Profile 36
Aston Graduate Career Profile
Name: Siddhartha Ray
Nationality: Indian
School of Study: Engineering and Applied Sciences
Degree Programme: MSc in Supply Chain Management
Year of Graduation: 2012
Job Title: Management Consultant – Supply Chain
Management
Company: Accenture Services Pvt Ltd
Industry: Professional Services
Share your story…
After graduating from Aston University’s Masters Programme in Supply Chain Management
with a distinction I went onto join the Supply Chain Centre of Competence with Mckinsey
and Company as an Analyst. In this role I worked on numerous supply chain consultancy
projects helping clients analyse, diagnose, and transform their supply chain to help cut
costs, improve and track performance and become more competitive. The role required me
to have a strong theoretical and a practical understanding of supply chain concepts to help
solve numerous business problems which clients face. It also required me to have an
understanding of analytical tools and techniques to deal with large sets of data and complex
scenarios. My stint at Aston university had equipped me with the fundamental
understanding of supply chain management which helped me add a lot of value while
researching about clients, gathering data and while problem solving during these projects.
Subsequently I have now moved to Accenture’s supply chain consultancy team where I work
as a management consultant. This role is entirely client facing and requires me to work in
high pressure situations in the realm of supply chain and operations management.
The best thing about your current role is…
I work with a team of talented and very knowledgeable professionals who help clients
become more efficient and high performing. Apart from being challenging and intellectually
stimulating the role requires me to leverage some of the skills that I learnt while doing my
masters at Aston (like researching, analysing and project management).
Most valuable skills…
Domain knowledge and subject matter expertise, Analytical ability (quantitative and qualitative),
client relationship building, networking with colleagues and leveraging each other, ability to handle
pressure and communicating effectively, being open to feedback and criticism, patience , positive
attitude and hard work.
My golden nugget of advice would be…
I have realised it is important to be passionate about a profession or a subject to stay
motivated. Once we have identified that area it is helpful if we can get some formal
training/degree/diploma to get a grip on the subject and develop deep expertise. After that
it is up to the individual to make most of the opportunities that come their way, work hard
and keep learning. I must add it is important to be willing to make mistakes and not being
too scared of failure because that is the only way we humans learn (I would recommend
students to read a book by Jonah Lehrer called “How we decide” – the book talks a lot about
how the human brain learns and takes decisions and you would realise that if we don’t
make mistakes we can’t get better at anything.)
Give us a quote!
“I do not know what I may appear to the world, but to myself I seem to have been only like
a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother
pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered
before me.” –Isaac Newton
I have always drawn inspiration from this great quote by Sir Isaac Newton, it keeps my feet
on the ground and motivates me to never stay still and keep exploring and learning.
© Aston University Careers and Placements Centre 2013