Andrew Zerzan

Name
Andrew Zerzan
Grad Year
2003
Degree
BA
Program
International Affairs
Role / Title
Head of Risk Management
Industry
Business, Finance & Administration
Organization
Reed Elsevier Group

Andrew Zerzan's career trajectory has taken him through many countries, industries and responsibilities. His interest in Japan was fostered at UTM, where he subsequently moved and founded a language school. From here, his career at the World Bank began as a Financial Market Integrity Analyst before working as an Independent Consultant in financial risk management projects, specifically in the booming mobile banking sector. He was named Junior Professional of the Year for his publication of the work done over this project. He now heads the Risk Management department at Reed Elsevier; where he was commended as Risk Professional of the Year, and sits on the board of IDEA, a debate education focussed organisation.

He attributes most of his success to the lessons he learned and the people he met in his undergraduate years. Though, if he could do anything differently, Andrew says he would have taken advantage of the internships and professor contacts he had at UTM.

“I really regret not making good relationships with my profs. Many of them are cool and interesting people. I should have tried to make long-lasting relationships with more of them,” he says.

He does credit the broad and diverse student base at UTM for teaching him how to approach his work today:

“I think an open attitude to cultural differences is important. Also, it took me a long time to realize that people's motivations are highly variable. Many people work for money and many for experience. I recommend graduates take care not to have a confrontational attitude in the workplace. I found that such people are rarely happy in their jobs.”

He does stress that even after leaving the halls of university; you mustn’t forget to keep leaning:

“I recommend doing what I didn't do until now — remember to keep learning as much as possible from every experience. Don’t take everything personal in the business world. Remember that the vast majority of successful people don't make decisions based on personal views, they make them based on whatever they think is just best for the business."