Insight Technology | Insight Investment

As I finish my first of four rotations as a technology graduate at Insight, I reflect on what a rewarding experience I have had so far.

I’d been warned about what to expect from friends about moving to the city and joining a finance company.

I have had these views flipped on their head. Insight has been much more innovative and welcoming than my expectations.

When I arrived at Insight

I received an extremely warm welcome.

At first it was surprising how many people came up to introduce themselves and say hello, but this absolutely made those first day nerves go away.

My team has been incredibly helpful, and no question is ‘too silly’.

Moreover, every individual I have met has been willing to give advice and made time for me when I’ve needed their help – whether they sit on my team or not.

My last 6 months have been spent with the Cloud Security team

I have gained skills both in Azure and the security space.

After doing my postgraduate degree in the Mathematics of Cybersecurity, this was a nice fit and allowed me to see learnt theory brought to life.

Being in this team has been a great insight to the risk management culture in a financial environment.

I will pivot onto a development team in Manchester for the next 6 months to expand very different skills.

Every graduate is buddied up with a mentor

This is helpful with navigating around the business and someone to answer questions without judgement. This relationship has been one of my favourite things about the programme so far. My mentor has been amazing! Very supportive in my decisions and the direction I want to go with my career, and a fountain of advice and encouragement. It is an amazing feeling to know you have someone to talk to at work whilst you are still trying to get used to ‘the working world’. As technology graduates, we also have access to our technical spirit guides – the all-knowing gurus of the Insight technology universe.

Meeting my fellow graduates

We were given the opportunity to meet all graduates before the scheme started. We got to know each other and set up a group chat to keep in touch. After many chats and some good banter, it felt like I was starting this job with friends. I knew I wouldn’t be alone at lunch on my first day!

My fellow graduates are one of the best elements of the scheme. Over the first 12 weeks we had one training day a week together, followed by many social events, which allowed us to really bond. We all sit in different areas of the business so there is always someone that can shed some light on any problem you may be experiencing – whether it be technical, finance or even compliance. I can safely say I think I have made friends for life.

Complete the IMC (Investment Management Certificate)

This consisted of some training days with the whole cohort and a lot of self-study. Most of us starting in technology were not as familiar with the jargon and the concepts and this helped us get up to speed with the other graduates.

We also have Pluralsight subscriptions, so whatever technological training we need is at our fingertips. I am currently revising for the AZ-500 Azure Security exam using it. The variety of learning and rotations available makes this a fulfilling scheme with opportunities to develop and grow.

Technology cohort

As a technology cohort, we have our own project which we work on once a week. It has been good to attack a project from the very beginning using the agile methodology. It has been useful to see the many signoffs needed to get the go ahead and understand how projects work in the corporate world. We have all been allowed to get our creative juices flowing here and work on every angle of our application; from the UX and UI design, to the architecture and the development. Again, another experience that gives us increased opportunities to learn new skills.

I move into my next rotation excited for the rest of my Insight journey. I’m looking forward to many more learning experiences that will come my way.

It’s Saturday morning and I’m sat in a church hall in Darwen. I’m reflecting on my time since joining Insight whilst my youngest daughter takes her dance lessons.

In late 2018 I received a phone call from Rob a recruiter at a digital recruitment agency. At the time, I didn’t know Insight Investment and what they did. Rob explained they were an asset management firm with a head office in London who were transforming their technology. This included moving some of their infrastructure to the cloud, focusing on Agile delivery and expanding their capability by opening a new, dedicated Tech Hub in Spinningfields, Manchester.

Was I interested? Absolutely!

I researched the firm.

I had an informal call with Dan, who with Gareth, have overall accountability for the hub and then an interview, where I meet one of my future colleagues Chris Evans (not the DJ…). It goes well; I have a final interview with Emma, get an offer and accept the opportunity to join.

I’m a certified chartered accountant by trade and over the past 6 years I’ve moved into the data and analytics world. I’m able to combine my commercial skills and experience with data in my role of heading up Insight’s Client Reporting Development team.

Client Reporting Development are responsible for getting high quality and accurate data through Insight Investment’s combination of data tools, which takes data from source systems and supplies it to our reporting tools. This is more complex than it sounds and is vital, as we are a data driven organisation and data is managed and controlled much more closely than many other organisations I’ve worked for before. Our business is regulated and providing accurate data to our clients is business critical so it’s incredibly important that we ensure attention to detail in everything that we do.

I’ve been supported by a well organised induction and on-boarding process, HR didn’t pay me to say that, and frequent trips between London and Manchester to: learn the ropes, meet the people and get up to speed learning the business. I’ve been supported by an on-boarding buddy, Pete, who has answered my questions and queries and helps give me the inside track. All of this has enabled me to get me up to speed quickly.

I’ve discovered that many of my colleagues have worked at Insight for many years. It seems to be a place where you can grow and develop a career and many of my colleagues have progressed in different roles and areas of technology.

So far, I have recruited a new team of SQL developers and business analysts in Manchester and am working closely with our business partners and the non-technical Client Reporting team in London. I’ve also had the opportunity to do a session for our ‘Meet the experts’ series. It felt a little early to call myself an expert in all things Insight but it was a great opportunity to talk about my experience so far, our culture and my observations and help graduates, or others considering a career here, get the lowdown; so I took the opportunity. I’m impressed by the support from my colleagues in London who’ve helped me to understand Insight’s business and the tech. There is no lack of patience and indeed a real desire to support me and my Manchester colleagues to ensure we are successful. I’m also struck by the lack of egos and the flat structure that allows things to get done. This is all perception right and I feel a sense of team, which I am enjoying.

