My Journey – John Murphy
A positive attitude, strong work ethic and a desire to succeed goes a long way at Reconomy. By demonstrating these qualities, many of our employees have carved out very successful careers for themselves, often irrespective of whether they have any previous experience of the waste and environmental sectors.
In the case of Financial Planning and Analysis Manager, John Murphy, his incentives for joining Reconomy were threefold; to get that all important first step on the ladder, build his skillset, and most importantly – the opportunity to obtain a professional qualification. When John started at Reconomy in 2015 as a Finance Analyst, he had just graduated from university with a degree in Economics.
Looking back, John said: “Becoming a Finance Analyst at Reconomy was my first office job. I was looking for something in finance that directly related to my degree, so it ticked those boxes. More importantly though, the job was advertised as coming with a study support package towards a Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) qualification. That was the biggest attraction, as I could see a career path laid out in front of me.”
Having worked hard to establish himself, John began studying for his CIMA qualification in 2016. As he progressed through his studies, his experience and knowledge grew alongside. This unlocked new opportunities, exposing John to a wider range of duties across different areas of the business.
John continued: “As I progressed through my qualification, the work I was doing was changing. I began to get more involved in budgeting and planning cycles for Reconomy’s management team and then also started preparing materials for the Board of Directors, so as my knowledge grew my work started reaching a more senior level.”
John qualified as a Chartered Management Accountant in 2020 and was promoted into his current position of Financial Planning and Analysis Manager in April 2021. He is now responsible for the development of Reconomy’s budgets and planning cycles alongside the consolidated budgets for Reconomy’s wider Group of companies. John also supports many other areas of the business, such as assisting with the financial analysis of marketing campaigns and supporting the IT team with measuring the digital rollout of new technologies, such as Smartphone Apps and APIs.
John added: “Probably one of the best things about my job is the shear variety of tasks that I’m now getting involved with. Financial reporting and analysis are both hugely important fields, because they give people the critical information that they need to be able to adapt and improve their performance.”
John’s promotion also left a vacancy for his old position, which has since been occupied as the result of another internal promotion. That individual will now go on the same journey taken by John and will begin their professional accountancy training shortly. And thus continues Reconomy’s perpetual cycle of personal development.
John concluded: “It’s three years of studying to become a Chartered Management Accountant and I’m very grateful for the time and energy that Reconomy has invested in my development. I’ve had a huge amount of support from the senior finance team and benefited from the kind of hands-on experience that you can’t get from a textbook. I hope I can offer colleagues that are beginning their respective journeys the same level of support that I received when I was starting out.”