Cardiff and Vale College alumni Paul Haley comes back to talk business

Former Cardiff and Vale College student Paul Haley has come back to his alma mater to give a talk to Business students about his life and experiences as Internal Audit Manager UK at Tata Steel.

Paul, who completed a BEC OND in Business Studies at the former Barry College in the 1980s, has had a long and varied career. Previous roles include roles at Managing Director of Leisure and Tourism Business at ECGD, Head of Internal Audit at the MoD’s Defence Aviation Repair Agency and Director of specialist internal audit practice BHBi, as well as holding a wide range of voluntary roles.

He came in to give a presentation to Year 2 learners on the College’s Level 3 Business course. Paul chose to do so in May as it is International Internal Audit Month and he wanted to highlight to extremely wide range of careers that can be achieved in auditing – from heritage and entertainment to national defence.

“When I went to the College in the late ‘70s, early 80’s it was still Barry College so coming back in is almost like coming full circle,” Paul said. “It’s good to come back and talk to students about my journey and the life lessons I’ve learned – hopefully there’s a few nuggets that resounded with them!

“Today’s world is totally different from the one when I left college. The power of networking, linked to sites like LinkedIn and Facebook, actually reconnects you to people you were in college with, which is great. Those links, those networks, create opportunities and I’ve come back to my college to suggest those opportunities are there for today’s students.

“You don’t have to know at this point in your development where you want to go. I think that will help in a modern day career – it’s all about having a portfolio of careers as people might have a job in 20 years’ time that doesn’t exist at the moment.”

CAVC Deputy Head of Business, IT and Professional Studies Fiona Tierney said:

“It was great to welcome Paul Haley back to the College which set on his incredibly successful career path. Having former students with the range of experience that Paul has come back to inspire our current learners is one of the real benefits of being the first college in Wales to establish an Alumni Network.”