Viewing archives for Alumni Newsletter

An alumni trio of Economics graduates gave current QE sixth-formers key insights to guide them along their university and career paths in a series of talks.

Zainul Jafferji (2000-2007) visited on three occasions, while Zain Gulamali (2005–2012) and Yemi Falana (2008–2015) gave virtual talks.

It was, Zain told the Headmaster afterwards, “lovely to get a chance to ‘give back’… always keen to help where I can. I still remember how I felt when I was in their shoes and how important QE has been in my life since I left.”

Zainul Jafferji

Zainul Jafferji,  who took a Master’s in Economics (MPhil) at Cambridge, visited on three consecutive weeks.

He told Year 12 members of the Economics Group about applying for and studying Economics at Cambridge, set out career paths and explained how to think like an economist.

In the first session, he told members of the Economics Group about Cambridge’s Economics admissions process. Not only had taking a diverse range of A-level subjects (Mathematics, Economics, Physics, German) given him an edge and enabled him to stand out from the crowd, but his German is useful even today when he is advising German companies in his role as a Management Consultant, he said.

He urged the boys to start researching universities and courses early, suggesting they use QE Connect to speak to OEs before applying. This was doubly important for Cambridge where the choice of college is important: he advised looking up a college’s financial situation, location and, perhaps most importantly (!), menus, before applying.

Zainul stressed the importance of regularly reading The Economist and other Economics materials to prepare for interviews and advised the boys to hone their speaking skills by getting involved in  debating and taking LAMDA examinations.

He concluded the session by telling the boys to expect an intense, independently led course at Cambridge, where they would be in tutorials either alone or in small groups and so have nowhere to hide if they had not prepared correctly

In week two, he outlined the four main career paths for Economics undergraduates: investment banking, management consulting, public policy and further study.

University of Cambridge career fairs begin three weeks after term starts and applications for ‘Spring Weeks’ (an Easter internship) start soon after. It was, he said, important to apply early for “ferociously competitive” areas such as banking and consulting.

Zainul was able to secure a Spring Week at Royal Bank of Scotland in his first year. (He maintained that the bank’s financial collapse soon after, in 2008, was despite, rather than because of, his work there!)

In his final session, Zainul spoke on critical-thinking skills. He outlined the key skills required to think like an economist and to construct powerful, compelling arguments.

Students then split into three groups, looking at topics covering macroeconomics, microeconomics and econometrics. One group tackled the most current of issues: the impact of sanctions on Russia on the UK economy. He helped the pupils to move beyond CPI as a measure and to better understand the worry of a wage-price spiral taking hold.

Afterwards, Economics teacher Sheerwan O’Shea-Nejad  said: “Zainul has been an excellent guide for the students through the process of choosing a university, thriving there, getting a job and excelling once employed.”

Zain Gulamali

In his virtual talk, Zain, who read Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE) at Warwick, said boys should start at university as they meant to finish, rejecting any thoughts of “the first year doesn’t count so I will work harder in the second and third years”.

He advised them to start applying for work experience immediately: there was no such thing as bad work experience, since even a boring placement could show them what to avoid.

Zain previously worked at an accountancy firm to qualify as an ACA accountant, but now works in the finance department of multi-national mining company Anglo-American.

He warned of the dangers of ending up in an unfulfilling repetitive career just to earn a large salary and impress others.

Yemi Falana

In his talk, which was also delivered online, Bristol graduate Yemi related how he had switched from Medicine to Economics at university. He said frankly that his parents were keener on Medicine than he was.

Yemi stressed the importance of applying for internships early – even during A-levels. His included two with Goldman Sachs, where he then went on to take up a full-time post as an analyst in 2018.

Now an Associate with the investment bank, he advised researching the work-life balance and job security of different roles carefully, remarking on how he works shorter hours than the deal-making teams, and appreciates the opportunity to have more of a personal life.

Taking part in the BBC’s MasterChef had long been a dream, yet Old Elizabethan Rishi Nanavati assumed the programme would not be interested in his vegetarian and vegan food.

But when the young dentist went along to try out for the show last year, he found that far from ruling him out, the MasterChef team were “actually quite intrigued: they loved what I did”.

Rishi (OE 2006–2013) went on impress in the first episode of the current series with his dish, a coconut, lemongrass and chilli aloo tikki served with a coriander yoghurt, a tapioca cracker and topped with lime leaf sherbert and a raw mango chutney.

MasterChef judge John Torode calling the dish “bang on the money”, and Rishi was the first of the nine contestants to progress to the next round.

His dessert, a dark chocolate pavé topped with a pistachio dust and crystallised pistachios with a cardamon shortbread biscuit, saffron caramel and a cardamom crumb, was described by the celebrity chef as “professional level”.

He reached the quarter-final stage before being eliminated and is very positive about the whole experience. “I loved it. It was definitely very intense. There’s a lot of pressure, you have to stick to the timings, and you are cooking in front of two of the biggest food critics.” [John Torode and Greg Wallace]

Rishi, who is 27, relished the “amazing feedback” and the opportunity to cook alongside “very talented people”.

He had told an interviewer ahead of the series’ broadcast: “I’ve been a vegetarian all my life and really want to showcase the potential that vegetarian and vegan food really has, especially with a fusion of pan-Asian flavours.”

Now back home, he posted to his Instagram followers last week: “Still can’t believe this happened. For modern vegetarian food to be on a national platform and having the opportunity to be the one to portray it. That’s a dream come true.”

Rishi told QE Connect: “I started helping around the kitchen around the age of seven or eight, doing really simple jobs. When I was 12 or 13, I started doing recipe development.”

Looking back, he can see that his time at QE helped lay the platform for his current success, both in his career and in his ability to cope with the intense demands of the show. “I think the pressure of School did set me up for future pressure – in a good way! It was a lot of hard work and I got used to working hard and working independently.

“And I had a very good time and made friends for life.”

Rishi who lives back at his parents’ home in Pinner, remains in close contact with a group of eight alumni, including two, Nihir Shah and Vishal Davda, who read Dentistry with him at Bristol.

In the past few years, he has started to share his passion for cooking with others, through food blogging and social media.

Asked about how he plans to balance his cooking and his dentistry, he said: “I would love to juggle both. Dentistry does give you flexibility.” After the excitement of the show, he is now taking a few months to decide how to move forward.

• Rishi is on Instagram, @dish­­­_by_rish, and also blogs at https://www.dishbyrish.co.uk

Today, Barry Lui is a manager in one of the world’s leading professional services organisations, pressing ahead in a successful career in enterprise technology – a field he loves.

But it wasn’t always that way, and in fact Barry (OE 2004–2011) had to overcome serious early disappointments in order to put himself on the right track.

“If I think back to myself in 2011, leaving school and starting university after going through a tough UCAS clearing process, I definitely wouldn’t have been able to foresee or plan where I am today. There’s a message I’d really like to get across to young people, as I have often come across those who are not necessarily getting the best grades and often feeling very dispirited and pessimistic about the future as they’re still in an environment where their present and short-term future success is equated to, or determined by, their grades.

“They should keep their heads high and know that their future can still be very bright so long as they are proactive about finding their passions and strengths.”

Barry had relished his time as a pupil at the School, where he enjoyed success in national mathematics and chess competitions. “I look back very fondly at my time at QE: I made life-long friends and I’d say it has defined much of my character. The School encourages pupils to be organised, disciplined and focused. Organised in the sense that we were expected to be very aware of the homework expected of us and the quality required; disciplined in the way we were taught to address teachers and be very regimented about our schedules; focused by reinforcing the importance of our studies and encouraging a lot of competition.”

With Geography his favourite subject, he duly made his UCAS application, only to find that his grades did not live up to expectations. After ploughing through clearing, Barry gained a place at Queen Mary, University of London, where he studied Geography with Economics from 2011 to 2014.

