Loves the competitive work environment. He says that the competitive environment motivates people to work on themselves. For this reason, he is always looking for a competitive environment to work. He worked in India for 1 year and has been in Belgium for 5 years. We are talking about young Azerbaijani Panah Abbasov, who works as a senior financial analyst in the Belgian office of Mastercard.
– Mr. Panah, your bachelor’s degree is in business management. Have you always had an interest in business?
– I first chose to study international relations. This choice was made at the insistence of my father. I was also interested, so I said yes. I am still interested in geopolitics, politics, international economics. However, in my first year, I noticed that there are not many job opportunities in that field, so I switched to studying business management. When studying business management, finance, marketing, human resources, etc. Each of the directions is taught, and there is general information from all of them. Then, in which direction you want to specialize, you already have an impression. You know, it is difficult to choose a specific specialty not only during university admission, but also during undergraduate studies. At the age of 18-20, you cannot define your whole career. I made such a choice so that I could switch to different directions.
– Although you have your own interest in international relations, you chose it at your father’s insistence. What did your father say about this change?
– My father still says that maybe you should return to diplomacy (Laughs). Even after my decision to change, my father was against it. That’s just how I made my choice.
“Although I didn’t get paid, it was great work experience”
– When you were a student, you were the president of AIESEC, the largest youth organization in the world, for Azerbaijan. It seems that you have been an active student. Have you been selected as an active student since your school years?
– By nature, I was a very quiet, shy child. During my student years, especially after joining that organization, I gradually became active. I joined projects, participated in conferences and events. I was going abroad to events and internship programs. I learned English as a student, until then I had no access to information and the world. I started using available online resources to improve my English. All this led to my socializing and becoming an active person. Looking back on my 4-year professional career, the skills I developed in parallel with my education have been the biggest help for me. Communication, communication, working under stress, etc. skills are very important today.
– In other words, the knowledge we learn at the university is not enough to get something.
– I failed the finance class during my undergraduate studies. I am currently working as a senior financial analyst at Mastercard. Or I was cut off from statistics. I worked on a number of data analytics projects in the “UCB” company, where I worked before in Belgium, and it was quite successful. True, there are some subjects that have been very helpful. I would estimate the role of what we learn during higher education in our career as 20-30 percent. The rest is to work on yourself. Companies also consider this as the main factor in recruitment.
– Did you not work in Azerbaijan after graduating from the university?
– I worked for a short time in the OSCE election monitoring project. I think that being the head of AIESEC was a professional experience in itself. We worked with state institutions, sent students abroad, accepted students from abroad. Although I didn’t get paid, it was great work experience.
“It was both an adventure and a job”
– Then you went to work in India with an internship program. Why India?
– When I chose India, I was more interested in adventure than work. I had just graduated from the university, and I had finished my work in the organization. I had the idea to work as a bit of an experiment and then decide what field I wanted to work in. There was a one-year internship program at India’s Tata company. Although an Indian company, it was a global company. I would work at the head office. I said, let me gain experience working there. I work in a different country, different culture. When I first went to India, I worked in human resources. Then I saw that this field is not mine. I moved to finance and analytics.
– But were you able to experience the side of adventure?
– Every day in India was an adventure. Even commuting from home to work is an adventure there. They turn motorcycles into taxis, you approach, one does not want to go, one goes. There is no reason, he says, I don’t want to go. It’s raining, you can’t find a taxi to go to work. The office was 99 percent Indian. Communicating with them and understanding their work culture was an adventure in itself. In terms of food, I was in a completely different environment. When coming from Azerbaijan to Europe, there are different issues, but also common issues. Everything is different in India. The similarity is minimal. During my work, I visited 15 cities in India. It was both an adventure and a job. I have learned a lot in terms of work.
– What did you learn when you worked in India?
– I learned how to work with people from different cultures. While working there, I was in close contact with offices in other countries. When I came to Belgium, the company I worked for had a vender from India. They managed our data. When I spoke to the workers in India, I understood them better than my colleagues. Because I already had experience in India. In general, this is the practice in Europe and the United States, where large companies outsource many jobs to companies in India to reduce costs. Communication between employees in India and employees in Europe, USA is also a problem. They often do not understand each other. It helps me in this way.
