Interview Summary

I did my interview with a guy named Blake, a graduate student at the University of Iowa studying corporate finance. He gave me great information that I believe will be imperative to the success of my paper. Blake said that what is most important in the field of corporate finance is to get idea across quickly and clearly, without changing the information you are communicating. He said that the most common genre would be non-fiction, because of all the memos, proposals, periodical reports, monthly budgets, plans and summaries often used in corporate finance. According to Blake, the culture of corporate finance is fast paced, constantly moving and constantly changing, and its a lot more formal than other departments in business, such as marketing. The main skill that makes someone an effective writer in corporate finance is communication. Being able to effectively express an idea quickly and clearly to someone, without context or background, and knowing how to explain numbers and other statistics is very important in the field. The audiences most written to in corporate finance are senior members, shareholders, and peers, both in the department, and those outside the department. Much of the communication in corporate finance is written. Face-to-face talking is important, but to communicate different numbers and information effectively it must be written. Blake gave me a lot of information to work on and I will definitely be incorporating much his interview into my essay.