We are proud to announce that the team of Kyiv School of Economics consisting of the students of the Master’s program in Economic Analysis Andriy Zinukhov, Mykola Shishov and the student of the Master’s Program in Economics and Business Natalia Soldatenko won the CFA Institute Ethics Challenge, which took place on November 21st.
During the competition, student teams analyzed a case containing a variety of ethical dilemmas faced by investment professionals.
Special guest of the competition is Sonia Gandhi, CFA, Director of Ethics and Professional Standards, CFA Institute.
We talked to the students about the secrets of their victory:
Mykola Shyshov:
The competition required an ethical dilemma to be worked out and identify violations that had been committed in accordance with the CFA’s Code of Ethics and Conduct.
While working on the project, we realized how important ethics is in business, especially investing industry, and how certain factors can influence the decision-making analyst/professional
I think KSE is useful because we have a progressive, in my opinion, education system compared to others … + after participating / winning in several cases / Challenges in the past, there is an understanding of what is a quality/competitive work.
Andrey Zinukhov
What did you learn in preparation for your presentation?
Employees in the investment industry regularly face situations in which the interests of the parties involved, that is, your personal, client and employer, are confronted. The CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards for Professional Conduct helps you to understand how to behave professionally in situations where there may be a conflict of interest between the parties involved and what steps to take.
What do you think put KSE into your victory? What made you more competitive than students from other universities?
In KSE we should often work on a tight schedule and perform high-level tasks. At the CFA Ethics Challenge, the case was taken only one week, for which it was necessary to disassemble the case on all the details and prepare a presentation with a speech. Since during the educational process we also have to prepare presentations on a regular basis, from the very beginning of the case we had a clear plan of action and an understanding of how long it would take us to prepare.
I would like to add that KSE is not only about training and hard skills, it is also about the community of people with whom victories in any cases become real 🙂
As far as I understand, the topic is actually relevant, yet isn’t represented in a good way in our country. Tell us about the importance of studying it for future industry professionals? How different is the concept of ethics of ukrainian business and in international companies?
I think that the CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct is useful not only to professionals in the investment industry, because such rules can easily be applied to any other industry. I am sure that the person who adheres to these rules in the long run will be more successful
Natalia Soldatenko
What is the most important thing about CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct that you need to know and put into practice?
First of all, when the career path is just at the beginning and there is no experience to help with complex ethics cases, the CFA Institute Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct can be a guide to go when you don’t know how to do it right. One of the main principles of professionalism that I advise to adhere to is always remembering to remain objective while performing your work responsibilities and avoiding any temptation (such as receiving valuable gifts from stakeholders) that may threaten it. You can incredibly fast to lose the reputation of an independent expert, created over the years.
Why the topic of ethics has become so relevant to business?
Trust is the foundation without which it is impossible to successfully build not only a private life, but also a professional career. When others know that you follow the same rules of the game as they are, it is a guarantee of successful long-term cooperation.
What kind of knowledge did you apply to the case study?
Thanks to KSE, we were able to organize effective teamwork, structure information and find the most important of a large data set, as well as present the results of our work to a large audience.