[Music] welcome back to another episode of the figures tech talk i am here with my guest mr jared shaw and uh today we're just gonna jump right in and and talk about his career journey and a few other things a few other topics that we thought would be pretty interesting so without further ado want to give you the chance to uh take the floor hi everybody my name is jared sharr i'm a senior tech consultant i'm a big four consultant i've had different experiences working in several big fours as a tech consultant that kind of ranges with a lot of different things like working with uh different companies to assess their controls i'm more of a controls and securities guys so assessing controls and kind of doing full implementations on systems and making sure stuff is secure uh within the back end like controls um socks controls you know all the big sec you kind of have to have you know sec ready type stuff so that's yeah there's a lot there's a lot jammed into that i wanna i wanna walk back and uh talk more about what it like what is big four what is tech consulting and all the other things that you mentioned so let's start with the big four what is the big four yeah for sure so the big four it's four consultancy group uh consultancy companies there's pwc deloitte kpmg and ernst young also known as ey and basically they do a lot of financial services you know kind of helping out different companies with a wide range of things i'm on the consultant side but we also have tax we have audit which i came from other i used to be an auditor and we have we have a whole bunch of different other kind of compartments within the big four like m a you know mergers and acquisitions whenever you see big companies buy other big companies that's big four is behind that doing the investigation and making sure it's legal and stuff like that so so tech consulting what exactly do tech consultants do at these big four companies so tech consulting it's uh it's kind of a big wide range of uh things that we do i'm specifically in the grc group which is governance risk and compliance so what we do is we we kind of work with different uh um different technologies such as sap oracle archer um the whole nine to make sure that we optimize um so i'm more on the grc side and we also have you know things that you think are considered with tech tech such as you know cyber we have a big cyber practice as well and um there's just a lot of different things that you can do in technology consulting uh which i like and it's a lot it's it's very thought thought based so it's not like cut and dry which is more what i was doing on audit where you have a set rules that you have to follow here in tech consulting is more you get to think you get to come up with solutions and things of that nature and you get to have stand-up meetings in front of some you know c-suite people and and make sure that you know your ideas are heard and it feels good to actually be heard instead of doing work and kind of going in the bottomless bucket so that's what we're doing at tech consulting we just kind of provide solutions we call them leading practice to kind of help our clients out um you know there's a lot of things changing right now so okay so you're doing big you're doing tech consulting and you're doing this on behalf of one of the big four companies what type of clients do you typically see like what industries or like are these are these people who are already taking advantage of these big four companies um like are they already represented and doing business or are they just needing like resources to work on certain things what what exactly is going on what type of clients are you working with well honestly it's so it's such a wide range like there's so many there we work with every sector so i just got off of an engagement where i was working with a big tech company like a fan company i moved to another company that does clothing um at some point in time i was on oil and gas so we do a lot of different things that's where kind of that thought aspect comes in where okay i worked on the oil and gas engagement now i can take this to my next engagement and kind of help with the solutions because i already know what they're doing over there not necessarily saying we copy and paste or anything like that everything's tailored but since we have that experience we're able to go from different industries and take the practices that we got from that industry and translate over to another industry a lot of the things are kind of like you just have to have knowledge on that industry and understand like how the dynamic is but besides that um it's pretty wide open as far as like who we service um we do a lot of assessments like i said implementations our biggest thing is like trying to make sure that our clients work smarter and that's basically what we implement not many people have that that level of experience uh enough especially in in our communities where we can learn more about opportunities you're not you may not be confined to just doing one thing for a particular company but if you're looking into technology you can look into doing things like consulting where you know the world is kind of yours you you define the solutions you work with these different clients and you help your your respective consulting company build that rapport over time so i like hearing that i think it's very valuable for people to hear that so that they can see other avenues or lanes that they can go down as well yeah um another question i have for you is more tailored around like your career journey maybe how you got to where you are today so what would you say or or or how would you tell that how would you tell that story and how you got into technology where does it begin well it's actually a crazy story and i was telling you you know it was kind of random look almost like a fate i would say um i came to college i was in high school i knew that i i used to open computers and you know work on computers work on phones and do all types of like kind of ad hoc at the house you know take apart stuff put it back together to see what's inside and understand how like hardware and stuff works so when i came to college i was like you know i like that so might as well do computer engineering um after in in the best part about college is that you kind of figure out what you actually want to do and what you want to be um so after going through you know we all have like those growing pains and i met you in college so we have those growing pains and we we tried different things out and in the end i graduated from unt with my integrated studies major computer science business techcom and