The book is:
- story focused whereby readers can learn about pensions through Sarah who starts her first job and is wondering what “tax relief” means for her or Aleksander who signs up for a store credit card while working abroad for a Summer and pays the price or Mike who wonders how to make his side hustle profitable
- full of relevant modernity including ESG, fintech, online brokers, differentiating between trading and investing as well as using technology for active learning.
- illustrative of the diversity of careers in finance. Each chapter contains a case study of a charterholder and highlights accounting, business, maths and economics can really come to life.
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Here are my top ten ways to use the book:
1. Use it as a menu.
There are three key strands namely enterprise, personal finance and investing. You can solely focus on how to make money and making a business more profitable. You might be somebody interested in generating the highest rate of interest and figuring out your own risk profile. Alternatively, you might want to trace the step-by-step guide to investing. The road is yours to travel and you can totally tailor it to your own interests.
2. Get a taste of the subjects underpinning the chapters.
Each chapter is highly practical with a focus on making real life decisions and using interactive tools to make decisions. However everything in practise is underpinned by theory. The outline at the beginning will point out how the learning in the chapter links in with business, accounting, economics, maths and other subjects.
3. Lever the characters' emotions
One of my favourite things about the book is the characters who I could shape around a narrative. The excitement that Aleksander feels about his Summer in Berlin. The helplessness that Danny and Emer feel when going through the mortgage process. The uncertainty Sarah feels about signing up for a pension. The cynicism Raphael feels about shopping local. Money isn't just coins, notes and digital balances - it can be full of pleasure and pain.
4. Consider what appeals to you in the case studies.
Each chapter features a CFA charterholder and they share their career journey and the nature of what they do in their own specific jobs. Think about whether you would like to work as part of a team or in a very numbers-focused, research-heavy job or a combination of everything so that every day offered lots of variety.
5. Let market research speak volumes
One of the best things an entrepreneur can do, independent of age, is to learn how to listen to the market. An economist has to gather data all the time to discern trends and comment on the changes they see in the world around them. Therefore, building market research skills early is super useful. Activity 15.1 on page 132 explains exactly how to do that.
6. Use the T.V. as your teacher!
Speaking of market research, as we talked to people about what they wanted to find in this book, some told us that they really enjoyed shows like Shark Tank and Dragon's Den. These productions can teach us a lot about what investors want to see in a business, the questions that business people have to answer and how the accounts can make or break a deal. Using Activity 10.1 on page 79 or Activity 12.4 on page 105 can turn you into a passive participant to a critical thinker!
7. Bring sustainability and finance together!
Sustainability is a topic that is high on everybody's agenda these days. In the finance industry, ESG (Environmental Social and Governance) has come right under the spotlight as investors want to put their money where their values lie. Also, businesses are now well aware that being environmentally friendly and socially conscious is what their customers and their staff demand. Consumers want to shop local and sustainably, but also with convenience and high quality customer service. As a result, this is the biggest chapter in the book and is full of activities where the reader can learn how to make finance and sustainability co-exist.
8. Build a paper portfolio
One of the best ways to really learn about the stock market is to put together a paper portfolio and track the share prices on a regular basis. Google Sheets enables you to do this in realtime, for free and using real data. Watch your shares go up and down so that you can truly get a sense of what it's like to put real money into the market.
9. Fan the flames of local pride
People love to talk about where they're from and what makes them proud of where they live.
10. Use the journal questions to spark conversations
