VALENTINE BOUFFINIER
A SPECIALISATION IN LINE WITH MY CAREER GOALS
Valentine Bouffinier is a fourth-year student on the Business Management track, specialising in Audit and Financial Management. She completed her baccalaureate, with honours, at Notre Dame les Oiseaux secondary school in Verneuil sur Seine in the department of Yvelines. She chose the EDHEC International BBA after attending the Open Day. “I fell for the charm of the Nice campus and the programme,” she says.
Valentine began her course by studying the fundamentals of management at EDHEC Business School’s Nice campus. In 2017, she spent a semester studying at Yonsei University in South Korea as part of a double degree programme. Yonsei University is one of the top 20 institutions in Asia, according to the QS Top Universities rankings. “My decision to go there stemmed from a desire for discovery and adventure,” Valentine says. At Yonsei University Business School, she took management-related courses taught exclusively through English – project management, international management, negotiation and business model development. “I also took a course on Korean culture, which was very interesting, as it gave me a better understanding of the country’s culture,” she says. “In addition, I took a Korean language course, which helped me enormously in day-to-day life there.”
Yonsei University
On her return, Valentine completed her first six-month accounting-sector placement at an accounting firm. The first three months involved entering invoices and cashflows, bank reconciliations, VAT returns and declarations of exchange of goods (DEB) and services (DES). In the following three months, she worked in managerial audit at a Groupe ENGIE subsidiary in La Défense in Paris. Her tasks involved creating summary tables and charts. “Thanks to this internship, I was able to get an initial taste of the accounting profession,” Valentine says, “which made me want to continue down this route.”
In her fourth year, Valentine decided to specialise in Audit and Financial Management, “in line with my career goals”. She deepened her knowledge of accounting and management controls. She learned how to value a company for mergers and acquisitions and in line with different international accounting standard (IFRS), as well as how to apply these in practice. She also took courses in taxation and software, such as Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) and SAP.
Valentine is currently on a placement at accountancy and audit firm Grant Thornton in Neuilly sur Seine as an assistant entry-level consultancy intern. “I arrived in tax season,” she says. “In addition to updating accounts and tax returns, this is when the accounts and statements are prepared for certain companies. I also help with the drafting of legal documents (for example, the minutes of general meetings or management reports). I also compile and create summary tables and charts. What I really like about the environment at the firm is that one is never bored, as there is always something to do (especially in tax season).”
After the BBA, Valentine hopes to continue studying for an MSc at EDHEC Business School.
Valentine is on LinkedIn.