essentially what i did with that is is i parlayed that into my first job was it was pretty much like web design and i knew that that wasn't necessarily what i wanted to do at the time with the rest of my life but i knew that was a step in the right place right right i didn't have a lot of prospects coming out of school because like i said i was bouncing around a lot i knew i wanted to do something in tech i just didn't know how to get in what to do and things of that nature um so that's really when i kind of kicked it in overdrive i got my resume up you know i did linkedin and i was like i'm just going to put what i like what my interests are what i learned in school and hopefully this lands a job and you know somebody hit me up on linkedin and said hey you know we have this opportunity for you um and i took it and ran so that was my first job and then after that getting into uh my next job i was doing that's where i got the sap knowledge and i understood what sap was um for y'all who don't know sap is the erp solution that companies use it it handles a lot of stuff from company warehousing to you know pricing to you know the client side the back end side it's just like a big world of stuff so once i got my foot in that that's when i was able to go start my journey within big four and um pretty much get to where i am right now that's that's that's what's up man yeah that that's i think um what's most interesting about your story is talking about like not really having exactly like a way so the the last guest that um oh she's one of the previous guests that we had you know his story was a lot more centered around like how his father inspired him right so he kind of already had like an idea of like you know um if there's nobody else that i could say inspire me to gun on the path that i'm already going down yeah it's my father so i i know that i can go to somebody and ask them questions or whatever i need um to to get me there yeah whereas like there's other people and i feel like um they'll relate to you a lot more in the aspect of like you're trying to hit a moving target yeah you don't even know exactly what the target looks like but you also have an idea in your head of what it could look like so you're literally trying to find a way to get there and by the grace of god you end up getting that first opportunity and then you know you take the experience and knowledge from that and you transfer it somewhere else where you feel like it might apply more to where you might be passionate yeah because you you took the time to understand like just how vast technology was what other things are out there in technology um that you may be interested in so a question i have from like i guess a part of your career journey when you got that first job did you already anticipate that the skills were going to transfer or were you kind of more so just like happy to get a first job and didn't really know what to do just yet um i would say 50 50 honestly um it was it was one of those things where it was almost like and i think leaving college everybody kind of has that you know you're wet behind the ears and you like want to get into your career and you want to do it now um so half of me was like i don't know if this is the right choice if i'm you know i went to after college i went to um after unt i went to villanova to learn some stuff about scrum um i got a certification professional certification in scrum i was like i don't know if if i'm gonna do anything with scrum because i'm not even doing anything in this realm right now right um same thing with the lot knowledge that i learned from my job i had no idea it was almost like i'll get this job if it goes right i'll stay here i don't want to be here forever so i'm going to keep elevating but i have no clue what skills i'm going to take with me and you know what what i'm going to need for my future so i think it's it's definitely 50 50. i knew that there was some stuff that i was going to take with me no matter what like scrum because it's you know big project management is very important in agile and stuff like that but um there are some things i was just like i have no clue honestly i might be wasting my time on this you know yeah um and i think that a lot of our experiences just in perfect in the professional world like the smallest things are always the things that you remember like oh you know i have a meeting right now i just remember two years ago when i did this engagement this is what i did so i can lead in with this so you know a lot of the knowledge that you take you may not know if you're gonna need it in the future right um but that's why it's good to have that knowledge it's good to write down notes and keep that with you yeah so what's your plans as a tech consultant today uh how does how does tech consultant bridge into i guess where you see yourself in professional career is this strategic for you like becoming a consultant because you want to do blank or is tech consulting kind of the end of the line or like where you want to land in your career well i know that tech consulting right now is um it's it's a it's a big part of who i am right now i love consulting i like to talk to people and figure out what they got going on what's wrong and then coming up with the like solution that will blow them away it's something that's going to solve all their business issues you know stuff like that so long term i see myself being a consultant um but it's just like my journey up till now you never know um and it's always good to you know i tell people it's always good to continue searching for opportunities while continue learning new things because you never know you might be put in a situation where you know google hits you up and they say hey um i see that you do data analysis yeah small things yeah small things like i could tell people right now so many people on linkedin have hit me up from some of the smallest stuff yeah i may have uploaded a resume on a random job board that i did back in college and years later i got linkedin recruiters hitting me up saying they found my resume and they send me what they saw and it's my college resume from two three plus years ago or um i make a post sometimes i post the the podcast content and and i've had recruiters compliment me um fat hiring managers tell me just how thrilled they were to come across you know my um my profile because they felt like i'd be a good fit for their company or stuff like that you guys don't know just how far some of these experiences will go um it's not just about the on-the-job experience but literally you just putting yourself out there you put it making a voice um if things are