Vishnu Thaver

What do you do?

My main responsibilities are to identify/evaluate partnership and acquisition opportunities for Tradeweb, with the goal of growing the company. Most of my projects incorporate financial modeling, valuation, risk assessment, and competitive analysis. A successful project involves identifying and evaluating, but also presenting to key stakeholders, executing, and integrating. It is all very rewarding, but most of all is the ability to have a diverse set of challenges to attack each day.

What types of skills do you use?

I use math, accounting, presentation skills, Excel, and networking.

How are applied mathematics and/or computational science important to what you do?

In many circumstances I develop forecasts for various model inputs. I often use statistical and mathematical methodologies for these forecasts.

What are the pros and/or cons of your profession/job?

Pro: Learning new things each day, solving problems, making an impact.
Con: Long hours sometimes.

Does your job offer flexibility?

Yes, I can work from home or the office.

What career path did you take to your current position?

School → Risk analytics consulting → Current job

Was your career path well planned or a result of taking opportunities as they arose?

I took opportunities as they arose.

What advice would you give to someone pursuing a similar degree or profession?

Get as much internship experience as possible. Take all the opportunities to develop your own projects and share them on GitHub. Get multi-disciplinary: science, finance, etc.

Was there anything that surprised you when you started out in your career?

I was surprised at how much my social skills would come in handy.

Salary

$200K-$300K