What is the financial services sector?
Most adults have some dealing with the financial services sector. Personal and private banking, insurance, pensions and investments are provided by an extensive range of financial institutions and organisations, which include many major names such as HSBC, Santander, Barclays and Zurich.
The financial services industry is highly competitive. As such, financial firms continue to be early adopters of emerging technologies to speed up processes and deliver better insights than the completion. Developing a career in financial services, especially for a major, global institution, is an ideal route if you're eager to future-proof your career by developing modern and tech-led skills from day one in the workplace, rather than developing more traditional or manual accounting skills.
Opportunities in financial services are extremely varied. Your role could be in-house, outsourced or in shared service accounting. You could either have broad responsibilities, or specialise in areas such as risk, audit, fund or financial product management. One skill is essential though. You must be keenly aware of the fundamental relationship between risk and return when safeguarding the assets of organisations and individuals.
Roles in this sector
Explore some of the roles you could undertake in the financial services sector, alongside study and employability tips for accountants:
