Why Am I Here and Where Am I Going!?

Why Am I Here and Where Am I Going!?

I am 10 years removed from a Bachelors degree in Quantitative Economics.  I may have been able to tell you what that meant 10 years ago however after a decade of not using my Economic “muscles” I wouldn't even know where to begin.

Immediately out of college I found a job as a Loan Officer trainee with a Rochester MN based Credit Union in downtown Milwaukee.  I was ecstatic…not sure why, but I was.  I am rather quiet and reserved and not much of a “salesman.”  Looking back it wasn't a great fit, but it was a career and I was going to give it everything I had.  It pushed my comfort boundaries and I grew as a person and professionally.  Everything went great for about a year until the home office closed our lone WI branch.  I was 24 and already out of a job.

I recalled some conversations I had previously with one of my professors at Parkside.  He had mentioned that a few of his graduates went on to become Actuaries.  “Hmmm, that sounds interesting and I think they make good money, right?”

Fast forward 9 years –

I am currently the owner of the SQL Server DB servicing the Actuarial dept for the Individual segment of Humana.  My progression to my current role started shortly after I started at Humana and specifically within MS Excel.  We had 26 state based Excel workbooks filled with many worksheets of algorithm factors.  Making updates was a nightmare and extremely error prone.  I played around with VBA in my own time to come up with automated ways of making the factor updates and calculating rates that were much quicker, less tedious and far less error prone.  Based on this interest, my boss at the time put me in charge of moving all 26 workbooks to a SQL Server DB to which I replied, “Uhhh, what’s SQL Server?”

Luckily I wasn't immediately pulled off the SQL project based on my initial reaction or I might not be writing this Blog today :)

Needless to say it went extremely well.  Queries and tables I developed 7 years ago are still being used today.  My SQL skills have grown to the point where I am a resource for data within our department as well as across other business units.  I am still not at an IT level which is why I have returned to school in the Programmer Analyst program.  I want to validate what I already know as well as build a skill set more suitable for IT.  I enjoy what I do each day and my education at MATC will simply ensure that my career will continue to line up with what makes me happy.