What's your job about?
I work for the Consulting Division at KPMG in the Workforce Human Resources Advisory Team. We work with companies to uplift their HR Practices as well as optimise and future proof their workforce.
This is kind of a cliché in consulting and its one of the things I like the most about it, is that no two days are the same. If I am on a job with a client, that could involve doing a daily stand up with my colleagues on the job with me detailing what we are working on and what the focus needs to be for that day/ week, I could be helping take notes in a workshop, I could be analysing a clients workforce data to better understand the make up of their staff or I could be helping put together a report to submit to the client as our final deliverable. On the flip side of that if I am not on a job, I could be doing some self-directed learning, helping put together a proposal for a client or working on and internal development project to help better our team and the company.
What's your background?
I grew up on the Gold Coast in Queensland and was a swimmer for majority of my life. During my last year of High School, I was recruited to go and swim for a college over in America. It was an experience I would go back and do again and again if I had the chance. It was unlike anything I would have been able to do here in Australia and I am very fortunate that I was able to get a degree from a top-ranking University and swim competitively at a high level at the same time, making the National College Championships (NCAAs) all four years. I was thankful enough to graduate in 2019, before COVID hit, and came back to Australia to continue my passion of swimming. After getting delayed due to COVID I competed at the Olympic Trials in Australia in 2021 and made the Australian University Games team for that year. We couldn’t travel to compete anywhere due to continuing COVID disruptions, but it was an honour to make the team all the same. At the end of 2021 I felt it was time for me to hang up the goggles and start looking for a full-time job. I knew I wanted to work in HR but didn’t exactly know where, so I thought a graduate program was probably a great place to start. I applied to a bunch and got through all stages of the process with KPMG. Their values aligned very closely to mine and even though I didn’t have the best understanding to begin with what exactly consulting was, I am very happy I chose KPMG and have been exposed to so many different types of jobs and facets of HR in my first year.
Could someone with a different background do your job?
I think the answer is both yes and no. I definitely think someone with a finance background for example could definitely become a consultant, they would just be a finance consultant and join our Finance Advisory team. I think to be a HR Consultant you definitely have to have a background/ degree in HR, or at least an interest otherwise you won’t enjoy the work you are doing. But there are many areas within our Consulting division that cater to a wide range of backgrounds. I think the biggest things that are needed to be a consultant besides the technical knowledge of your field are the soft skills like the ability to communicate, not only with colleagues but also clients, the ability to manage your time well and the willingness to learn.
What's the coolest thing about your job?
The coolest thing about my job is being able to work with people all over Australia. We are a very national team so I may be on a job with someone from Melbourne or Sydney even though I’m from the Brisbane office. Apart from that I also really like seeing the outcome that we’ve achieved at the end of a job. It's nice to be able to finish a job and sit back and look at all the work that was done, all of the setbacks that may have happened and look at the final outcome that the client is happy with and be proud of the work you accomplished.
What are the limitations of your job?
One of the limitations would be when you are not on a client job, your work day is very much up to you. You might have some busy days where you’re trying to get a proposal submitted on time or there might be days when things are quieter so there’s time for admin tasks, learning or reaching out to colleagues to see if they need any assistance. So, this means you have to be able to juggle this well and not be dependent on having set tasks to do every day.
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