GRADUATE IN LOCKDOWN

VINAY PATEL SCHOOL HOUSE 2011-2016

I have just graduated with a First Class Honours from Imperial College London studying Chemical Engineering right in the midst of these uncertain times. My career journey began during my second year at university at the time of applying to spring weeks and internships. With the mindset of pursuing a career in Chemical Engineering, I applied to the Oil & Gas and the Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) industries based on the modules I most enjoyed on my course.

After successfully securing a spring week with Unilever for 2018, I passed the term time with the multiple projects that were thrown at us. After my spring week, there was an opportunity to apply for the Summer Internship for the following year. I capitalised on this great opportunity and prepared intensively, knowing that if I was to get accepted onto the program my Summer 2019 would be sorted! Thankfully, Unilever offered me a summer internship in the supply chain area with a focus on the manufacturing and engineering aspects.

During this internship I was based in a factory producing household items which were being sent worldwide. My job was to understand and suggest improvements on various engineering aspects (apply some of the engineering knowledge that Imperial has taught me!). However, about half-way through I realised in the long term a career in engineering for wasn’t for me. I am much more interested in the financial and consulting sectors.

My passion for these two areas rapidly increased during multiple engineering economics projects and from following financial news including surprisingly enough from watching The Big Short (definitely recommend)! From then on, I switched to finding a graduate role in finance or consulting in the finance industry. This switch between engineering and finance is more common than not, since the soft skills learnt during an engineering degree are totally transferable to any industry.

My summer of 2019, whilst working at Unilever, suddenly became very busy with building my CV and writing cover letters for companies I was interested in, within the aforementioned areas. Of the numerous banks and consulting companies I applied to, my heart was set on securing a role in Accenture’s Management Consulting Graduate Scheme. After successfully passing the first couple of rounds including tests and video interviews, I was invited to the final round Assessment Centre which, for the first time ever, included a VR strategy game section.

After waiting an agonising two days, I received a phone call to offer me the job. I was ecstatic. I was informed my start was to be February 2021. This was just when the number of cases of Covid-19 had started to pick up and was spreading quickly around the world, although it hadn’t yet been classified as a pandemic. I was still hopeful that my start date wouldn’t change; everything seemed on track for me to start exactly a year later.

Months went by without hearing anything from Accenture until a phone call in June, when I was told that due to Covid-19 my start date was to be postponed until September 2021! This news put me back and left me without a job for more than a year. I keep thinking to myself, circumstances change in a matter of days if not hours and then re-planning becomes more and more difficult.

However, I am still lucky as my offer is still being upheld and has only been delayed for a six months. Being part of the socalled Covid-19 Class of 2020 has had lots of downs and for now, my plan is to find something in the interim within my areas of interest and wait for Accenture’s start date of September 2021.

My advice to up and coming graduates still at university is to be ready for any eventuality no matter how large or small. Prepare properly for those pesky numerical and verbal reasoning tests which can catch you out. Don’t let them affect our chancesof getting into the company you aim for!