Co-operation Ireland - Morgan Stanley

The Co-operation Ireland – Morgan Stanley project ended last week. This project aimed at giving a group of young people from Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and London an opportunity to engage in an event that could possibly have life-changing impacts.

The young people travelled to Morgan Stanley’s UK headquarters in Canary Wharf London for a two-day event. Many of the young people and indeed some of the teachers and adults, who accompanied them, had preconceived ideas about what a bank was. This was almost instantly dismissed within the first hour as they were met and escorted to the banks facilities and hospitality floor where they had breakfast of scones and orange juice and met the main sponsors of the trip. They saw the facilities available to the employees of Morgan Stanley, which included restaurants, coffee bars, restrooms, wonderful views, hairdressers and beauticians.

They then began a rather intensive two-day programme which introduced them to the work of an Investment Bank with visits to the Trading Floors to see the buyers at work. They had talks about what the bank does, what are the different divisions of the bank and they met people who had given up their lunch time to come and speak to them relating how they got involved in the world of investment banking.

AS well as the more formal sessions they were involved in Active Session some similar to the Alan Sugar’s Apprentice type tasks. In one they were competing with the 6-week Morgan Stanley Academy classes. In groups of four to five they were given an area of Canary Wharf and had to promote it as a tourist attraction and create resources to advertise the area. They were required to create a 4-page brochure, a 3D model of the area and create a presentation.

They were allocated an amount of money and they could purchase materials. Given one and a half hours they were dispatched to carry out the tasks. At the end of the allocated period three members of Morgan Stanley’s staff judged them and a winner was chosen.

Now remember they were competing against the Academy Groups who were older than them and had been on the course for a longer time. The overall winner was one of the Co-operation Ireland groups.

Other similar exercises on Project Management were included and it was actually stated at the end of the two days that some of the questions and indeed some of the answers from the Co-operation Ireland group were as good if not better than what could be expected from the graduate course.

The rest of the time was in a similar vein and it was thoroughly enjoyed by all.

One thing that I noticed more than any other was the confidence gained by some if not all of the young people, the realisation that such career paths were not out of their reach, they had skills that maybe did not show in their formal education but were drawn out in this informal active learning environment. I think they went away from the experience believing that the jobs involved in Investment Banking could be within their reach and that as individuals they would be certainly capable to carry the out.

It is hoped that these realisations will encourage them to accept that confidence in themselves and not to settle for second or even third best but to aim that bit higher.

This was a very memorable experience and hopefully it will be repeated next year and for many year to come

Should the balance of Formal versus Informal perhaps swing towards the informal for these type of children?