Sales Associate
Fidelity International

Tom D

00:00:03 My name’s Tom D, I’m a FundsNetwork Sales Associate. My job basically involves speaking and communicating with Financial Advisers, and selling them the various investment products that FundsNetwork offers.

00:00:15 The most interesting thing is every day is different – or pretty much every hour is different. I’m speaking with the public every minute of every day really and, as we all know, the public are quite interesting people. So that makes my role interesting. There’s good satisfaction at the end. Obviously if they decide to use your products. Not so satisfying if they don’t. But yeah, it’s just the variety, and you’re consistently learning.

00:00:39 Started off with – my sister actually worked – works for the company. I done two years at University and I have – I set myself aside for a year out in industry, because I didn’t have a clue really what I wanted to do. Sold time shares for a little bit, and then obviously that – found out what the company was actually all about, so I decided to move on from the pretty swiftly.

00:01:03 Didn’t have complete confidence in what I was selling, so I thought I can’t carry on doing this. And I questioned whether I’d actually buy one myself. I thought if I wouldn’t, then how am I supposed to sell it to somebody else? Even really negative experiences you have – where you’re almost told to sit down, and look you need to sell X amount or whatever – it toughens you up, which is what I needed at the time, and I don’t regret it at all. But it just wasn’t for me.

00:01:30 I actually moved – well hypothetically moved – to Canada, with the thoughts of staying over there. So I took a bit of time out over there deciding if that’s what I wanted. I’ve got relatives over in Canada, and I really like the way of life and everything about Canada, so I thought – is this for me? Weighed it up. It wasn’t an easy decision, but I thought maybe come and learn my industry in the UK first, before trying to apply it in a country that was new to me as well.

00:01:57 A defining moment for me personally was kind of the decision to come back from Canada. Looking back I’m quite proud of that moment, to do it. I think – not that I was struggled, but I think it was a wise decision to make. It was probably one of the only decision I’ve made sensibly rather than with my heart, and it made quite a big difference.

00:02:15 When you’re young you don’t really know what you want to do. It’s pretty rare for somebody to have the same thing in their mind consistently. There were a few main careers that – well careers I say, use the term loosely I suppose – but a few ideas I thought would be an ideal job. But as you get older and become slightly more realistic, my thoughts changed slightly. I remember wanting to be a professional golfer in America to a Club Rep in Ibiza.

00:02:44 Always wanted to go to University, obviously it’s encouraged internally within the school. But everyone that I kind of spoke to suggested it and recommended it, and I just thought – get to Uni, it gives me three or four years to kinda get my head round, graft a little bit, move out and decide on where I wanted to go.

00:03:02 I always thought sales, or something very similar to sales. Always kind of wanted to represent a company, whether that was sales or marketing or some kind of PR. From those industries I kind of thought sales was going to be the most rewarding, because if you’re good at it you’re going to sell, and your figures won’t lie.

00:03:20 I joined as a temp again, which is pretty much the only way into the company at the time. Back in exactly the same role, with the same people. So it was like I’d never been away as such, and I took the time to kinda think about what I actually want to do here. Fidelity’s a great name, stick with it, and then look at different areas within the company where I can really push on, and areas of interest for me.

00:03:43 I didn’t think I’d be doing this job this early in my career. I don’t really think about the future too much, but I just kinda didn’t think it – this is like my career now, in my eyes – so I didn’t think I’d be in my career job at 24 really, but it’s obviously a good thing that I am.

00:03:59 ENDS