What's your job about?
KPMG works with different-sized clients to help fuel NZ’s prosperity. We aim to help companies achieve their business goals and exceed their expectations. I work on the Innovation and Growth Advisory team. We work with different government agencies to help clients access funding for their exciting innovations. Specifically, we help clients with the R&D tax credit, which incentivizes companies to do research & development in NZ to help broaden the country’s scientific and technological horizons.
A normal day will see me meeting with different companies’ technical and finance teams. We help them navigate the legislation, then translate their R&D activities into a narrative for the government to assess. Each day is different and requires different skill sets. One day you might be working with engineers building rocket ships, and the next day you might be working with doctors developing brain-training headsets!
There’s no ‘right’ pathway into this role; we have team members from all walks of life, which helps broaden our network of companies we can help. Everyone has different technical training and skills, so when we collaborate, everyone’s contribution is valued.
What's your background?
I grew up in Auckland and went to the same school from years 1 to 13. During school, I was heavily involved in many sports, competing around New Zealand. I was always a good student, grades-wise, but never the best in the class. I think this was really good for me because it taught me that there’s more to just being smart, and this helped me become a more rounded person.
All throughout my childhood, I was encouraged to give anything a go and never turn down opportunities. Because of this mentality, my CV looks pretty unusual compared to others. When I was 14, I became a lifeguard at my local beach. This was an invaluable experience and taught me so much, which has been transferable to every job I’ve had since. As a lifeguard, I had to be able to communicate with people of all ages professionally and confidently in usually high-stress environments.
At university, I was all over the show, changing my degree every year I studied as different opportunities arose. Initially, I wanted to do medicine, so I enrolled in Health Science at Otago. Although I found the topics interesting, there was something about the culture that didn’t do it for me – so I switched to biomedical science. Later in my second year, I decided again that this wasn’t quite what I wanted to do, so I switched to genetics and added a minor in marketing. Odd combo, I know. After all this chopping and changing, I thought I was going to struggle to find a job, but luckily I fell into the perfect role.
Applying for jobs during the 2020 lockdown was a nightmare. All of the assessments and interviews were online, so it was hard to make a good first impression. Despite this, KPMG was all over it, made prospective grads feel comfortable, and gave us heaps of information from the get-go. After a couple of weeks of moving through different interviews and assessment centers, I got the job. I’ve been in this role for 6 months now and love it.
Could someone with a different background do your job?
If there’s one thing about KPMG I didn’t expect when starting, it’s that everyone has a different background. In my team alone, we have lawyers, engineers, software developers, geneticists, economists, and psychologists. I thought everyone in a big four would be accountants with similar upbringings, but on my first day, I was proven wrong. It doesn’t matter what papers you took, the grades you got, or which university you studied at—if you’ve got something that sets you apart from the rest, you’re almost halfway in the door.
What's the coolest thing about your job?
My job is cool because it doesn’t feel like work. I have a young, fun, and social team that gets along well. We work hard and have lots of responsibility, but it’s so rewarding. We are encouraged to work flexibly, which means we can work from home, work from different offices around NZ, or work during whatever hours of the day we want. This is really helpful if you want to go away for a long weekend or have something on; you can just reschedule your hours so they’re convenient.
What are the limitations of your job?
This job is often high pressure with reporting deadlines. We do our best to bring work forward so we’re not in a mad rush at the end, but there’s always some residual stress. Although this is a limitation, we actually find that we enjoy work more during a busy period as we get a greater sense of satisfaction when the job is done.
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