Starting his first permanent job and writing his master’s thesis in business mathematics at the same time: Sebastian Schlichting had a busy schedule when he joined Deutsche Börse Group. “It was a challenge to master these two milestones at the same time,” he says in retrospect.

He benefited from the fact that he had already worked as student assistant at Pricing & Data Analytics at Eurex for a year before joining the same team permanently in 2017. The section is responsible for transaction fees and discount models for listed derivatives, checks if pricing models are up to date, but also carries our specific analyses, e.g. of the order book. 

Sebastian already felt well integrated as a working student and took on various tasks in smaller areas. “And when I got my permanent job, I was given more room to manoeuvre and responsibility for individual tasks quite quickly, and I was able to drive topics forward independently.”

In addition, he is also responsible for supervising the student assistants in his team. “I enjoy passing on what I learned myself back then. And of course it helps when you’re still ‘close’ to your own time as student assistant.”

At the same time, Sebastian did not only get more familiar with his team’s areas of responsibility, but also broadened his understanding of many of Deutsche Börse Group's services along the value chain: “I was able to build up a good network here and regularly exchange ideas with colleagues from other departments,” he says. “This gives you a better understanding of the interrelationships and of how different details fit into the overall picture.”

And his best experience to date? “In August, I was lucky enough to be able to spend some time abroad as part of a job rotation,” says Sebastian. He spent a total of four weeks with the Equity Index Sales team in the US, first one week in New York, then three weeks in Chicago. “This enabled me to learn many details and connections in the daily business of my sales colleagues and, above all, to establish a good personal relationship with them – before that we only knew each other only through e-mails or telephone calls, if at all. I am very grateful for this experience.”

Meanwhile Sebastian is preparing for the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA). Next to his job, he took the first exams – and has a pretty busy schedule again. “Fortunately, the working atmosphere here is very positive and I am supported in further education,” Sebastian explains. “In situations like these, you realise once again how important it is to have an environment in which you feel comfortable.”