Myles Wood-McGrath's story of studying BSc International Business and Entrepreneurship

BSc International Business and Entrepreneurship student Myles Wood-McGrath tells us about his experience of studying at Essex Business School.

Why did you choose to study BSc International Business and Entrepreneurship?

With a large focus of today’s journalism centred around internationalisation of  companies and the impact they have on stakeholders worldwide, I felt that studying this degree topic would help educate me on how businesses are reacting in a domestic and international environment. 

I also wanted to further gain a greater economic and financial insight into the multinational corporations and the effect that they have worldwide. Whilst also aiming to identify the breadth of strategies that companies use to combat issues on a day to day basis such as issues on human resourcing overseas to marketing communication methods.   

Why did you choose to study at Essex?

The attraction of studying at Essex Business School, that led me to choosing the campus, was the heavy investment the University was willing to undertake to provide top of the range facilities. From the new SU lounge to the 24/7 door lock system for University students only. 

What are you favourite modules and aspects of your course?

For me the stand out module was the Business Strategy Simulation Game, the reason being that is was an in-depth, as to close to real life business game that mirrored a real business market. The analytics, statistics and the hunches behind the decision making processes, were very interesting to learn. Especially when you compete against other students in the class.  

Other notable modules for me were, international business strategies and international business environment as it applied current business decisions to the module theory.  This made the course a lot more meaningful when it took up to date business decisions to relate it to relevant academic frameworks. 

Tell us about any assistance you found particularly valuable 

I was really lucky, I managed to receive a lot of support from Essex particularly from the Careers Service. I received Careers Support, CV writing support, achieved a Frontrunner position and had help finding an internship. The online resources of Moodle, the Albert Sloman Library and Faser were all very user friendly and had an abundance of information to learn from.  

Tell us about your internship and job prospects

I was accepted onto an paid internship programme for State Street Corporation in the Jersey office whereby I was helping with fund accounting and administrative duties. During my 6 months of experience, I was logging incomes and outgoings for a multimillion pound fund that invested into numerous commodities and products. Further day to day roles were processing payments, invoices and prepping bank reconciliations for the senior accountants.

Studying the Accounting and Finance module in my first year of studies helped me grasp the accounting concepts and allowed me to have a basic knowledge of principles that allowed me to start on the front foot. From my time here, I have now been offered a role as an Associate 1 Fund Accountant with the aim to undertake my ACCA qualifications to become a Chartered Accountant, on the condition I achieve a 2:1 Degree.