Four weeks in London. Joette Mallia was over the moon at the prospect of working in the British capital, knowing it would be a great opportunity to hone her skills with EY London’s client.

One placement followed another in quick succession as the project was extended – and before she knew it, she had been there for four years, working her way up from assistant to stints in risk management and compliance, becoming a manager.

She could never have guessed that the work placement would lead to the setting up of a Managed Services centre here in Malta – let alone that she would become its leader just a year later.

It is an ambitious project. EY Malta will be starting off with 50 people but will then take in 10 or so new employees a month.

EY Malta prides itself on its flexibility with regard to work/life balance – and gender equality

“It all depends whether there is a pipeline of the right people to work in this sort of environment,” EY Malta’s country manager Ronald Attard said.

One of the key messages Mr Attard and Ms Mallia want to convey is that recruits can come from a wide range of backgrounds.

“I think there is a considerable amount of students who are not aware of what we need... We need risk professionals, mostly at graduate level, not only from University of Malta but also Mcast, who do not necessarily have any experience.

“Apart from the fact that we will provide full training and induction – which is why we are taking on new employees in phases – they do not all need an accounting background; only those who do assurance would do that,” he said.

“But in other centres, like the UK, we attract graduates with very surprising backgrounds, like history and the classics. All we need are people with numerical skills and a big brain, who are willing to learn. It would be wonderful to do so here. We would love to give people the opportunity to benefit from the work experience and the career path. People are simply not aware of the careers that there are available in financial services. Being part of a global team opens numerous doors.”

“It would be a great opportunity for those who come here with a general bachelor degree in commerce, whether finance, insurance or management.

“The indications are very positive. We have already received some very interesting CVs from candidates,” Ms Mallia said.

Mr Attard is enthusiastic by nature but the new centre has really fired up his imagination.

“We have been sending people overseas for foreign engagements through EY London for some time and many people were very successful. At one stage we had 30 people working on various projects, either at the EY London office or at its clients. The Maltese have a great reputation.

“We realised that Managed Services is very much internet-based, and just as the clients could be anywhere in the world, so the work can be done from anywhere in the world,” Mr Attard said.

“So we asked ourselves whether we could offer these services directly from Malta, instead of sending people to the UK... Of course some of our staff love the opportunity to travel, and they will still have the opportunity to do so, but the centre will give dozens of people the chance to try a completely new career. And this is not only good for EY but also for Malta, especially since it is locally-generated and not foreign direct investment.”

The Managed Services centre will provide ‘know your customer’ services to clients in the financial services industry, networking with other centres in the EY family, predominantly – but not exclusively – those in the UK, which focus onbroader risk management for financial services.

The amount of due diligence required as a result on anti-money laundering directives has increased tremendously. Financial institutions need to identify not only their clients but also the source of their wealth.

One of the key messages Mr Attard and Ms Mallia want to convey is that recruits can come from a wide range of backgrounds

The level of due diligence can vary from a straightforward check to enhanced due diligence, depending the nationality of the client if he or she comes from a sanctioned country, or if they are a politically exposed person.

Mr Attard believes that the centre could grow – and could be extended to other areas besides due diligence, such as processing financial statements and risk management.

“We know we can never be a big Indian-style centre with thousands of people – the EY Global Talent Hub employs 30,000 there – because there are simply not the human resources in Malta to do that! But we can grow beyond 50, depending on whether we find the right people. We can’t see any reason why we should not grow to 200 within a few years.”

EY Malta thrives because of the diversity of its workforce and at present around 20 per cent of its employees is foreign. But Mr Attard is keen to encourage as many Maltese as possible to come forward.

“If we were to get another 20-30 people we would find work for them all. The challenge is finding enough people! As part of a global network, we can always find people to bring over – but we would love to attract Maltese.”

“The centre will help in a number of ways as they can work here for a few years – although many will see it as a long-term career. There will be several levels, from associates and assistants to executives and managers,” Ms Mallia said.

The 14-year-old company is currently remodelling the three floors it occupies in the Regional Business Centre in Msida – but it will also be taking on additional space to cope with its ongoing growth. Work started on the designs in November and the construction and finishing work on all the floors should be completed by September.

“This year we will probably take on 70 full-timers –50 for the centre as well as another 20 for assurance, transactions and so on,” he said.

“We can take 100 people per floor so we have room to grow even further and there are plans to take over other parts of the building in the coming 18-24 months,” he said over the regular thumps from the construction work below.

“We like this location, for various reasons. It did not make sense to move out. It is very accessible and central, with good public transport connections. And even the parking will be easier as we have spaces in the blocks across the road too...”

EY Malta prides itself on its flexibility with regard to work/life balance – and gender equality.

“This would be great for working mothers or women coming back to work after a career break. We could be very flexible in terms of working hours.”

The new offices will reflect this flexible approach. Although the Managed Services centre will have the traditional layout, the rest of the building will have a totally open-plan one. This will enable ‘hot desks’ so that staff can sit down wherever they find a space when they get into the office, while teams from various disciplines will be able to sit together when working on a particular project.

“We are no longer going to have all our tax people on one floor and advisory staff on another. It is a very efficient way to use space. The nature of our work dictates that many of our staff are working in our clients’ premises. It doesn’t make sense to take up a desk for one staff member on a 100 per cent occupancy basis if the likelihood is that they will only use it one week a month.

“Some people will be almost permanently there, and others almost permanently out so I am sure that some desks will be ‘hotter’ than others,” he laughed.

“The work ethic here is very good and if there is work to be done people are willing to stay on, and even to work on weekends to meet deadlines,” he said, pausing for a moment before chuckling.

“Should we say that? We don’t want to put people off! We are a great company to work for!”