happening in the workplace that you see that you want to speak on you should speak on them because you don't know who's watching if there's things that you're proud of that you and your team accomplish that you can speak on you know publicly your company allows you to speak about yeah you should speak on them um i mean there's just so many different things if you're if you're an expert in your area and you want to pass free knowledge to somebody else speak up and and pass that free knowledge because when employers when recruiters and things like that see that it gives them more of an incentive to to take you serious yeah to think that you you you have the talent that they're looking for a lot of these companies are looking to hire diverse by the way so if you're hearing this like just take into account how like how companies view you when you you already are representing um a minority faction in their company yes so if we can not only help our numbers help us diversify as a company with who we're like thinking of demographically but we're also diversifying ourselves with a plethora of skills and resources that can be passed throughout the company that is a heavy incentive for them to hire you so just very true just think about that think about how you can put yourself out there and put and put the spotlight on you that way you're no longer having to apply to jobs i don't know what the last time was that i've truly sat down and applied that application because of things like linkedin yeah because of things like putting myself out there on linkedin where i no longer have to worry about how am i going to find my next job i've got an inbox full of full of job interview um offers and things like that or recruiters excuse me or recruiters who just find find interest in my background and want to learn more about who i am yeah build like i i mentioned this and and i won't go too deep but i i do terrible at keeping up with these recruiters if i was if i was you know what i'm saying like when you're comfortable in your job and you're not really on the market looking you don't care but a smart person they're going to take the time to get to know these recruiters who are reaching out even when they're not actively looking for jobs yes they're going to build those relationships because those relationships we always talk about network and how your network is your net worth everyone thinks of their current network you know how many people are thinking about a network strategy to expand your network how many people are thinking if i build this relationship today it may land me a job two years from now yep if you just take the time out to put yourself out there and then when people start reaching out take more time to get to know these people who are reaching out spend more time to build those relationships you're literally coming up with your own career strategy and taking control of it over time you'll be able to to say you knew strategically you made this decision and it landed you here one thing that i did not like factor in bro is like linkedin plus like so and i tell everybody that i know like and like it's like so simple like get the free month of linkedin plus like every time that i you know it could have been times where i wasn't looking for a job and linkedin would just email me and say hey linkedin plus you want to try it for they they send it to you every year yeah so basically i take that trial every every year even if i'm not looking for a job just to see what's there and it's the same thing with what you said where recruiters are hitting me up so much that it's hard to keep up with yeah um like there's always a job like every day there's always an mail um that's why i always say everybody should get linkedin plus like take time to like actually do your linkedin like look at a good linkedin and figure out what they're doing like their resumes on there their skills are on there everything is maxed out and it looks good like post positive stuff and people will be flocking to your your linkedin dms with within no time honestly no joke let i i just pulled up the the benefits of linkedin's premium plan so i wanted to share with people what are the differences between a basic linkedin account and a linkedin premium so if you're wondering what's the difference between linkedin basic and linkedin premium i'm about to give y'all a game so with the basic account this comes directly from linkedin.com on their faq uh with the basic account you can find and reconnect with colleagues and classmates basically you can connect with other people you can request and provide recommendations so if you want to recommend somebody or you want somebody to recommend you that's a feature that you have access to search for and view profiles of other linkedin members receive unlimited email messages so that means that if somebody else has linkedin premium they can send you can get unlimited amount of linkedin in mails you have to be a premium member to send linkedin emails so you can get as many of those and then you can also save up to up to three searches and get weekly alerts on those searches so i believe they're talking about job searches or regular searches that you look up you can save the search and get updates to those now this is where things change and this is where linkedin becomes very powerful it's behind this linkedin premium subscription so the various premium subscriptions we offer and their features are premium essentials it helps you get hired and get ahead in your professional life look that up if you don't know what premium essentials is on linkedin it is said to help you get hired and get ahead in your professional life the next one is the sales navigator so that helps you generate leads and build your clientele if you're in business you might want to consider getting linkedin premium because they will help you generate leads and build your clientele much faster yes the uh the next one is the premium pro plan that helps you get detailed business insights and further expand your business this is where you um want to take the most advantage of right here when they talk about detailed business insights i'm talking about salaries i'm talking about um maybe some sentiment on company culture it'll help you get uh better ideas of of just like who exactly is this company or who is this person that's representing this company yeah you get a lot more insight through the premium pro plan uh on linkedin and then the last one i love telling people about this because when i found out about it it was free linkedin learning yeah oh my goodness a lot of people don't take advantage of like my job has linkedin learning within our portal we have linkedin learning so that's like part of that's how you know it's legit like the stuff that they put on there and it's like a big repository of people it's almost like it's crazy it's it's it's just like so much knowledge that you can soak up and linkedin like how much is linkedin plus it's not a lot i think it's like 12.99 or somewhere now i've honestly always complained about how much linkedin premium was i used to think that it was only like 12.99 no it's
