What I’ve Learned Thus Far

As I wrap up my second to last week at Mirador, I have made a list of each task I’ve explicitly completed during my time here. Considering each task I completed was part of a bigger, ongoing project, the list below also makes note of the overarching processes that I was involved in:

•  Used Morgan Stanley’s Matrix Portal to create organizational spreadsheets of various investment funds for bulk upload to Addepar.
• Organized Excel spreadsheets from the Goldman Sachs custodian for bulk upload to the Black Diamond Platform.
• Sat in on client onboarding meetings and followed the onboarding process of a new client from a family office.
• Worked hands-on with the engineering team in implementing Mirador’s protocols and piplines.

Specifically, a lot of the above list entails just writing lines of Excel and uploading them into Mirador’s myriad of technological platforms. While the Excel part was tedious, I learned a lot and strengthened my knowledge of Microsoft Office, and learned a lot about the Addepar and Black Diamond platforms. Addepar is a wealth management platform for registered investment advisors that specializes in data aggregation, analytics, and portfolio reporting. Black Diamond is a portfolio management system and client reporting solution for financial advisors and wealth managers. Mirador is essentially the middle-man between clients’ funds (family offices or wealth managers) and custodial reports, either from Morgan Stanley or Goldman Sachs. A custodian, I learned, is a specialized, regulated financial institution that holds customers’ securities for safekeeping in order to minimize risk. Furthermore, my contributions mostly entailed doing the dirty work for Mirador’s employees, as well as ensuring capital calls noted on the custodian were correct by comparing them to the values in Addepar and Black Diamond.

I would not necessarily say that my observations/perspectives changed or enhanced any projects, but I definitely helped in making the process of publishing financial reports more efficient. As a financial reporting firm, most processes are ongoing, as Mirador’s main role as a company is to track portfolios for their clients and to provide them with specialized reports of how their investments are performing and why (quarterly, monthly, and annually). I was fortunate enough to get the opportunity to sit in on a client onboarding meeting, which was cool, as receiving new clients is what allows Mirador to continue growing as a business, and explicitly watching one of my supervisors talk to this individual was both interesting and informative. 

Overall, as I was working as an unpaid intern, I did not impact Mirador’s “greater good” in terms of their profits and performance, but I believe my insights about leadership allowed me to develop meaningful interpersonal relationships that will last me beyond my time here as an intern. Multiple people I have worked with mentioned reaching out if I ever needed help, whether it be advice or a recommendation, in the future. I think I brought a lighthearted and energetic attitude to the office each day. My previous knowledge of leadership theories allowed me to efficiently develop a network of successful individuals and understand how to behave and interact with leaders in a corporate environment.