Personal Reflection
As an undergraduate accounting student at the University at Buffalo, it is very common for firms to interact with students in a variety of ways on campus. In recent years, accounting firms large and small have recognized the importance of networking with students earlier on in their collegiate studies, which facilitates stronger relationships that can potentially lead to employment opportunities one day.
“The Challenge”
This past fall I was granted the opportunity to engage with PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), one of the “Big Four” accounting firms, through an on-campus Case Competition. Essentially, the task at hand entailed a team-based approach for generating a solution to an open ended problem. Through our randomly assigned groups, I had the pleasure of working with two international students and a peer of mine to evaluate a hypothetical company pondering relocation sites. The competition involved our group presenting our proposal to a panel of PWC executives and faculty. And the presentation itself was the ultimate test. Likewise, the key component of delivering our solution was incorporating visuals that could echo our message across in a profound way. Every competing group had been given the same group of documents, and PWC wanted to observe how each group would interpret and process the data. In the same light, this concept of incorporating data processing systems like Alteryx and Tableau to display information effectively was exactly what PWC has moved towards inside their own company. Furthermore, PWC has made substantial efforts in the pursuit of improving the digital fitness of employees’ company-wide. In like manner, our group was able to pull data from the provided resources and build informative charts and graphs.
“The Transformation”
Staying up to date in the business world is crucial for all types of companies and individuals. In my young professional career, I’ve only been able to witness a glimpse of the effect that data analytics will shape into the workplace. Though, I’m confident that the influence will continue to grow and alter the way business is conducted globally. The struggle will always be how to interpret data and through what technology. But data processing systems are becoming more prominent and efficient for aiding this process. Despite the numerous variables and components, I think that the aspect of developing models will be vital for the professional sports industry. Especially with sports, there is significant potential for data systems to totally revolutionize strategy on all levels.
