Michael Shannon: Strategic Advisory and Restructuring Analyst at PJT Partners

What is your background/ experience with ISCG and what are you currently doing?

I got involved with ISCG at the beginning following its founding by Ronan, Rory and Jan-Philipp in my 1st year at UCD. It was a great opportunity to join ISCG at this point as I got an insight into all the work that goes into creating a society/non-profit entity from scratch. I also was very lucky to get the opportunity to be involved in ISCG’s maiden project for Team Horizon, a life-science engineering consulting company. This afforded all of us involved a great opportunity to gain some real world experience and culminated in a presentation to the Board of Directors of the Team Horizon, which included none other than Dragon and future presidential candidate Sean Gallagher. Building on the momentum of this more projects came down the pipeline such as an assessment of the retail meats market and I was fortunate enough to be project leader on our project for Terminal 4, a CMS and digital marketing platform. This project culminated in a presentation to the company’s management team on a niche online market, in which a large investment was being considered at the time. 

Fast-forward to post my ISCG involvement, having graduated with a BSc. Economics & Finance from UCD in 2018 I am currently a Strategic Advisory and Restructuring Analyst at PJT Partners in London having completed the Summer Analyst Programme in 2018 and joined full-time in February 2019.

What did you enjoy most/find most beneficial about ISCG?

ISCG was ideal for me as I looked to gain work experience and gave a great boost to my applications when I applied for consulting and finance internships. The real-life business problems, which ISCG projects give you the opportunity to become aware of, assess and subsequently solve, provide for great experience for any prospective job you may take up. The skills acquired over the course of my time in ISCG such as project management, business acumen, application of consulting frameworks, IT skills and teamwork more generally etc. proved invaluable when I finally entered the workplace. 

Finally, the other great thing about ISCG asides from the tangible benefits associated with the experience acquired etc. is the network you build and the friends you make over the course of your involvement within the ISCG and who I have maintained contact with since we went our separate ways.

How do you think your experience with ISCG has helped you generally and/or in your career?

ISCG has helped me hugely in my employment to date with the skillset provided being invaluable. As part of my job, I regularly have to look at a new situation in a new sector and fundamentally, this is what ISCG challenges you to do (as everything is more or less new to you as a student). I also found ISCG gave me the tools to play a more active role in the planning/preparation of client materials by virtue of the enhanced sense you gain on how to structure materials in a way that effectively communicates the desired messaging to the client. - having the opportunity to be a project leader as mentioned above was definitely very useful in this regard. ISCG also helped to foster my ability to work independently and take on increased responsibility within lean project teams, which is very useful within any job but particularly useful at present given the lean teams prevalent in the boutique investment-banking model and the steep learning curve encountered in this sector.

To conclude I would encourage any students who are interested in a career in consulting or investment banking if you have not already done so to submit an application to join the next session of ISCG as it continues to represent a brilliant extra-curricular opportunity.