Entry Level

Every time I look back at my previous experience in sectorial industry companies (I went up almost the full career ladder from accountant to CFO), I am convinced that I took the right choice, when more than 10 years ago I decided in favor of a career at Bellerage. Having moved up from Senior Consultant to Partner, I can say with confidence: regardless of your grade and position, consulting is always interesting and offers prospects for growth and development. Bellerage is a friendly and close-knit team, full of smart and motivated employees, with very different clients and projects.

Working in the financial outsourcing department, you regularly give clients advice on choosing a financial model, optimizing taxation, building optimal business processes - thus, every day there is an opportunity to make a tangible contribution to the development of a client's business. In order to understand his business well and give professionally founded and practical advice, you need to learn quickly and absorb a lot of information in a short time. You will have to work a lot. But on the other hand, career growth is faster than in other companies, and most importantly, it depends only on you. There are always plenty of opportunities for professional growth.

While still a physics student at Moscow State University, I came to the financial outsourcing team of Bellerage as an intern and started from scratch. At present, I lead a team of 20 people. Nevertheless, I am not going to be satisfied with what I already achieved – I have more plans for further professional growth and for expanding my team. Of course, to work well, you need a friendly atmosphere. Bellerage’s team is made of positively minded and open people. The company's management is always ready to listen to initiatives and proposals. Company trips to the countryside twice a year are always fun and unforgettable.

During these years, I had the task of building an internal control system in financial outsourcing from scratch. To develop approaches, to find and adapt specialists on my own. Then there was the period of large-scale internal automation and the development of tools to control implementation - to know exactly who uses the features and how they do it. Today I support the growth of IT practice from the HR perspective. These kinds of tasks are very inspiring.

Naturally, when you encounter difficult tasks, crises are inevitable. In hard times, I found it helpful to talk to my colleagues and top managers, to review the interim results of my work, to have a clear understanding of my goals and, of course, to have a proper rest (after that, motivation comes back by its very self).

Now my main goal is to improve my management skills and to help the company's partners to establish a high-performance business unit with a truly unique team.

The internship was a breathtaking experience - I can't remember a day when I didn't do something new. I can't say that some tasks were more interesting and some less so, everything was exciting. I was also very lucky with my first supervisor Dmitry Nazarov. He shared his knowledge with great pleasure, and I soaked this knowledge up with pleasure. Therefore, my professional growth has been very swift. After the internship, I joined the staff.

I can't say that at the time when I was a student I generally thought that it was hard for me. The work was so interesting that all the difficulties were a thrill - this drive kept me going throughout the entire period when I had to balance my work with my university study. I admit that it was difficult only at the moment of writing my thesis - I had to stay overnight in the office to be able to complete all the tasks and meet the expectations of clients. That lasted for about 2 months. When that was over, I could finally relax and was able to devote all my time to work.

One of the most amazing things is that I got to work in two different departments. In financial outsourcing, I made my way from assistant to financial manager, having worked on more than 10 projects. The tasks there ranged from very simple to complex client requests, sometimes requiring the involvement of colleagues from other practices. I then shifted to the audit and tax consulting department, where I was involved in large-scale audits, due diligence procedures and wrote many interesting tax advice reports under both Russian and international standards.

At the moment I'm a manager. Among my goals is at least to become a partner at the company, and would like to achieve this within the next 5 years.

At this company I value people the most, as well as the opportunity to contribute to the improvement of existing business processes. If you offer something interesting and useful, you can be sure that you will receive constructive feedback and that you will be heard.

After studying the company's website and reading the reviews, I decided to apply for an internship at the financial outsourcing and consulting department. Having successfully passed the all the stages, I got the offer and became the intern. At that moment, life changed dramatically!

Interesting tasks from the manager and colleagues turned out to be more exciting than classes at the university. From the very first days, you are immersed in working on client cases, rather than being overwhelmed with ephemeral tasks and not forced to cram the theory. Although the interns still have a training program, and it is quite intense. You gain more knowledge during the 3 months of internship than during the years of study at the university.

By the way, it turned out to be quite possible to combine study and work. I was immediately warned about this at interview stages, and I eventually checked it on my own experience.

Of course, I would like to note that there is friendly atmosphere both within each team and throughout the company, which is especially important for consulting. Having lunch together, traveling out of town, and celebrating birthdays outside the office make us not only a close-knit team, but also friends in everyday life.

Within 5 years of work, I have grown from an intern with university knowledge in finance to a senior consultant with my own projects and team. I'm still constantly developing in new areas and learning something new every day.

An internship at Bellerage is a great opportunity to become a professional consultant within a short period of time and with a great team around that always ready to support and help.

The Bellerage interview was my first interview ever, but it was successful. I liked the interaction with recruiters, the description of the tasks and functionality of our department seemed interesting.

During my internship, I almost immediately came across the true work of an auditor – I participated in audits at clients' offices. All the training, in fact, took place on live and real projects. This experience gave me an understanding of what the audit really is.

