George Brooker, Consultant

For me, I like to get into the office early and kick-start my day with some admin and getting all my actions organised and planned out. I try to exercise before work so by the time I’m in for 8am I’m ready to go. If I’m not on a client site, which now happens around once every two weeks, the team will have a daily stand-up call at 9am to review our group tasks for the day. Fortunately, and somewhat unsurprisingly, no two days are the same; I could be holding workshops to understand client requirements, or working on a data model to help our client visualise the performance issues they are facing. Typically, on shorter engagements, we’d have a weekly steering committee where we present our progress, findings, and outline any blockers or risks to deliverables to the key stakeholder.

When I’m not working on client delivery work, I spend some time assisting our sales team with business development activities, such as presenting in pitches or helping with marketing outreach to raise awareness within client organisations. On top of this, I’ve recently held interviews with Cyber Security start-up CEOs to better understand the start-up ecosystem.

For me, the most exciting aspect is the problem solving directly with clients. I really enjoy working in collaborative team environments, so having the opportunity to work with people with diverse backgrounds means I am always learning about new ways and approaches to solving problems.

Adding to this, the culture at Wavestone makes it a fantastic place to work. Monthly socials and events in the office mean that there’s always something exciting happening, whether it’s internal training, or our monthly all-hands meetings and the socials that follow.

Within a few months of joining as an analyst, I had the opportunity to attend the International Women’s Forum for Economy & Society in Paris. Wavestone is one of the sponsoring partners for the annual forum and was my first chance to work with staff from the Paris and Luxembourg offices. I helped with producing a publication on the key takeaways from talks held by the huge variety of incredible women from all over the world in attendance, ranging from technical AI experts working for social media platforms, to CEOs of Women in STEM charities, to presidents and executives from major international corporations. Of course, we had to try out some French delicacies (see garlic snails and steak tartare!).

I normally bring my own lunch in as I quite enjoy cooking at the moment, but given Wavestone’s fantastic location in the heart of the City, I like to take some time out from the office and sit on the steps of the Royal Exchange. This view looks out over the Bank of England, and you can see the Walkie-Talkie building out towards Leadenhall Market. This always gives me some time to relax and take a breather from a particularly busy or hectic day.

Having studied for my master’s degree in engineering, I spent some time working as a project engineer at a global heavy-lift and transport firm. Whilst I enjoyed the technical elements of the role, I found that my greatest enjoyment came from being on live project sites working directly with stakeholders and their teams, helping to solve their ad-hoc and often trickiest problems. Alongside this, some of my studies covered topics such as IoT and 5G applications in industry, as well as the global movement towards more sustainable technology. Combining all these considerations, the role of a technology consultant seemed like a natural choice.

My childhood dream (like many) was to become a fighter pilot or astronaut – so if the stars had aligned, I’d like to think I could have pursued that career… Perhaps more realistically, I’d have continued working for my placement company and looked to travel the world, working on massive engineering projects such as removing gas turbines from power stations in Canada, to transporting and installing wind turbines off the coast of Taiwan.

For me, consulting is all about solving problems for clients, and doing so through effective communication in both individual and team environments. Given the technology and transformation orientation of Wavestone, I would ensure that a particular area of our offering aligns with a personal technological interest – whether that be cyber-security, digital transformation, cloud and infrastructure, or smart connectivity with technologies such as 5G.

Be ready to learn continuously. The culture at Wavestone is one of continuous learning and improvement, shown by our training and CDM programme, as well as monthly seminar-style sessions and the annual company-wide Bridges event.