The next in the Student Entrepreneur Interview Series, this time we caught up with second year Westminster Business School student Artur Kuleschow, to find out more about his involvement in entrepreneurship at the University, and how Westminster has helped shape the trajectory of his professional career.
Can you please tell us a bit about yourself?
My name is Artur, I am 22 years old. I am studying Business Management and Marketing BA at Westminster Business School and currently finishing my second year. I was born in Kazakhstan and moved to Germany when I was small. I spent my whole life living in Germany until I was 19, when I moved to London. After my European Baccalaureate I worked as a junior consultant for a marketing agency. Soon I knew that I wanted more than just working. I decided to move to London and study, which is what I am doing now.
How has Westminster Business School aided your professional development, and your development as an entrepreneur?
I joined Westminster Business Consultants (WBC) just after I started my degree; It gave me the first basic understanding of consulting and allowed me to work on a number of different projects, with different clients. I have joined many presentations about consulting in many different departments such as finance, business development, hr and marketing. Training provided by WBC managers and senior consultants was an advantage to get individual care. Started to get involved in real life projects I learned pitching myself and the process of finding clients and closing deals. The clients we have are my inspiration, mainly entrepreneurs, with amazing ideas and great potential. Working with them allowed me to develop my entrepreneurial skills and get experience in networking with others.
What three adjectives best describe your strengths?
My strengths: I am a honest person, which always helped me to avoid awkward working situations and helped me to get a good acknowledgement for what I am doing. I am very hard working, which helped me to achieve good recognition from my employers. Next to my studies and WBC I am also an assistant restaurant manager in central London. This job helped me to understand the financial modules in my degree due to the real life practice. My languages are my biggest strength. Speaking German, Russian and English always allows me to stand out of the crowd. It is always worth a good conversation in interviews.
What was your first experience of entrepreneurship?
I guess my first entrepreneurial experience was at WBC. Accepting projects always takes its time. Evaluation of profit, as well as seeing potential in that project is not always so obvious. Once the decision is made there is the project proposal, which needs to be spot on to the client needs. In my two years at WBC I wrote many project proposals, which makes closing deals now easier. I am now the marketing manager at WBC and involved in many interesting projects. My most memorable experiences are the ones where we get to finish projects and reflect on our work. It is amazing how much experience you can gain, just by joining WBC. I have to say, it is not always so serious, our networking events organised by the hr team are always very fun. We are such an incredible team with so many different individuals from different study backgrounds.
What do you consider to be success as an entrepreneur?
Success for me has many different meanings. I guess it is mainly about the ability to see potential in something and be able to put your individual work in it. For me it is always very helpful to reflect on my work and find potential improvements for the next tasks.
What do you aspire to in your future professional life?
My future… Due to my experience in consulting I would like to find a graduate job in management consulting. My financial modules gave me a good insight in financial consulting, which I also consider. WBC is always a good start for a conversation in my interviews, employers like the experience I make while I am studying.
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