With the promotion to higher grades, there was less paperwork and more managerial tasks (like organizing the work of the project team and projects in general). There were more complex blocks given me to audit as well as accounting statements of different companies. There started to appear some independent projects and my personal areas of responsibility.

Now I am a senior consultant, and my main goal is to get an auditor's certificate. This is a long and complex process, consisting of passing 12 exams (in three stages). I am currently completing my 2nd degree, and I plan to have my diploma next year.

I really appreciate the fact that colleagues from all departments are very responsive and are always ready to help. There is a knowledge sharing practice that is well-organized, and because of this, the horizons are constantly expanding. There are also warm relations within the colleagues, and it is very delightful to work with such a team.

At Bellerage, there have been many interesting and complex cases. Among those I would point out the general work that our practice regularly conducts due to sanctions restrictions towards Russia. During these few years, the usual rules of business have changed significantly, we need to always be aware of all changes.

And thanks to our proactivity and creativity (among other things), our clients continue to doing business without loss of quality, even if it initially seemed impossible.

The most difficult thing in our work is the lack of time in the day. It is impossible to overestimate the importance of time management, and my constant task is to plan and prioritize my work, as well as the work of my junior colleagues.

If we talk about long-term motivation, this is a very individual issue, but I personally am driven by new challenges. The specificity of financial outsourcing lies in the fact that you can work with a large number of companies from different industries, so each new project or task gives new Energy. And of course, those who work well should also have a good rest. Vacations, weekend trips, and regular sports allow you to switch activities and stay in a proper shape.

My current plans are to expand and strengthen my team, as well as participate in sales and brand promotion more often and more effectively.

I chose Bellerage because the internship selection process (just like the people there) seemed very pleasant and fast. I believe that the first impression very often turns out to be fair, so I trusted my own feelings.

During the internship, I was primarily struck by the amount of information and the diversity of the tasks. It was very pleasant to feel that you were really given time and advice to develop. The tasks Included everything from banking operations of companies to small consultations on tax systems. The training program is a separate topic. It helps a lot to solidify the knowledge got in practice.

Since I joined the internship already at the end of the 4th year of my bachelor's degree, there were no problems with combining work and study. Nevertheless, I was always allowed to go to classes without any questions. The thing is to be able to show an adult approach and communicate with colleagues for general planning.

As one progresses at the company, there are a lot of transformations. Firstly, as I still remember, the most exciting is getting your Client to lead, when you are fully responsible for accounting, consulting and their overall satisfaction. I also really enjoyed participating in sales, which started even during the 1st year of work. Now, of course, there is a lot of work "for the benefit of business" - the calculation of financial indicators and analytics.

After three years of working for the company, I am a Senior Consultant. My nearest career plans include conducting sales on my own and improving my professional skills.

I really appreciate free and informal communication between employees in the company. It's nice when you can safely ask for advice from someone from absolutely any department. I also really like corporate events that help me get to know new guys better and relax in the circle of teammates.

I found out about Bellerage when I got the call from the HR. They invited me to take the internal test. I really liked the people I met during the selection stages, and I immediately realized that I could easily join the new team. I also liked the description of the department and the tasks that I would need to be complete during the internship. They stated clearly what are the steps to be made for the further career growth.

The internship period coincided the audit season, so it was very intense. I had to combine loads of tasks during audits, project preparation for the internship itself, and writing a master's degree, it was fun! I think that the abundance of tasks at the start helped me getting into this consulting mode faster and improving my skills. The internship assignments mainly consisted of checking the primary documentation for audits.

Then over time, during audits, I began to check more complex and analytical blocks, as well as to prepare consultations on complex tax issues for our clients. Then there were more tasks related to project management, complex communications with clients, as well as training of junior colleagues.

I am currently a Senior Consultant. One of the most global objectives now is to pass an audit exam and to get an auditor's certificate. I also would like to improve my managerial skills and to develop in this direction. My colleagues are real professionals who always motivate me to do more. All the guys are very versatile, and it's interesting to talk to both during working hours and out of the office.

Soon I got a call from Bellerage and they invited me for an interview. The first stage was testing and communication with future colleagues – supervisor and team leader. The second stage is to get acquainted with the managing partner, and finally, an offer for the position of an intern in 1C practice. I was attracted by the professionalism of my future colleagues, the enthusiasm and fire in their belly.

During the internship, I had to study a lot, the tasks were difficult but interesting. A month later, together the training, I began to deal with client tasks – so I began to immerse myself in the fascinating world of business processes automation.

With career growth comes great responsibility. With each new grade, the tasks became more complex and voluminous. During the first year here, the tasks were simple – small improvements to the system – and these were checked by senior colleagues.

Now it is the automation of entire blocks, the adaptation of standard solutions to customer requests, the development of solutions from scratch. There is more interaction with clients in the work: discussing clients’ needs and offering optimal custom solutions.

I'm a senior consultant now. One of the most important goals for me is to prepare for the exams for getting 1C certificates. Another interesting new target is to learn how to conduct interviews with candidates for the internships. And, of course, it is always important to improve communication skills.