@Aurelija's

It has been an extremely busy few months for me - lots of traveling, everywhere from Gdansk in Poland to St. Petersburg in Russia to the polar Tromsø in Norway. And on top of that I had ACI course in November, which I successfully finished earning the Dealer's Diploma with distinction last Friday following a 3-hour exam. After the 3-year CFA saga the ACI 2 levels this year were a walk in the park - yet, still challenging. Moreover, ACI Dealer does not overlap with the CFA heavily, as CFA is more designed for capital markets, while ACI focus is on FX and the money markets.

And that was not all for me this autumn/winter - I also took a course in Advanced macroeconometrics - cointegrated VAR - at Copenhagen University and an exam is pending January. So this beautiful blue book...


...is and for a while will be my "bible". And I truly love it. :) I know other people think I am crazy when they see me reading such stuff (e.g. on a plane), but I find the world of matrices and stochastic processes like a pastime activity, it just stimulates my mind just like running stimulates my body.

I know I am no longer "student" officially, as the master's degree issued nearly two years ago, but I am sure I will be a student all my life. When I watch my colleagues and meet other business people it seems that once people get the jobs many fall into their comfort zones and give up actively seeking new learning opportunities in a couple of years. That's wrong. In order not to get rusty one should seek opportunities to learn, turning the practice into the lifelong learning.

For me the lifelong learning continues. Apart from the vast amounts I learn at work I will continue to pick up the courses, seminars and designations on my way. Not quite decided what designation to take next (CQF or FRM?), but as a next course I have already booked a phd course in advanced continuous time finance in spring 2012. Gotta be fun :)

Apart from the knowledge that can be applied at work another big advantage with studying extra is better time management, I find. My experience shows that when the hands are full the time optimization is more successful, and hence productivity increases. And productivity is the ultimate power (ask Germans).