He then faced disappointment again on realising that the course contents did not match the kind of material that he really enjoyed learning about. “Geography at QE allowed us to explore a good breadth of the subject, exploring themes from both Physical and Human Geography. I always enjoyed learning about Physical Geography a little more. The subject matter at university became much more narrow and focused on Human Geography.

“I came to a junction: I could either change my subject, or stay the course, but try to find another way to find, and then explore, my passion.” Eventually, he decided on the latter path, determining to take steps to give himself a career head start while still studying.

A way forward came in the shape of a part-time job with Apple, where he started as a humble shop floor assistant (a ‘Specialist’) at an Apple Store, before progressing to become an ‘iOS Champion’ –- “basically anything to do with iPads, iPhones etc.” –- and then being offered the opportunity to deliver workshops, in addition to his iOS Champion role. (He is pictured, circled centre, on his first day.)

“I delivered workshops to sometimes large numbers of people, which really helped build my confidence in presenting face to face. On the other hand, sometimes there were no registered attendees for the workshop, so we’d turn the speaker to max and deliver the class for the whole store to hear and try to draw a crowd that way!”

It was a job he did throughout almost his whole time at university, and the effects were profound. “At the beginning, I was quite a quiet and reserved person, and this job really helped me come out of my shell and explore new ways to engage with people. It completely changed my life in many ways, both in terms of personality and of giving me an industry focus.

“During this time, IBM and Apple formed an Enterprise Mobile Application partnership, which was really big news at the time, as mobile apps were becoming much more mainstream. I saw this as an area of very fast growth and decided to explore it more.

“In my final semester at university, I was simultaneously writing my dissertation, working part-time at Apple and I also picked up a summer internship at a recruitment software development firm exploring the industry of SaaS (Software as a Service) and Cloud software. At this point, I decided I wanted to work on landing a career in enterprise technology and put all of my focus into securing that as a graduate job.”

Juggling everything was not easy and, as Barry admits, in the run-up to his finals, his studies suffered: “I’d either be working, or applying to every single technology consulting firm graduate opportunity that I could find. I found that job applications were extremely time-consuming, especially if you want to tailor each application to each company.”

While he may not have ended up with the best marks in his degree, he had certainly gained a great deal of determination in his university years. And so, armed with this and with his professional experience, he found a technology consulting graduate role with Capgemini, where his main role was implementing Oracle Applications to clients who ranged from public sector organisations to retail companies. Significantly, in terms of his career development, he also teamed up with other graduates to build up an enterprise mobile applications initiative, building custom mobile applications based on client business need.

“I was then offered an opportunity at Deloitte to continue working in that space – albeit for projects on a different scale – with a strong and fast-growing team, so I decided to take it on.”

Four-and-a-half years later, Barry remains with Deloitte, “slowly taking on more and more responsibility, growing a great network and learning so much along the way”. He has risen through the ranks to his current position as a manager delivering functional financial and procurement solution consulting for enterprise technology programmes.

Over the years, he has increasingly sought to give back to those he can help: he has participated in mentoring schemes at his former university for the last three years, spoken at career panels and helped out at a QE careers day.

Barry married his wife, Mina, in 2019: “We’re continuing to grow together.” The couple met at university – “so, if my grades hadn’t taken me to Queen Mary, I wouldn’t have met my wife!”

As he reflects on this and on his career to date, this former Apple employee, concurs (in common with other QE alumni) with the words spoken by the company’s inspirational founder, Steve Jobs, in his commencement address to Stanford University students in 2005: “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.”

After an early career switch from advertising to IT, Warren Lipman has never looked back, building and adapting a company that now employs more than 20 people and supports thousands of customers across the globe.

After leaving the University of Greenwich with a degree in Real Estate, Warren (OE 1986–1988) worked in the 1990s as a Planner Buyer for industry giant MediaCom.