How’s my time at the Manchester Tech Hub been so? I’m feeling optimistic and excited for 2020 as we continue to grow and build out the teams. We’ll be looking for more people to join and that’s exciting and one of the reasons why I wanted to share my experience. It might peak interest in others to join us.

My first week journey.

It’s late Sunday afternoon. I'm on a train headed to London. It’s quiet and I feel vindicated in my decision to take up Insight’s offer to travel down the night before I start. My first solo venture on the London Underground is outside of peak hours. It’s calm rather than carnage. I’m not barged out of the way or shouted at for standing on the left side of the escalator.

I arrive and am greeted by beautiful architecture. I take some time to relax; albeit I'm about to start work for Insight Investment part of BNYM. I'm about to start what I consider a very rare and prestigious opportunity; seriously... relax? On the contrary, I'm giddy and buzzing.

I’m greeted by a number of people from HR and taken through the formalities of building passes, the benefits package and given a taster of Insight culture.

We run through the benefits: family medical care, dental, critical illness cover, health checks and a very rich wife if I die etc. etc. Ok it's a touch morbid and yet this stuff helps me sleep at night. I’m also super happy that I now get a 9% pension to keep my dream alive of retirement before I’m 65! That’s a long way off.

This shows me this is a place that clearly cares about its people.

We go over compliance, when you're working for a bank chances are they have a few rules to tell you about right? I won't give you an hour by hour account, so I'll point out a few things:

• Ridiculously clever business folk? Check Helpful, knowledgeable and patient colleagues? Yes, especially you Kieron.
• Clear plans, direction, strategy? Ambitious plans? Check
• Equipment ready? Email working? Induction week fully planned out? Yes. Perfectly? Well, not quite, but easy fixes for next time.
• Access to training? Yes - you get Safari & Pluralsight as a minimum for starters.

The management, culture, environment, ambitions and people feel right. There are many challenges to solve and those are problems that Devs can solve; that’s definitely good.

As for the journey ahead, my new found colleagues, (nay friends already) and I, enter the company at a really exciting time. Agile has arrived and I'm about to play my part in an exciting transformation project to bring the companies applications on a journey into the cloud. This, even for a semi-legacy app of any significant size, poses a joyful amount of challenges. Bring on .NET Core, Micro Services, Disconnected Architecture, Containerisation and all that good stuff. Many of the applications I’m about to get to grips with support a business which manages large amounts of money; and does so ultimately on behalf of millions of people like you and me who seek happy and prosperous retirements – no pressure huh!

Along with the technical challenges, the people, from Devs through to Heads of, have a great vision for the new team in Manchester to do some amazing things. They’ve invested in a new purpose built office in Spinningfields. It’s a suave and modern space – not quite what you might expect from a bank (no offence meant).

If you're a super-awesome techie, Business Analyst or a great team leader and you're reading this because you're scoping Insight out as a future place of work; I’d encourage you to pursue it.

You'll likely get to speak with people like Gareth and Dan (two of the IT Heads), who've been with the company for a collective 30 years and still carry the passion of a pair of new starters. It won't be as 'hip' as some tech places you'll find but then those companies probably aren’t managing your pensions. I, for one, am cool with that.

It was a great first week and if you want to know if I feel the same many weeks and months in; reach out for a chat. I’ll be honest about what my experience is so far.

It's Monday and it’s 5 am. I’m generally out of bed at this time; I’m not often leaving the house. It's cold, dark and I'm at least a 30 minute commute from my first caffeine hit.

I’m on en-route from Manchester to Insight Investment's London office to start a new adventure.

I’m one of four Tech Leads hired to establish Insight's Manchester Tech hub. I feel a great responsibility on my shoulders. We four (along with subsequent hires) will fuse the culture of an established, leading global asset manager within our new office, set up to focus on excellent technical engineering. I’m a northern software nerd with no prior experience in finance and an aversion to London. I’m on a high diving board about to plunge into a deep lake of the unknown.

The journey to London is effortless. I meet up with my fellow Tech Leads. We head through reception to meet Abi, our contact in HR, who takes us through the basics.

Monday is filled with a collection of on-boarding sessions that run like clockwork and we meet with some great people. We discuss Insight culture with Jeff. He explains to us culture is not something you can capture on a post-it note. It’s intangible and absorbed through osmosis, which is exactly what we do for the rest of the week and beyond.

I jump from one meeting room to another as Insight executes a well thought out on- boarding. It’s a combination of technical briefings and gentle introductions to asset management and Liability Driven Investment.

The pace is fast. The people we meet are focused, driven and yet unmistakably human. Insight people are very approachable and friendly, something my preconceptions hadn't allowed for.

We are taken through more of the strategic vision for cloud computing and where the Manchester Tech hub fits into the bigger picture. The commitment to Azure and their in-house expertise on leveraging cloud computing is impressive. It feels good to be part of something big, complex and considered.

There’s time for a break, an evening social in the Rising Sun. Stone floors, sticky bar tops and proper beer in real pint glasses. Not a mason jar in sight and a million miles away from the painfully cool bars that surround our new Manchester office in Spinningfields. Again, my preconceptions about "financial types" fade as we descend into relaxed chat.

It's hard to pick a highlight but I'm going to. Gareth (Head of Technology Transformation) took time out to walk the floors with us. An Insight veteran of 20 years, Gareth seems to know every corner of the business and how each part interacts. Even though some of the buzzwords and concepts may still be out of reach, this seemingly simple walk around the office is enjoyable, memorable and gave us some much needed context.

As the week draws to a close and I get the train back to Manchester, it's time to reflect on what I've experienced. It will take a while to fully replay my experiences but already I can sense an attitude of personal responsibility in everyone I've met. A "can do" approach and a drive to get things done with little fuss or ceremony and a basic orientation to "do the right thing".