How to forge a career in football finance

a lot of you have been in touch recently

and asked me how best to get a job in

football so this is the topic of today's

video from my perspective it's only fair

for me to talk about the way that I did

it but that's not the only way that's

possible so I will discuss other routes

into the industry and that's the

advantage that we have at football

Finance professionals we not only teach

you about football Finance but we can

also advise on our own experiences and

the experiences of the people that we've

met along the way to get into football

and how they've leveraged their networks

their experience their knowledge and how

they've been able to crack that

interview process because ultimately

what you need to do first is get

yourself recognized on a CV a digital or

hard copy piece of paper that someone is

going to read and is likely to be

reading hundreds if not thousands of

applications for what could be a very

popular job depending on the level

depending on the Club depending on the

country so if you have Ambitions to work

in football Finance stay attitude as I

discussed my experience of how I forged

a career in football there are many

routes into the industry and you can

start at any level

you could start at entry-level roles or

even try to get into the industry as a

senior executive or director or it could

be anywhere in between depending on who

you talk to they're going to have their

own opinions but is it all about

networking not necessarily and if it was

it would be almost impossible to get

into the industry because everybody in

the industry doesn't necessarily want to

just offer people their time and it's

the same in any industry trying to

strike up a relationship out of nowhere

networking is difficult for most people

at the best of times so you have to be

able to build a relationship with people

over time I didn't know anybody in the

industry before I stepped into it the

first interview that I had was with the

first person that I'd met from the

football industry what I had was a plant

that was put in place probably five

years earlier to be able to get to that

interview so my first tip would be to be

realistic and be patient it's not going

to happen overnight unless you're

extremely lucky we're here to try to

help you to accelerate that process we

can help your CV stand out with the

professional certificate in football

Finance that's exactly what we can do an

education from the most exclusive and

established Sports University in the

world that's the sort of thing that will

help you stand out without speaking to

an individual coupled with the fact that

if you do our program you will learn the

ins and outs of football Finance from a

practical perspective in conjunction

with Loughborough University I have

designed a course and delivered it to

give you the best educational experience

in the world of football Finance we can

leverage what we've learned along the

way both in and out of the industry I

had 10 years of experience in

international finance before I even

joined the industry and then the best

part of six years working at the top of

football Finance in the most challenging

of environments at City football group

between 2015 and 2020 and I can tell you

now that that was a challenging

experience but one that allowed me to

learn about the ins and outs of the

industry so now I can offer to you

something that I was never offered

either virtually in person online or

through a course I can offer you my

experience and my knowledge so back to

how you can get into the industry it

might be easiest for you to go for one

of these entry-level roles what might

that look like if you're coming out of

University or even if you've not gone to

University you might be looking for

something that allows you to get into a

finance team in a football club that

could be a role such as a finance

assistant role an entry-level role that

allows you to get your foot in the door

processing invoices processing expenses

improving the processes that interact

with the finance team making an

impression and then progressing from

there you do not have to be qualified as

an accountant nor do you need a degree

in finance and accounting to get one of

these roles it would be preferable if

you had experience in a finance

processing role to begin with but the

question comes back to you how do you

get yourself noticed against your

competitors it's all about who's

applying for that role at the time so if

you can make your CV stand out that's

the first challenge because once you get

your foot in the door for the interview

it's all up to you it's all about your

knowledge and about your ability to

build a relationship almost

instantaneously with the person sitting

at the other side of the desk not an

easy task but at least you've progressed

Beyond an application if you're going

for a more senior role there will be an

expectation that you have more knowledge

more qualifications more experience and

often in football it's a desire that

you've had experience in football which

sometimes is quite restrictive but in

senior Finance roles comes

responsibility and depending on the

organization there will be a gradual

ladder of experience from that entry

level role all the way through to the

senior executive or director SO pitching

yourself at the right level it could be

a management accountant role a role with

some sort of supervisory

responsibilities let heads of team team

or it could be a specialist role such as

a tax roll for example or even the one

such as the one that I got at City

football group responsible for the IFRS

conversion a specialist accounting role

these types of roles are going to be few

and far between but with the potential

changes on the horizon with the

independent regulator football is going

to need to level up when it comes to

governance and so if you want to

position yourself in such a way that you

have experience to complement the

football industry you have an

opportunity to do so in my opinion you

just need to be able to figure out a

route of how to gain that experience and

Pitch yourself at the right level when

those opportunities arise that could be

in one two three four years time that's

exactly what I did but behind that I had

experience at a big four firm I trained

in audit having completed my degree in

sports science and maths I wasn't an

accountant or I wasn't planning to be an

accountant when I went to University I

made the decision to become an

accountant as I was leaving University

and in my opinion it's the best decision

that I ever made it allowed me to pursue

a career in an industry which was

recession-proof and pandemic proof not

that I was necessarily thinking about

that at the time accountants can now

work from anywhere and if you have

Ambitions to work in finance in the

football industry but you never quite

get to that football Finance role you're

still working in finance and that is

still going to be a robust career for

you to be able to pursue and one that

will come with a whole host of unique

challenges if you're on the advisory

side in a big four environment a top 10

environment or even a small firm your

clients are going to need you they're

going to need your expertise and

experience in order to be able to help

them solve their problems those clients

could be football clubs and that's one

way of potentially forging your

relationship and a network to be able to

get into the football industry another

way is through potential Partners or

sponsors of the football industry that

pool or population of companies is

continually expanding everyone wants to

be involved in sport and in particular

in football so if you can navigate to A

Partners company and then potentially

move over by building a relationship

that way or getting yourself known at a

football club in that capacity that may

increase your chances I went down a big

four audit and then advisory route

building a skill set that I knew the

football industry would need and that

route works for me and it's something

that I wouldn't have changed but it's

not for everybody it can be quite

competitive in its own right so if you

have any questions about how to get into

the football industry where you're up to

in your career what should you do next

why not drop us a note that info

footballfinancepro.com leave a comment

below I'll try to get back to you as

soon as I can if you liked the video hit

like And subscribe for more football

Finance related content my name is Neil

wood and I'm a football Finance

professional thanks for watching