Job Shadow: Melanie Rubino

One of the things that I did during the summer is job shadow Melanie Rubino, Director of Education and Quantitative Analyst at Wolverine Trading, for half a day.

I had the opportunity to learn about the culture of Wolverine Trading, the derivatives market, and different job roles related to trading.

Wolverine trading is one of the proprietary trading institutions in Chicago.  It is known for derivatives valuations and order executions.

The day started out with a tour around the floor with Ms. Rubino: an electronic trading pit with at least four monitors for every employee, a number of engineering analysts, and a “Chinese wall” that divides traders for legal issues. Oh…did I forget to mention the all-you-can-eat cafeteria? Yup, all the employees have the access to a full cafeteria for breakfast and lunch.

I went to a Scrum meeting after the tour. It is a type of meeting where the team gets together every morning to talk about their documented project progress and other related issues on the project. So that everyone can be posted on status and it is also proven to be more productive.

Then I had a chance to sit and ask some of the questions that I had about the industry and job roles. While Ms. Rubino was prepping for a class later in the day, I had the opportunity to interact with one of the employers, Nate Pomeroy.

Mr. Pomeroy has his degree from the University of Chicago in Philosophy and Mathematics. He first joined Wolverine Trading as an intern during summer and moved up the “ladder” ever since.

I learned that philosophy is not much different from the critical and logical thinking of mathematicians.

Then I sat in a class for the first session of the summer-long course, about stocks and derivatives market, with the new interns and other employers that are taught by Ms. Rubino.

Who knew that when you buy a stock from an online brokerage account you do not technically own the stock until the three business days after purchasing the stock?

I would like to thank Ms. Rubino for giving me this opportunity to explore and learn about one of my potential careers.

Every day is different from any other day and if you have the passion and drive for the job you will set yourself apart from others.