Friday, *again*??
So, here's the latest round-up...
1) Trying to decide between Audit and Tax. Apparently Tax people study for the same qualification, work shorter hours from their own office rather than working at clients' sites, and get paid more. But Audit is a more transferable experience. Any thoughts?
2) A friend of Mum's has just been telling me how abusive the Job Centre people were to her husband when he was claiming JSA. I guess I can manage without it.
3) I'm looking at diagrammatic reasoning tests, like here. They're incredibly difficult in places, even with the answers, though the second one went much better than the first.
4) I went to buy the FT, cos I feel like I ought to be at present. Took the car the mile or so to Tesco, because of the weather, and just as well: no FT there. So I drove the mile or so the other way to Somerfield. No FT there. So I walked to WHSmith, where I finally found a solitary copy. Hurrah.
5) Seems a bit strange that success in finding a job should at least in part be predicated on whether one can be bothered to trail around looking for newspapers...
6) But, now I come to think about it, it's all very well saying we should read the FT and improve our business awareness, but how can one tell which are the kind of stories we should be interested in?
1) Trying to decide between Audit and Tax. Apparently Tax people study for the same qualification, work shorter hours from their own office rather than working at clients' sites, and get paid more. But Audit is a more transferable experience. Any thoughts?
2) A friend of Mum's has just been telling me how abusive the Job Centre people were to her husband when he was claiming JSA. I guess I can manage without it.
3) I'm looking at diagrammatic reasoning tests, like here. They're incredibly difficult in places, even with the answers, though the second one went much better than the first.
4) I went to buy the FT, cos I feel like I ought to be at present. Took the car the mile or so to Tesco, because of the weather, and just as well: no FT there. So I drove the mile or so the other way to Somerfield. No FT there. So I walked to WHSmith, where I finally found a solitary copy. Hurrah.
5) Seems a bit strange that success in finding a job should at least in part be predicated on whether one can be bothered to trail around looking for newspapers...
6) But, now I come to think about it, it's all very well saying we should read the FT and improve our business awareness, but how can one tell which are the kind of stories we should be interested in?
posted by Z31 at 2:27 pm
20 Comments:
You should obviously be interested in them all.
Which is probably why I end up reading the TV listings and the weather, and little else.
TCH
Well, a lot of the stories are quite interesting. It's just that hardly any are obviously related to auditing/assuring, so I'm a bit clueless as to the kind of thing one should mention in the "well, I've been following the story of..." section of an interview. "Harry Potter" won't really cut it, I fear, and neither, I imagine, will "Paris set to bring in text message price controls".
Actually it looks like much of the FT is available online - but look at all the sections! Which ones should I focus on? Who knows?
World - Companies - Markets - Market data - Managed funds - Lex - Comment & analysis - Technology - Business Life - Business education - Your money - Arts & Weekend - In depth - Reports
Of course one could argue that detailed knowledge (well, sort of) of the automotive industry dating back nearly 15 years counts as business awareness, but I don't think I would.
Paris are set to bring in text message price controls?!
I tended to read stuff about big, serious subjects for which there's little to no likelihood you'd be generally interested. Things like pension acts, FSA guideline changes and of course the budget.
Or I intended to read stuff on those subjects...
The automotive stuff is definitely a speciality. Come to think of it, have you never considered going into the car industry somewhere? Your knowledge of all the different varieties and general enthusiasm ought to come bursting through.
-Markets data is particularly riveting, if I remember rightly.
TCH
See it's times like this my immediate reaction is to think "hmm, perhaps the business world isn't for me, I'd better just stick to," and then realise I don't have anything to stick to.
I don't think the auto industry is the place for someone who disapproves of the motorcar on principle, however much he knows about it, do you?
Well, maybe 'disapproves' is a bit strong, but I'm not exactly keen on it.
You're a very conflicted young man.
;-)
TCH
You probably got there too late. The types of people that buy the FT don't hang around, they are probably at their desks before you get up....
And the answer is:
You should be interested in whatever you're interested in. You're not going to be able to fake interest, there is just so much to know......
Audit and Tax, oh dear....
Well, I'm interested in a great many things, but whether any of them will ever make me any money is very much in doubt. Well, more money than £75 anyway.
I can't take seriously the suggestion that there are people in this town who both read the FT and are at their desks before I get up. There may be high-flying types who commute from here but they'd buy it at the station, wouldn't they.
It's all very well for you to be dismissive, having earned 30 times more than me in the last year or whatever. We can't all afford the luxury of smug scepticism.
For example, one of my recent interests has been in architecture/housing/town planning and the environmental developments associated. The only careers I'm aware of that have to do with this are architecture and estate agency, one of which is utterly implausible and the other distinctly suboptimal. (Would ACA help someone who decided to go and set up their own agency? There's a thought).
But what I really meant in my point 6 is not 'which stories are we meant to find interesting?' but 'which stories are we meant to consider bringing up in conversation with an interviewer in order to display knowledge and interest of what they do, if we're not really sure what that is?'
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Ooo... I would dearly love to know what those deleted posts said.
Anyway, try the automotive industry, best way to change something is from within. You might have caught the £1b Ford are spending on producing cleaner cars, perhaps try calling them and suggesting that you could help. In what way? You're a trained psychologist right? Who better to be involved in the development of cleaner vehicles, your skills enable you to predict what people want and how they would react to features that the cars of the future may offer.
Alternatively, working for any local council in the country would get you the best experience possible in town planning. Not to mention that you could have a direct impact on what gets built and where, shaping a town to your personal aesthetic preference appeals to your sensibilities doesn't it?
On audit vs tax, I have it on good authority (i.e the two people I know in accounting) that tax > audit. Of course they are both in tax, so small portion of NaCl advised.
Just so you know.
Oh and on town plannig:
http://www.rtpi.org.uk/careers-and-membership/cinp.html
It is a career, allegedly. Although, the quote "Planners typically complete a university course in planning and then after a few years of experience qualify as planners" may disuade you
Comment & Analysis is a good place to start. (I'm a sad geek who likes The Economist.)
PK: I posted the same thing four times, so there's no cause for excitement!
Linux dude: I've been hearing that tax > audit, too, but then that's cos I've mostly spoken to tax people. Apparently audit gives you more transferable experience and such, plus it's easier to transfer to tax than it is to transfer to audit. Anyway, we'll see.
I was reading about town planning careers last night. Surprisingly, I could technically go into town planning, but I think my background would be very unusual, so it's one of those cases of something I could do if I really really wanted to...
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