Hey guys
Just to formally introduce myself, my name is Numrah. I want to give you a quick update on my week so far ‘mid-week review’. But before I dive in, just to let you know, I’ve been broken off writing this entry about 5… hundred times due to work commitments, which is a big part of my working, you start working on something and the phone rings, you’re interrupted it just comes down to how you prioritise tasks, what needs to be completed first and why sometimes it takes longer to decided what to complete rather than doing the actual task itself!
- Health and Wellbeing
I must admit, working for the Department of Health has had a huge impact on my health and wellbeing. I always try eat healthy (salads for lunch), walk to and from the train station (unless it’s Monday morning, or any other morning) and drink plenty of water (this I honestly stick by). Obviously this doesn’t take into account this morning when I consumed 3 slices of granary toast and a toasted teacake – I committed carbocide (death by carbs). But I haven’t had butter for over 1 week to be lying, it’s only been a few days. Hey don’t judge me – my intentions are good! The whole reason I got into being a healthy eater is because I am very conscious of the fact that I sit at my desk all day. I did, by coincidence, stumble upon this article which gave me the much needed final push towards being more healthy at the office: http://style.uk.msn.com/health/10-reasons-your-job-is-making-you-fat
- Depressing Mondays
I’m not going to lie about Mondays, they’re just depressing. I have a strong belief that there is some sort of curse on Monday mornings. I’m sure you’d agree if you saw a picture of me – puffy eyes (even after 7.5 hours sleep), hair soaked as the weather wasn’t kind (maybe I should have been grateful it wasn’t windy) you’re too lazy to reach for your umbrella because you convinced yourself it wouldn’t take long to power walk to the shuttle bus, and you also wanted to ‘refresh’ yourself and be more healthy, well at least I looked refreshed (definitely won’t be posting a picture). But when I was a student last year everything was muddled in to one day, which was quite nice now that I think about it, definitely making the most of that when I get back.
- Tuesday
Anyway, it’s only Tuesday today and I feel like I’ve done so much already, whether it’s answering phone calls, finishing off an important spreadsheet for senior colleagues, or escorting external staff to room ‘6E66’ which you could have sworn you knew where it was! Working in healthcare for central government is not an easy job. Mind you I don’t have to run the system, I’m just a part of the (never-ending) jigsaw. So let me try and put a few of the pieces together:
- My role at the DH
I work in the Arms-Length Bodies (ALB) finance team, which is part of the financial management and reporting division of finance in our organisation (it’s a lot more complicated than that but I’ll leave it there for your sake). An ALB is “at national level, but at ‘arm’s length’ from Department of Health, a network of organisations have been created to help support and manage the health and social care system.”
I help support the ALBs and carry out a lot of ad-hoc work, with a few interesting (and classified) projects here and there.
- To sum up
(The important bit for you guys wanting to pursue a career in finance)
I guess what I can tell you about the actual work I do is that a lot of it has links to my finance degree – to all my modules. Something I’ve realised is NOT to forget all that I’ve revised. It’s all well and good memorising everything I can when it comes to exams – but what really matters is how much of that information you can recall and as long as you have a genuine interest in a career in finance, this won’t be a problem. So my number one tip: always go over your notes even AFTER you’ve finished your exams – a lot of the modules will relate to accounting and keep them handy or make space in your study for all your notes which are easily accessible. However if you’re like me and have the interest yet still can’t remember the information (which I think will be the majority of you) well you need to work really hard (hope you weren’t expecting me to give you genius advice there).
Anyway, hope you enjoyed my entry. Enjoy your week and be productive and healthy. If you feel like being lazy and ‘committing carbicide’ here’s a link to my favourite TV programme at the moment, How I Met Your Mother.
Enjoy!
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