Final STEP Reflection

At MAI Capital Management, I was a corporate accounting intern. At my internship, I worked within Microsoft Office to keep track of company finances, produced spreadsheets to analyze the company, and worked within the financial forecast.

My internship at MAI Capital Management allowed me to have a better understanding of myself because I learned about what I would enjoy doing in my career and what I would not enjoy doing in my career. Specifically, I learned that I enjoy doing accounting work. Because of this internship, I have decided to change my major to accounting and economics so that I can be better prepared for a career accounting. MAI Capital Management manages the wealth of high net worth individuals. Working with this client information made me rethink what I want to do with my money if I become wealthy. I learned about some foundations that these high net worth individuals started to help others in need. These clients have inspired me to use my time, treasure, and talent to make the world a better place.

At MAI Capital Management, I formed several relationships that aided in understanding more about opportunities available for in business. I formed close relationships with the corporate accounting associate, the senior financial analyst, my manager, and the company’s Chief Financial Officer. Each person aided me in understanding more about what they do, what they studied in school, and how they apply that knowledge to their career. Through this communication, I decided the accounting would be a better major for me due to its flexibility in business. Accounting also provides you with the valuable skill of being able to understand financial statements. MAI Capital Management works to “take care of their clients, take care of yourself, and take care of each other”. Through this my work at MAI Capital Management, I saw this motto personified. I was treated like a family member. It made me realize that I want to work in a company that treats each employee with dignity and respect.

MAI Capital Management is committed to its community. Twice a month, volunteers from the company go to a soup kitchen in downtown Cleveland. This commitment to their community, inspires me to help others. I also had the opportunity to understand what some of the high net worth clients do to make the world a better place. Learning about clients’ foundations to help impoverished or ill people has inspired me to want to help others with my time, treasure, and talent. There was a lot of emphasis on service to others and making the world a better place. I hope to continue what I learned at MAI Capital Management, and take care of others.

Servant Leadership has been an important value in my life since I learned about it as a pillar of my high school’s mission statement. Even though I learned about Servant Leadership in high school, I never had the chance to see it in action in a business. Watching MAI Capital Management’s Chief Executive Officer serve his employees to ensure that they could do be the best work possible allowed me to see Servant Leadership in action in a large business. MAI Capital Management’s work environment was positive and everyone enjoyed each other and treated each other like family. This all starts at the top, and the CEO exemplified the value of servant leadership so that his employees could also lead others by serving them.

Learning more about accounting and potential careers in accounting have helped me to decide my major. This will help me narrow down what careers I want to enter and decide on internships for this coming summer. My commitment to my community will be valuable for my life because I want to be a positive force in my community. I want to make the world a better place, and I believe that I can make the world a better place because of the tools MAI Capital Management has given me. I also believe that MAI Capital Management has allowed me to see the impact that Servant Leadership can have on an organization. I wish to continue to lead by serving others and making a better the world a better place. All the employees and executives have served as excellent role models for me in my pursuit to lead others.

 

No alt text provided for this image

Artifact: Autumn ’18

This semester has been important in my professional development due to my role as a service committee chair for Mount Leadership Society. As a service committee chair, I have coordinated several service events from the initial contact of our service site to the final report for our advisor. I learned how to professionally email our contacts at various service sites. This is a vital school that I will need for the rest of my life, and I am thankful that I have learned this. I have also written lesson plans and budgets for service projects in my role as a service committee chair. In the beginning, I struggled with writing lesson plans because I was not as thorough as I could have been. My advisor made a lot of suggestions to make my lesson plans better, and as I progressed throughout the year, I believe that I have been more thorough in my lesson plans. As a leader for many of our service projects, I have better learned how to lead a group of peers and solve problems that have come up during the service projects. I also learned how to conduct a meeting well. In the meetings, I believe I did a good job keeping everyone on task to make sure it was a productive meeting. There were times this semester when I did not do well in my role. However, I learned from the mistakes I made and throughout the year. As the year progressed, I became a better chair because I learned from my mistakes. I am grateful for this opportunity as I believe it has helped in my professional development.

Semester, in Review

As I look back at my first semester, I believe that I have grown in several aspects of my life. Academically, I persevered through all the challenges and distractions that college through at me. I developed good study habits and learned from my mistakes. I hope to continue practicing healthy study habits while continuing to learn with each passing day. Socially, I learned alot about myself. Coming from thirteen years of private schooling, attending Ohio State was a huge culture shock for me, especially since I spent high school at an all boys Catholic high school. However, I have developed friendships that I believe will last a lifetime. I have learned more about others, and I have learned more about myself. I have found that people come to me when they need advice or need someone to talk to. I enjoy being a support for others, I hope that others will continue to see me in that light. Spiritually, I have also grown as I have become more dependent on God to guide me towards success. I pray more often, and I am more involved in my faith than I ever was. My goal for first semester was to improve in every aspect of my life. I truly believe that I have improved wholistically. I am thankful to be at The Ohio State University, and I know that I do not want to be at any other university.

Artifact 2

 

On October 28, 2017, I had the privilege of watching one of the greatest football games ever. The Ohio State University Buckeyes came back from an eighteen-point deficit and won the game against the Penn State Nittany Lions. Over the summer, I was worried how I was going to fit in and if I would find a good group of friends who would strive to help me be a better person. After the first few weeks at The Ohio State University, I realized that I had found a great community in the Mount Leadership Scholars Program. I found a group of like-minded individuals who could help me to better myself. I am overjoyed to be a part of my scholars program. That night, October 28, 2017, as I hugged all of my friends when the Buckeyes scored the go-ahead touchdown in the fourth quarter, I realized that I had made the best decision of my life to attend The Ohio State University and become a part of the Mount Leadership Scholars Program.

