Once you register and attend the Finance Trading programme (FTP) you are offered the opportunity to create a Personal Development plan (PDP) to help you to think about your future career in finance and to show evidence of the skills and knowledge that you develop in pursuit of that career.

    It is important to start at an early stage in the academic year to identify options for finance internships or careers and to focus skills and knowledge development on these choices. The PDP is personalised to you. After an initial survey of your needs, a programme-mix of mentorship and self-study is provided which lasts six-weeks. The PDP is designed to assist you in pursuit of your career.

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    Why does the PDP help?

    The PDP helps you to think critically about your future work and to help you to map a path towards it. It then enables you to target and learn useful skills that are relevant to your future career and to record relevant training and skills adoption. This verifiable record has several benefits including supporting applications for internship and jobs and assisting in the application for post MSc study.

    What do Employers want?

    From our discussions with industry professionals we have put together a range of knowledge and skills that they have highlighted that would materially help graduate students to find jobs in areas highlighted in the table.

    Each area of interest has specific skills and knowledge that employers would expect to see. The TTC Institute provides the opportunity to identify and learn these skills, to show evidence of case studies in these areas and to show verifiable Certification of ability.

    Identifying career paths

    Not everyone has a clear picture of what they will be doing after graduation. While some may be on a set-course towards a certain career, many may be experimenting with options and not ready to make certain choices. The PDP provides the opportunity for you to think critically about your work-future and to look at different options that may be available to you before committing to a certain career path.

    Recording Verifiable Skills

    The PDP also consists of a record of your verifiable skills and practical educational attainment. These verifiable skills can be searched and confirmed by employers and other interested parties and remain in place as a permanent record.
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    The Structure of the PDP

    There are four stages to the PDP:

    Stage 1:

    The initial stage of the PDP requires fact finding. From the outset, you provide a short summary, by email, of your potential career-path and your work to date in acquiring skills to support your choice. The PDP mentor then assembles information and insights into what skills you may need and how to acquire them. You then send your Resume/CV to us and we can help you to identify the skills you may have and those you need.

    Stage 2:

    Having identified the skills that you will need to develop the mentor assembles resources you will need including a series of videos, documented materials, short courses and practical exercises that assist with skills acquisition.

    Stage 3:

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    You then prepare a case study in your chosen field, or a subject that most reflects your skills, and this provides evidence of these skills which is assessed by a group of industry professionals in your field.

    Stage 4:

    Once assessed, you then receive your PDP completion award along with evidence of the set of verifiable skills that you have acquired.

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    What skills should I typically expect to learn?

    Typical skills that students often develop in the PDP are:

    • Market Intelligence
    • Financial Platform skills
    • Portfolio modelling skills
    • Data manipulation skills
    • Data extraction skills
    • Data analysis skills
    • Research report writing skills
    • Market Research skills
    • Soft skills related to client interaction, successful negotiation and document preparation

    Asset Management Skills example

    If we take Asset Management as an example, these are the skills that employers would like to see:

    1. Ability to use Industry Platforms like Bloomberg, Thomson Reuters Eikon and others
    2. Market intelligence: how asset prices interact, the roles of interest rates, economic news, statistics etc
    3. Ability to find, extract and manipulate data from the major financial platforms
    4. Understanding of regulatory measures in the Asset management world including the difference between open ended and closed funds, UCIT rules for portfolio construction, and the main regulatory rules pertaining to asset management.
    5. Coding: knowledge of Python
    6. Portfolio construction, rebalancing and strategic/tactical hedging
    7. Understanding of constraints on Liquidity in the markets, with a focus on TSO Ownership, capacity and other aspects

    In Summary 

    All of us must push forward with education throughout our lives. TTC enables you to further your studies after completing your traditional education by providing career-specific educational choices. As practitioners in the finance industry we provide extra opportunities to extend knowledge and skills in chosen fields. 

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