“But,” he says, “I was always very technical, and after an enjoyable career in advertising and in 1999 ahead of the millennium, I decided a career in IT was a good idea. I took a City & Guilds course in Micro Systems and OS, and then went to work as a contractor installing ‘millennium bug’ fixes for the banks.” After that, he worked as internal desktop support for a software company.

Then, in 2003, he started his own company, Storm IT, specialising in providing IT support to SMEs in the local area. The Barnet-based company has grown year-on-year and today employs more than 20 people, including technicians at all levels of competency, digital marketing experts and a full in-house accounts department.

“Our offering has developed and changed each year, embracing ‘comms’, business broadband, cloud computing and full security services.

“Professional highlights include buying a commercial property in Barnet, which became Storm HQ supporting many other businesses, and working with various blue-chip corporates, supporting thousands of users across the world.”

During the 2020 lockdown, in response to extensive feedback and requests from clients, he developed ‘Storm-In-A-Box’. Warren says: “It caters for the blended and hybrid WFH/work-from-the-office model – the premise being that we provide one laptop (and device) with unlimited ‘comms’ calling and headset, MS Office and cloud storage, and with all licences and IT support, for one cost per month. “This has been greatly welcomed and is a unique offering in the marketplace.”

Fresh from that triumph, Warren is now looking to pursue some other ambitions as well. “I have an interest in, and love of, coffee and have always wanted to open a coffee shop as a side passion project: this will be fulfilled in Q1 of 2022, as I am just about to sign a lease for a small shop in Radlett, Hertfordshire. I am an art and music enthusiast, too, and will be incorporating both passions in the coffee shop, which will sell ‘affordable art’ and possibly music. I probably have a few other businesses in me too!”

Thirty-three years after he left the School, Warren has “fond memories of QE (when I wasn’t in trouble!). It taught me the values and principles that have carried – and continue to carry – me through life. I am still in contact with one or or two fellow alumni (Ben Mendoza springs to mind) who are lifelong friends, and our children are friends, too.”

Anantha Anilkumar had a reassuring message for Year 9 boys when he visited the School to give a careers talk this term: “Nothing will happen exactly as you expect it to – and that is ok.” He detailed the twists and turns of his life before he settled into his career as a Civil Service analyst.

Since graduating from Oxford with a degree in English Language and Literature in 2016, Anantha  (OE 2005-2012) has worked in a diverse range of jobs, from being a Music teacher at a secondary school in the Borough of Camden and a content editor for an organisation offering Mathematics tuition, to working for a company providing IT Cost Management software.

Since September this year, however, he was been with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, fulfilling a role as a continuous service improvement analyst.

In his talk to Year 9 in the Main School Hall, Anantha detailed his somewhat unexpected journey since leaving the School in 2012, including some of the challenges he faced at university and his experience in a number of jobs before arriving in his current post with the Civil Service.

Head of Year 9 Akhil Gohil said: “We’re very grateful to Anantha for his inspirational talk. He emphasised the importance of having a plan and also the ability to adapt, since, as he pointed out, life, inevitably, will not always follow that plan. This particularly resonated with students in Year 9, who are soon to select their GCSE options and who have had to adapt to the global pandemic in the past two years.”

Academic Makoto Takahashi, who has earned an international reputation for his research into the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant meltdown in Japan, has curated an exhibition on the disaster, which is being shown at the Royal Geographical Society.

The exhibition, which runs until 23rd December, marks the tenth anniversary of the meltdown, and of the earthquake and tsunami that triggered it. Visitors have included a party of A-level Geography and Art students from QE: Makoto treated them to a lecture on the exhibition and also gave them a guided tour.

Makoto (OE 2003–2010) is the youngest-ever lecturer at the Munich Centre for Technology in Society (MCTS), part of the Technical University of Munich, a position he gained in 2019. A previous holder of a Science and Technology Studies Fellowship at Harvard, he will be returning to the Harvard Kennedy School of Governance as a Fulbright-Lloyd’s Fellow in early 2022.

