My name is Jamsheed Choudry. After receiving my MSc from TiasNimbas in December 2007, I first joined Intel International BV as an EMEA Financial Analyst. My responsibilities included monthly spend & head count analysis & management reporting and inventory control. I also helped to set up and oversee a monthly headcount management meeting with 10 cost center managers across the EMEA region and a monthly third party contract validation process. While I gained valuable experience, with opportunities to travel to Phoenix and Prague, I also knew I wanted to work for a bank. So in June 2008, I made the jump to Fortis Bank NV (NL) where I joined the International Finance Associate Traineeship. In this programme I rotate to a new part of the company every three or four months over the course of one and a half years. My first rotation, commercial banking, gave me insight into the various services offered by the bank to their different types of clients. It allowed me to see first hand why, or for whom, I’ll be doing all of the finance work.
In September, I moved to a Fortis separation team at the ABN Amro HQ. There I worked on the ramp down of the shared assets balance sheets for the consortium partners (RBS, Santander & Fortis), which had to be brought down to zero. I also worked on the cost allocation and cost unwinding for Fortis.
To have had the opportunity to participate in the separation of a bank of this magnitude, the biggest banking acquisition in the world, was just incredible. I've read about mergers & acquisitions in the news and I learned about the process in the TiasNimbas course (in Mainz), but actually experiencing what occurs on the inside was simply an experience of a lifetime! Then, after several weeks of uncertainty and constant rumours, it all came to an abrupt and shocking halt on the early evening of 3 October 2008 when the Dutch Government announced they had purchased Fortis Bank NV (NL) along with its stake in ABN Amro through RFS Holding BV.
Who would have thought in almost a year after graduating from the TiasNimbas Master Programme in Financial Management that I would be experiencing the credit crisis, that has gripped this globalized world, first hand? But TiasNimbas has not only prepared me with the financial knowledge that I needed to get my career going, it has also prepared me to a certain extent for the changes that I have recently experienced with Fortis.
Both the P&O and M&A lectures prepared me for the emotions that go with the shock of seeing the company that I work for being broken up; the denial and anger of not being able to go on an international rotation as originally planned; the slight depression of seeing colleagues/friends turning into competitors over a weekend; and finally acceptance, and looking at the potential new opportunities that change can bring. As some doors close new ones open.
This has led to my new assignment in performance management (finance analysis) for Fortis Commercial Banking NL and working on another assignment in Fortis Merchant Banking (Global Markets and Global Securities Financing Group). This will see me splitting my weeks for the next three or four months between Rotterdam and Amsterdam. Additionally, I recently became the new Finance Associates representative for the Fortis International Associates Programmes Networking Platform.
Finally, while rumours continue to flow on everything, from what our new name might be, to whether ABN Amro and Fortis will integrate or whether we’ll be sold to another bank, I have to say that while I have mixed feelings on the recent developments, being on the inside of all of this is a learning experience in its self.
