Akay Dur graduated with a First on our BSc Finance and investment course and now works as a Junior Business Intelligence Analyst. Here, we caught up with Akay to find out more about how his experience at Kent shaped his career.
What attracted you to University of Kent?
Firstly, I was looking for somewhere close to home where I could easily travel to and secondly, Kent Business School was rated one of the best compared with the other universities in the local area.
Why Finance and Investment?
I didn’t go to university right away after finishing 6th form as I was really unsure what I wanted to do going forward. A lot of people rush into these things, but for myself, I preferred to not commit to anything right away until I was certain in the direction I wanted to take.
For two years I worked with my dad in family business and I had a lot of time to think about things and ultimately decided I wanted to go into some sort of analytics role, whether investment banking, hedge funds or just regular analytics for big business.
What were your favourite parts of the course?
The group assignments definitely. Whether it was a joint presentation or joint report, the group aspect and working with peers was very fun and also helped develop many team working skills that are now proving useful in my career.
Which things did you learn that surprised you?
The deep dive into the 2007/08 financial crisis was one of the topics that surprised me. I did not realise all the little aspects leading up to the crisis and the course gave a pretty good understanding on the topic.
How did the course shape the career path you followed?
I am a business analyst and my job involves building reports and providing analysis for managers on data we have and the analytical skills gained during the course definitely help and are very transferable to any analytics role.
Tell us about your current role
My official job title is Junior Business Intelligence Analyst. I have a variety of jobs within my role, but the thing I do the most is build reports and provide analysis and I also maintain and update existing reports and dashboards that managers use within the business. My role has been heading into the Data Quality/Hygiene side of analytics, where I have created processes to identify and correct any data issues we are aware of and I have been learning a lot of SQL code.
What’s the best thing about your job?
This is cliché but honestly, this comes from the bottom of my heart and it’s the team I work within and the support I have available within my role. Everyone in my team is a lot more experienced than myself and they are always very helpful and patient whenever I need support.
Interested in studying Finance and Investment like Akay? Find out more.