For the past eight years, his work has focused on examining how expert authority is claimed in conditions of low public trust. Considered somewhat niche when Makoto first proposed it as his field of study in 2013, its relevance became apparent in 2016 with the election of President Donald Trump.

“In fact, I was at an OECD Nuclear Energy Agency event in Fukushima prefecture on the day that Trump was elected,” he says. “The shock was palpable. And the parallels between the crisis of confidence that Japanese experts faced following ‘3.11’ [the earthquake and tsunami took place on 11th March 2011] and the ‘post-truth’ political moment were clear.”

The exhibition, entitled Picturing the Invisible, sees his research interests coming together with his longstanding involvement with the London art scene: while in the Sixth Form at QE, he took part in in the Royal Academy’s attRAct programme and in the Louis Vuitton Young Arts Program; he has also been an Event Manager at the OPEN Ealing community art gallery.

It features the work of six photographers complemented by a series of short essays from policymakers, experts, and activists. The contributors include some “wonderful artists and essayists”, says Makoto, such as: Lieko Shiga, a photographer based in Kitakama, a village hit hard by the tsunami; Yoi Kawakubo, who buries silver halide film in the contaminated soils of Fukushima’s exclusion zone to produce a powerful series of abstract images, and Sir David Warren, British Ambassador to Japan, 2008–12.

A collaboration between the RGS and the Munich Centre for Technology in Society, the exhibition has secured coverage in publications including The New Statesman and The British Journal of Photography.

In preparing for it, Makoto says he has been committed to pedagogic innovation to benefit students disadvantaged by the impact of Covid-19 on higher education. “The pandemic has robbed students of so much of the normal university experience, so it’s even more important than ever to innovate new modes of engagement. In this spirit, I integrated preparations for Picturing the Invisible into my teaching at MCTS. Seven students from the Responsibility in Science, Engineering and Technology course have been involved in every step of the planning and [have shared] their perspectives on the works in the exhibition programme, alongside seasoned policymakers, activists, and experts.”

After leaving QE, Makoto took a First in Geography at Cambridge, winning the M T Dodds and Rowley Mainhood Awards for academic excellence during the course of his degree. He went on to gain his MPhil and PhD from Cambridge, where his doctoral studies were funded by the Economic and Social Research Council.

While there, in addition to lecturing, co-ordinating undergraduate groups and working with the university’s Communications Office to produce podcasts for a non-specialist audience, Makoto also served as the secretary of the Mixed Martial Arts Society (CUMMA).

In 2017, he spent three months as a Visiting Research Fellow at Tokyo’s Waseda University, where the proximity to Fukushima proved valuable. “I had the opportunity to interview notable public figures in the Fukushima debate, making regular trips to Fukushima prefecture itself.”

His thesis, The Improvised Expert: Performing Authority after Fukushima (2011–2018), drew upon his own extensive ethnographic fieldwork conducted in Japan; it won the American Association of Geographers’ Jacques May Thesis Prize.

He has presented his work at the Maison Francais d’Oxford (at the invitation of the French Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs), at the British Embassy in Paris, CEPN (Le Centre d’étude sur l’Evaluation de la Protection dans le domaine Nucléaire – a non-profit radiological protection organisation) and gave a paper at a conference organised by the International Commission on Radiological Protection to examine the lessons of the Fukushima Daiichi disaster.

During his schooldays, Makoto threw himself into all that QE had to offer. He was involved in debating, was the leader of the second violins in the Chamber Orchestra and was in the waterpolo team.

Today, he is still in contact with School friends Eigo Takeda, who read Mathematics at Cambridge before taking up consultancy work in Japan, and Evgeny Slavin, who works in venture capital in Cambridgeshire.

Having previously worked towards a commission with the British Army Reserve, he has had to pause his involvement with the reserves while working outside the UK.