlock their potential for growth by
providing meaningful, forward-thinking advice. Proactive teams, led by
approachable partners in these firms, use insights, experience and instinct to
understand complex issues for privately owned, publicly listed and public sector
clients and help them to find solutions