Postgraduate profile: MSc financial risk management

Alex Cheema converted his previous chemistry degrees and experience working in sales into a career in finance by taking an intensive MSc course. Armed with industry knowledge, he started a job as a market risk analyst just a week after graduating.

I wanted a better paid, more technical job working among top-calibre people, and past dealings with investment banks in a market research capacity had whetted my appetite for finance. I felt an MSc would give me the more specialised introduction to the sector that I needed to take my career in a new direction. The ICMA Centre appealed to me because it's a good value school that offers short courses - the latter was a real selling point as I wanted to gain relevant knowledge, qualifications, contacts and, ultimately, a job as quickly as possible.

My course

Nine months of constant study and exams was intense but rewarding. The course covered every aspect of quantitative finance, affording me an entry-level understanding of different financial markets, and I also developed my technical knowledge of products (eg portfolio management, financial instruments) and types of risk (eg market, interest rate and credit risk) through various electives.

I benefited from lectures taught by experienced PhD students and high-profile professionals, as well as more focused, collaborative study sessions where bouncing ideas off each other was encouraged. However, the course wasn't all theory: I particularly enjoyed the practical, role play-based trading classes, held in simulated industry-standard dealer rooms.

The benefits of networking

The networking opportunities were definitely a highlight: as a student representative I was introduced to ex-CEOs from different organisations, forming valuable relationships that I plan to develop over time. Talking to so many people about their jobs was also a great way to gain a real understanding of what role might suit me best.

I found I preferred the banking side of finance - this really complimented the qualitative people skills I had built up previously in sales - so from then on I then tailored my MSc, choosing my modules accordingly. I began work as a market risk analyst on the Royal Bank of Scotland's credit flow desk just a week after completing the course, having made a well-informed decision about where I wanted to go in the future.

Alex studied a BSc in chemistry and pharmacology and an MSc in organic chemistry at the University of Liverpool. A few years later, he returned to study an MSc in financial risk management at the ICMA Centre.