Aston graduate now works for American multinational company Yahoo providing the best service to their commercial clients.
Hi, my name's Greg Forbes. I studied BSc Business and Management at Aston University. I'm from Plymouth and I now work at Yahoo, in New York City, on their commercial side.
At Yahoo we help advertisers get their messages in front of their consumers on digital screens. So, in my job I work with our biggest clients, and I run those partnerships. It's my role to make sure that we're providing the best service.
Why did you choose to go to Aston University?
My decision to go to Aston University started back at school. At the time, I was asking my business studies teacher if they had any recommendation on where it would be good to study business at university? He mentioned Aston University. I then started doing more research. I really liked the idea of studying in a big city, being on a campus, and the idea of a placement year was also really appealing.
How did your degree help your career?
My degree was really quite critical to my career. It was a very practical degree and I learned lots of skills that I genuinely used, not only in my placement year but in my subsequent years too. It also gives you that start to get those first couple of jobs and get started in your career.
I got a real broad experience and introduction to different areas of business from finance to law, to IT, to marketing. All the lecturers were really great. They were sharing their learnings of what it's like out in the world of business and they were always very approachable, and very nice.
How was your placement year?
One of the big reasons I chose the course was the placement year. Such an amazing year, a really good experience. I found a company, Fidelity Investments. It was a perfect fit, we got on well. I was called an internet analyst, which back in 2000 not everybody even knew what the internet was, so it felt quite cutting edge.
The placement year really set me up for the rest of my career because off the back of that year they actually offered me a job and I went back to the company for a couple of years.
What do you like about Birmingham?
Being in Birmingham was one of the reasons I chose Aston University. It's very diverse and has so many things going on.
The Aston campus, is right in the centre of the city. I met lots of friends there and I'm still in touch with them today. I'm here in the U.S. now, and I'm fairly settled. New York's kind of crazy. I've been here for five or six years, and it's been really quite incredible.
Greg commented:
Based on my experience I would fully recommend Aston University. The lecturers are great, the studying is great, the courses are great. It was a great time in my life.