Discover International : Madison

Talk us through you relocation?

I’ve lived in Texas my entire life before coming to Miami. I grew up in Houston but came from a small town, then went to school at the University of Texas in Austin. I moved to Miami initially for school.

There was a big cultural aspect to the reason why I moved, coming from Texas, I wanted to be surrounded by people from different cultural backgrounds.

In terms of transitioning from the move, I didn’t know anyone when I came to school in Miami, but I made a lot of friends, I even had another friend from back home move out!  In terms of making friends – Discover comes in handy, as you can hang out with your colleagues outside of work.

What’s the cost of living?

Miami is very similar to Austin, they have a pretty similar cost of living and similar types of buildings. My friends in NYC get jealous in terms of the low cost of my rent! I live in a 2 bed, 2.5 bath with an 8 min walk to work and I only pay $1300 a month. It’s actually cheaper to do valet parking than park yourself! I’m moving out of my current place at the end of August into my own place, and looking at between $1600-2000 a month for a one bed apartment.

Why Discover?

They are really big on the cultural aspect and who I am working with. I have done other internships when I was the youngest one in the group, and you could really notice the age and cultural difference. At Discover, we all sit around, laughing, bantering with each other and having a good time. Because it’s a younger crowd everyone is of the same mindset.

What are the key selling points for the role?

This was my first real job, I was straight out of Law School. This gave me an advantage as I was a blank canvass, so they could teach me to Head Hunt and recruit in a specific way. Ryan and Adam have moulded me into their specific way. It has built my confidence up, even though the first year in all honesty wasn’t too great. In my first year I billed $40K, I am half way into my second year and currently on track for $400K for the year!

I would sometimes get nervous before calls at the start, but I don’t have those worries anymore!  It’s just a hurdle you need to get over.

What are the benefits of moving to Miami?

The beaches obviously!  The cost of flights here is amazing, it’s an AA hub, so flight prices are cheap. For example, last week, I didn’t realise it was a long weekend, and flight prices for the Thursday or Friday were around $120.

What is their management style?

I report into Ryan and I love it, he is very relaxed and wants you to be doing the work. He really invests time in you doing something over and over again and this is how you should learn.

He emphasises that you should be doing the work, and he doesn’t micro manage.