Study notes: Ovidio Graziano: accounting administrator in record to report, Italy, AstraZeneca.

PositionStudent one2one - Interview

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

You studied accountancy and corporate finance in Verona. How did you end up working for AstraZeneca in Manchester?

As an undergraduate I spent a year in Kassel in Germany and immediately wanted to work abroad again. So I went online and applied for work overseas. I found this job via an agency, so I didn't know it was with AstraZeneca (AZ). That was in July 2005. It wanted a German speaker and there was a shortage of people with European language skills because several shared-service centres had opened in the city and were competing for the same individuals. So I started working in the German accounts payable department on a temporary basis for eight months. AZ found that I was flexible because I could work on German accounts in the morning and switch to Italian ones in the afternoon. After eight months I moved to the Italian accounts payable team. I then applied for a position in general accounting.

What does your current role involve?

AZ has centralised most of its western European financial transactions and reporting activities for its sales and marketing organisation in a shared-service centre here. I'm in the Italian department, where we do all the accounts payable and receivable, travel and expenses, cash accounting, banking, reconciliation, general accounting and reporting for the Italian operations of AZ and its Italian subsidiary, reporting this to the group.

What attracted you to the job?

It gives me an overview of the whole business. see everything, ranging from inter-company settlements and the work we do with partners in the UK, Sweden, France, Australia, Belgium and the Netherlands, to VAT checking and working out how invoices should be posted under Italian law. It's really important because it's the behind-the-scenes mechanics of accountancy. It can be a puzzle trying to understand the connections. I feel as though I wrap up the present and deliver it, but I don't know what they do on the other side after...

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