– What differences have you observed in the work culture of India?
– It is possible that someone has been working in the company for 30 years, but he does not have any special duties. He has the same respect as a person who has been in the company for 5 years. The head of the Mumbai office has been working in the same job for 25 years. He had as much respect as the head of the India office. Experience and age at work is a big factor in India. The Japanese work as hard as the Indians, although not as much as the Singaporeans. Due to the large population, the competition is strong. They are all very smart people. They are all underpaid. The average salary was $500. If they do that work in Europe or America, they will get paid 5-6 times more. Which there are many who do it.
“Belgium is also a competitive environment”
– Why didn’t you stay in India?
– Actually, there were opportunities. I also volunteered as a consultant at a friend’s startup in India. He also suggested me to stay at our startup. I was thinking about it. I had adapted to India, I had a great relationship with Indians, I also ate street food. Then I didn’t want to live there permanently. India is a different culture, after one year one does not want to stay. Now I want to go and travel for 2-3 months, it is an interesting country.
– Then you went to Belgium for work. What made you choose Belgium?
– In Azerbaijan, if you know English well, if you have traveled to several countries, if you have more or less experience, you are considered a higher staff than those around you. There is little competition. You don’t feel like you’re competing. And I was looking for a competitive environment to work. Competitive environment helps you to work on yourself. When I worked in India, I was in a competitive environment. Again, I was looking for such an environment for work. There was an internship program at UCB, a Belgian pharmaceutical manufacturing company. It was a big company with annual revenue of 6 billion. Located in 33 countries. Their head office was in Brussels, and I used to come to the head office. During 1 year, you experience in 4 different departments – finance, logistics, human resources and investor relations. I found this internship program very interesting. Belgium is also a competitive environment. That’s why I made such a choice.
– You started working in that company after the internship program ended. Who did the company offer jobs after the program?
– About 30 percent of those who came to the internship program were offered a job. The main factor for me was that there is no “I don’t know” conversation. If I didn’t know it, I looked it up and learned it. I did it both from the business side and from the technical side. If I needed Excel and coding, I would find an online tutorial and use it. Although I am currently in the financial field, my technical skills are also good. I can learn different programs independently and apply them at work. Most of my colleagues think that I also studied IT. I have no such education, I learned it myself.
– After 3 years, you switched to “Mastercard”. Was it time to change jobs?
– 1 year internship program, 2 years I became a full-time employee. During that time, I worked on different projects, and progressed in my career. My character is such that I learn work very quickly. After improving at work, I want something new. I’m bored of working at the same job. I have been working at “Mastercard” for 7 months. I already feel like I’ve gotten better at it. I think I need a new position from January next year to keep the job interesting. I had already reached that level in the old company. There were high positions within the company, but there was no one I liked. That’s why I started applying to other companies.
“Everyone needs to see that you are doing a great job”
– What is your job at “Mastercard”?
– Cards are the well-known aspect of “Mastercard”. There is also a field of services that provide cyber security and data services. I am in data service direction. Who spends, where, when, how much, etc. data is collected from card data such as We have a great cyber security infrastructure. Through it, we sell data as a service to various companies. This area accounts for 40 percent of the company’s revenues in the European region. This service includes budget planning, revenue forecasting, analytics, finding new revenue sources, and more. I do things like The work was interesting. I was a financial analyst in the previous company, and here I came to the position of chief financial analyst.
– What kind of environment are you in “Mastercard”?
– It is an international environment. They are from every country. You don’t feel like you’re in Belgium. It is a very, even toxic, competitive environment. There is so much competition that sometimes you can see jealousy at work. Since there is a lot of competition, you must work hard on yourself and do your job well. Everyone should see that you are doing very well. It is very innovative. Everything changes very quickly. (“Kaspi” newspaper)
#day #India #adventure