expensive man like if i look this up real quick man because i remember when they was taking that money off my account it hurt it was hurting man and that's why i tell people utilize that free month and then i mean it's just like every other subscription that you get like netflix i know y'all been getting peacocks watching new fresh prints just get it cancel it it's something that can help your life and it's like i said it's free they give it to you every once a year so i think about it like every year i'm gonna see what's going on in the job market and you know either i go so they've got 29.99 for the basic uh linkedin premium plan and i think i had a plan that was i don't know why i was paying this i i thought this was the package that everybody was getting but 59.99 so i was getting attacked 60 a month yeah yeah so for a premium subscription i was like oh no but 29.99 is actually a lot
more manageable especially if you consider what you're getting so yeah even if you're not a current job seeker per se you um if you're a business owner great take advantage of linkedin premium if you're somebody who's looking to continue just growing your network you're already establishing your career um have a job those kinds of things you're not looking for a job you might still want to take advantage of the premium because you might run into people who again you'll have a mutual benefit and who knows where that relationship leads down the line so definitely look into things like linkedin premium because you just like you have to look at these things like investments if you're investing 29.99 a month and you're actively using the platform for what it's worth you will definitely get a good return on investment it may not come tomorrow but it actually may come tomorrow you never know you know what i'm saying so take advantage of it and the great thing about it too is is after i canceled it after i use my free month it's like it's almost like skipping the stone it's like it's like compound growth right so once my page started to grow and you start to get more connections and stuff like that then you don't even really need linkedin plus per se to keep getting those connections a lot of people still hit you up just because they see that you have a full profile yeah and i'm not sure if it's an algorithmic thing or what but basically i guess since a lot of recruiters see your profile they kind of boost your profile up and since you have more connections more people are going to hit you up you're going to build a bigger network to the point where you don't eventually you probably won't even need to go to linkedin like you said building those relationships and you'll be able to just hit the recruiters up on the phone and say hey like if you have anything let me know or they'll call you and do vice versa you know so i guess the last the last question that i have for you uh how would you like what would you recommend to people that are looking at the big four or uh tech consulting what would be your advice for them to either break into bit tech um excuse me uh break into tech consulting or break into the big four um well there's a lot but i think that one of the biggest things is to know i guess how to speak be eloquent in the way that you speak the reason i say that is like for big four we're very client-facing we talk to clients all the time with the interview process it's a pretty steep process which you know basically we have three interview three different rounds and it can be tough sometimes to manage that so if you can kind of speak eloquently you can get your words and point across then i think that helps a lot also know your knowledge it's this isn't college anymore i'm not gonna lie in college you were able to get by but in your professional career you really have to take that seriously because that is we talk about brands all the time building a brand isn't just you know doing your personal businesses or anything like that it's building who you are as a professional as well when you're in these companies word spreads oh jared knows about sap control so let's rope him in on this apple engagement or you know so on and so forth so build your brand know your knowledge don't be afraid to talk to people don't be afraid to build those connections um i think that's those those are like kind of the biggest things that you should keep in your toolbox whenever you're heading into these uh interviews awesome any takeaway message uh for for anybody else out there um i always believe in yourself um you know i i always thought there was a time i'll never get here you remember back in back in school i was i was i didn't know like i was ever gonna get here like there used to be times where i was eating ramen and i was eating cereal like for the whole week for the whole month like ten dollars in my pocket yeah um and and just having a belief in myself never giving up on what i wanted to be knowing that i wanted to not only make money but also make an impact i think that's like my biggest takeaway message is always believe in yourself because you don't know where you're going to be at tomorrow a year from now two years from now you know one thing that i really think about a lot is is is my growth um salary growth technology understanding how things work my growth in the last three years um i look back on it often i say wow like i i really can't believe it if i would have gave up when i thought when i wanted to give up i would have never made it i would have never made it so always believe in yourself give up and seek knowledge god is good all the time y'all well i really appreciate having you here um we wish you all the best in your future career journey i can't wait to see where you do land and um you know i'll make sure that we share your social media information in case anybody wants to reach out to you ask you questions that you might have for sure so with that being said man you know just best of luck to you moving forward appreciate it man hey man he tried to death you know covered time [Laughter] we might be able to do something with that he might be able to do something with that it might be like a little funny [Music]
2022-03-24