A business career has allowed Yashvi Khandelwal, Business Analyst at Ecolab, to expand her horizons across industries and borders.

Growing up in India, Yashvi wanted to pursue a career in electronics engineering. She never imagined she’d one day travel the world as a business analyst – helping organisations improve their processes and systems.

Within a year of graduating with a degree in Electronics and Communication Engineering from Jaypee University of Information Technology, she realised business was where she wanted to be.

“I wanted to work in a role where I talked to different people, went to different places and learned something new every day,” Yashvi says.

“I didn’t want to be limited to one technical area of the business or industry, but I wanted to get involved in the bigger picture and build on my love of communication and collaboration.”

Yashvi moved to Sydney in early 2020 to study a Master of Business Analytics and Information Systems at UNSW Business School. Since graduating, she’s embraced a varied and rewarding career working across different industries, from finance to aviation to sustainability. She’s worked in London and is currently based in Denmark working as a business analyst for Ecolab.

“In a technical role, my skill set would probably be limited to just one industry or sector of a business unit. But I’ve worked in so many different industries in such a short amount of time. Working across the whole business unit you develop transferable skills that can be applied to several different situations .”

Making a positive impact on the customer experience journey

After graduation, Yashvi immediately found opportunities to expand her horizons by working for an organisation leasing payments platforms as a business analyst consultant.

“It was the first job where I got to work with people in different countries who didn’t speak English as a first language and who were not very technically aligned. So I had to explain things to them in non-technical jargon and terminologies that they could understand and realise my vision,” she explains.

It also gave Yashvi the opportunity to develop her leadership skills, heading up a team of three to enhance the user experience of the platform and help improve customer retention.

As well as her technical skills, she got to develop her communication skills in face-to-face conversations with customers and improve upon her stakeholder management skills.

“Along with analysing the data, we had to get close feedback from the users in the form of one-on-one interviews or workshops. I learnt there were several ways I could gain information from the customer perspective and their pain points so I could make informed recommendations on what we could do better to improve their experience.”

Later on in her career, Yashvi worked at the corporate financial services division of Sydney Airport, a very fast paced and everyday changing industry where she had an opportunity to build on these skills and visualise the direct impact of decisions on the life of people traversing through the airport. 

"I also had the opportunity to work in India, Australia, UK, Denmark. On top of it I have handled projects in New Zealand as well and have had the opportunity to coordinate with stakeholders of US and Europe as a whole," she said. 

Now Yashvi is having a positive impact on our global future in her role as a business analyst for Ecolab. Ecolab is a global sustainability leader offering water, hygiene and infection prevention solutions and services that protect people and the resources vital to life.

Working across multiple industries on a global scale, including water conservation, the food industry, agriculture and resource management.

“Ecolab has a tangible impact on the everyday lives of people. If I’m consuming fast food or a product that came from a dairy farm, Ecolab has probably been involved somewhere along the customer supply chain .”

She was initially drawn to the company for its global leadership in sustainability and the opportunity to make decisions that can shape the future of our world. Ecolab’s innovative solutions improve operational efficiencies and sustainability for customers in the food, healthcare, life sciences, hospitality and industrial markets.

“It’s so rewarding when you see the outcome of your decisions tying into the amount of water conservation, water recycling, healthcare quality enhancement, automation platforms driving up the customer experience to get work done faster and meet their business needs on time.”

Gaining confidence and transferable skills in Business

Yashvi’s studies at UNSW Business School gave her a firm foundation to build the skills she needed to pursue her ideal career. Yashvi holds a Masters in Business Analytics and Information Systems, 2022.

“I didn’t just get theoretical knowledge,” she explains. “I got a lot of practical examples by using actual industry case studies and got to work through the problem to find a solution as if it was happening in real-time.”

Learning about and discussing these different case studies opened her up to different ways of solving problems, a skill she draws on every day in her work. And while she learned practical data analytics skills during her studies, many of the lessons she learned helped her develop interpersonal skills, like networking, negotiating and the power of speaking up.

“I learnt that speaking up and putting your opinions forward is never a waste. Your idea might be the most valuable one. And even if it’s wrong, that’s ok. You’ll learn the reasons why it can’t be done.”

For Yashvi, a career in business has given her much more than a job, it’s helped her gain confidence.

“It’s given me the power to speak my mind and make decisions. And seeing more women in higher positions within the organisations I’ve worked in continues to build that confidence. Many decision areas of business are still male-dominated, which means women often need to work harder to prove themselves and to be heard. It’s improving, but the more women we have in business leadership positions, the faster this will change.”

The transferable skills she’s gained have also opened Yashvi up to different opportunities for her current and future career paths.

“I’m in a business analyst role now but I could jump into project management or program management if I wanted to. There are any number of paths you can take being in business

and there’s no limit to how far you can go in business,” Yashvi explains.

“Even if you start as an entry level project coordinator, you can easily move into roles like business analyst, project manager and even consulting. So many companies operate at a global level, that you can work for an  international organisation and travel the world if you want to.”

For young women considering a career in business, Yashvi suggests embracing different experiences and exploring multiple avenues as there are so many opportunities and career directions to discover.

“Keep your options as wide as possible. Take courses from different specialities if you can, because in time you’ll realise what you want to do. Give yourself the flexibility to pivot later as well if you decide to move on and try something new.”

Yashvi believes a business career will withstand many of the challenges in our rapidly changing world and will offer you the opportunity to future-proof yourself through an adaptive mindset and the agility of transferable interpersonal skill development.

“While AI and technology are changing, it’s not at a point where it can make human decisions. It can’t comprehend strategic planning or consult with clients. As other skills become redundant, strategic business roles will always need a human making the decisions to bring empathy and other humanistic characteristics into the equation. Bringing vision to life for a better, more sustainable environment.”

 

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