On October 28, 2017, my cousin began his official visit at the The Ohio State University by spending the day with me. I showed him around campus and told him all the reasons why I loved Ohio State. I also brought him to the football game that night where he sat with me in my section with all my friends. As we watched the game, he cheered, booed, and talked with me and my friends as if he was a student at Ohio State. When we scored, he was giving people he had just met a few hours ago hugs as if he has known them for years. My cousin saw first-hand, what it was like to be in a strong, supportive community that will accept everyone as they are. The fact that my friends in Mount, were so welcoming to him speaks volumes of the character of the kind of people at Ohio State. I am proud to be a part of the Ohio State community.

 

Year in Review

[ “Year in Review”  is where you should reflect on the past year and show how you have evolved as a person and as a student.  You may want to focus on your growth in a particular area (as a leader, scholar, researcher, etc.) or you may want to talk about your overall experience over the past year.  For more information, go to: http://honors-scholars.osu.edu/e-portfolio. Delete these instructions and add your own post.]

G.O.A.L.S.

There are several goals that I have set for myself this year to make myself a better student, family member, friend, member of the community, and overall person. I set goals in hopes that they will make me better and make the world a better place. When thinking about my goals, I think that my goals fit in well with the G.O.A.L.S. framework.

First, when thinking about Global Awareness, two of my most important goals are to finish my Spanish minor and study abroad this May. I want to finish my Spanish minor, so I can have a better grasp of the language and culture. I want to travel to a Spanish-speaking country to immerse myself in the culture, so I can learn more about others and their stories. I also want to travel to a Spanish-speaking country, so I can become fluent in Spanish. That is the ultimate goal for me. If I can become a fluent Spanish Speaker, I can have amazing jobs that unilingual people can’t get because they only speak one language. In terms of Original Inquiry, I plan to engage in market research to learn more about the financial system and the global market. I plan to research stocks and invest so that I can learn more about finance. As I am a finance major it is important for me to do individual research. To continue in my academic enrichment, I strive for greatness in all my course. I strive for 4.0 GPAs every semester because I want to be the best student in my class. I strive to be the best and to work harder than the next person because I want to be the best. My goals in leadership development are to be vocal as a leader and to lead by example. As a service committee chair, I want to lead my committee to be the best that it can be. I need to be vocal and motivate them to be better. I also need to be led by example and work hard to make sure they are working hard to serve others. In service engagement, my goal is to lead a group to Appalachia to build houses for the poor. I want to lead this group to help impoverished people build houses and to help people in my group to grow in their faith.

Career

[“Career” is where you can collect information about your experiences and skills that will apply to your future career.  Like your resume, this is information that will evolve over time and should be continually updated.   For more information, go to: http://honors-scholars.osu.edu/e-portfolio. Delete these instructions and add your own post.]

Artifacts

In June 2016, I travelled to El Salvador with a group from my school to perform service work at COAR (Community Oscar Arnuelfo Romero) and the Cleveland Mission. As we prepared for the trip, I had no idea that it would be one of the most influential experiences of my life. Our mission was to teach English to students at COAR, and help build houses at the Cleveland Mission. As we worked on our mission, I learned about the culture and the lifestyle of Salvadorans. I learned about the danger that Salvadorans live in everyday due to the gang wars between MS-13 and other gangs in El Salvador. I also saw the extreme poverty that millions of Salvadorans live in every day. I was surprised at the condition of the communities that I saw in El Salvador. However, the effect this service trip had an incredible effect on my life After experiencing some of the poorest communities in the world, I began not taking things I have for granted. I realized that having a solid roof over my head, running water, and clean clothes is something that I should never take for granted because there are hundreds of millions of people across the globe who don’t have those luxuries. I learned that I should thank God and thank my parents for everything that they do for me and for putting me in a position where I can succeed. I make sure to pray for those that suffer from absolute poverty so that they may one day have a life full of the same opportunities that I have. This experience also helped me discern that I wanted to become fluent in Spanish so that I can continue to participate in service trips like this and continue to connect with those from other countries. I want to continue to help those who need it the most. One of the most valuable lessons I learned from the Salvadoran people I helped is to persevere no matter what the circumstances may be and always have a smile on your face. All of the children and adults we met always greeted us a smile no matter how bad their living conditions were. I was amazed at the way they went through life despite their unfathomable living conditions. Their perseverance and views on life inspire me to have a more positive view on the world.

About Me

I am Charles (Charlie) Giganti from Avon Lake, Ohio. I am a first year undergraduate student in the Fisher College Business where I plan to major in International Business. After high school Spanish, I will continue my Spanish education at Ohio State. While in high school, I was involved with Model United Nations, Mock Trial, Science Olympiad, Parish Council, and I volunteered with Special Olympics and Challenger Baseball. At Ohio State, I want to continue to volunteer with service organizations and work with the Newman Center to grow in my faith. I look forward to getting involved in several clubs at Ohio State so I can continue to grow as person and learn more about the world that we live. I hope to gain different experiences at Ohio State that change my perspective on the way I view personal problems and issues.