Amira Sustainable Financial Wellbeing Graduate Alumni

Amira

Economics

Placement (10 Months+)

Lloyds Banking Group

The job descriptions were persuasive

It was clear that a career at LBG would be very beneficial and allow you to have an impact by giving you hands on experience and opportunities to lead. I wanted responsibility early on.

Opportunities everywhere

Since I’ve been here, I realise why people don’t leave. I didn’t immediately know how to imagine my future in finance, just because I didn’t know that world very well, but now I can see the breadth of opportunities everywhere.

Feeling more involved

Now that I’ve joined a more technical team, I feel rooted in LBG’s technical transformation. My current team is one of the enabling platform teams so I’m right in there with the support and development of technology. It’s so cool we’re doing stuff that’s right at the forefront, I can’t wait for us to explore how to incorporate machine learning into our tasks.

Before and after

During my first placement, I doubted my abilities to lead sometimes. I think the graduate scheme has really helped me develop as a person and, as a result, has really helped my confidence levels when it comes to leadership.

I help others as much as I can

Inclusion and diversity are very important to LBG, but also for me personally. That’s why I was more than happy to be a mentor for the Growth Through Diversity programme. I see it in action through that specific mentorship scheme, and in the work done by BOLD & REACH employee networks.

Flexible working that works

I took advantage of this during Ramadan, as I shifted my work patterns so fasting would be easier for me. I didn’t need to ask for this – it was offered to me.

Reaching the wider community

I am bilingual, I speak Hausa. One opportunity I jumped at was to help develop some LBG webpages that had been translated to Hausa by a new translation tool the Group was testing. I checked for the accuracy of the translation and fed back to the team. This was a great opportunity that really helped our website become more accessible to the wider community. It was an amazing feeling making such a positive impact.