The Calne Girls' Association was pleased to host an informal Chapel Talk on Tuesday 21st March with Candida de Silva (Hall, 1989 Leaver), alumna and also a Trustee of The Calne Foundation Trust, who spoke about her career in Finance.

Candida is a Senior Portfolio Specialist and member of the International Equity team at Morgan Stanley and was keen to share her experiences and career development. In particular, Candida wanted to address stereotypes about the Finance Sector, outline the range of varied roles within Finance and highlight the opportunities that exist, particularly for women, in this sector.

Aurora, our new Deputy Head Girl, had supper with Candida and said, 'I had the pleasure of hosting and hearing Candida De Silva, a Calne alumna who works at Morgan Stanley as an Executive Director. I found it fascinating to learn about how she read Modern Languages at Cambridge University and went into book publishing as her first job, but then went onto a different career direction of investment banking later in her life. In her lecture, she falsified some of the stigmas we raised towards the occupation of investment banking such as it being ‘hierarchical’ and ‘maths-based’, which is very helpful for us to see a true picture of the industry. During supper, we had an amazing time exchanging our stories about Calne and talking about how much the school has changed since she left.'

Candida also gave details of 'Step in, Step Up', an initiative run by Morgan Stanley, which is a two-day programme designed to give an insight into banking that is available to our Sixth Form pupils. You can find more details about this in our end of term Focus on Higher Education & Careers newsletter.

You can watch a recording of Candida’s talk here.