Success Stories
Katie Harwood, Assistant Accountant
Katie joined us in 2020 on our Graduate Scheme. She has since become an Assitant Accountant, and is thrilled to have been part of the opportunity.
"When I stumbled across the advert for the graduate programme at ECC I was working in an admin role with finance tasks and looking for a role that would give me great career development and training. The graduate programme was absolutely perfect – ECC were offering the opportunity to gain experience in all areas of finance whilst paying for and supporting me to complete a professional qualification!"
She recently won the award for Partly Qualified Accountant of the Year at the Partly Qualified Accountancy Awards. You can read more about this here!
Robyn Evans, Management Accountant
I joined Essex County Council in September 2017 as a Graduate Finance Trainee and ‘graduated’ from the scheme in September 2020. During my time on the scheme, I worked in a variety of teams, including Strategic Insight, Internal Audit, Capital, Major Programmes & Commercial.
What made you join ECC?
It was very important to me to ensure that wherever I went to work after university, I felt that I had a career path that I could distinctly see and that I also continued my learning in the workplace. So, when I was looking for roles, I made sure to look for ones that had professional qualifications alongside them.
I’d been offered a role elsewhere through a similar graduate process, but I really didn’t feel that I got along with the people there at the assessments. Essex was completely different – the process was a great way to see if I felt like I fit at the council and I really found very quickly that I did. I knew that it was the place for me! I was attracted to how relaxed and friendly everyone was, but also how knowledgeable and helpful they were. It also really appealed to me that it was somewhere where I could feel I was making a difference to the community as a whole.
What do you do now?
I am a Management Accountant on the Corporate and Strategic Partnerships team. My role involves acting as financial to support to a range of different budget holders, including Essex County Council’s Section 151 Officer. I am also involved in reporting, closure and budget setting as well as various business partnering projects such as Digital Inclusion. I also manage a small team of my own.
I found that the graduate scheme at Essex really supported me in moving into my current role, as it gave me a broad range of experiences to draw from as well as a large number of contacts across finance and ECC as a whole. I look forward to seeing where my career takes me at Essex, in the knowledge that I have a solid foundation.
Will Goodchild, Finance Business Partner
First of all, thank you for taking the time to read through our ECC Graduate Scheme brochure. I hope you have a better understanding of how we work at ECC and the value we place in our training programme.
My name is Will, and I joined Essex in the first cohort of their graduate scheme having graduated from Warwick University studying Maths. I thoroughly enjoyed my time on the scheme, rotating around the department, learning as I went, whilst making meaningful connections with colleagues.
After completing my studies and receiving my CPFA designation, I was successful in applying for a Finance Business Partner role working in the field of Adult Social Care. I have undertaken a wide variety of fascinating projects including the financial modelling for a new pay scheme across the function, input into the financials required for a piece of lobbying to Central Government, and most recently, I have become the financial lead for all work relating to Mental Health.
I like to get involved in as many projects as I have time for. Along with a colleague, I help organise this graduate programme throughout the process. If you are successful through to the assessment centre stage I look forward to meeting you there!
Another of my interests has been volunteering with CIPFA for a number of years. I am currently the national CIPFA Student Network past-president. This level of responsibility has challenged me in a number of ways that I had not experienced before. My duties as student president varied widely from chairing committee meetings, writing and presenting reports to a CIPFA board, and most recently, attending CIPFA Council representing students views. One of my favourite achievement's was organising and then hosting CIPFA's first online student conference attended by over a hundred students from across the world.
I am passionate about student experience, both across the world with CIPFA, and closer to home, here in Essex. I look forward to reading your application