Source: http://www.easterneye.eu/business/uk-business/Blind+trader+Ashish+Goyal+refl ects+on+an+amazing+career/4286#
Blind trader Ashish Goyal reflects on an amazing career By Imran Choudhury INSPIRATION: Ashish Goyal Ashish Goyal is not your average city worker. The trader, who is blind, fulfilled his dream after beating all the odds to work for a top financial firm. He is now calling on others who are visually impaired to spend more time looking for "solutions" to their problems and less time "pondering" over them. Goyal, who lives in central London, won the GG2 Achievement through Adversity Award earlier this month at the GG2 Leadership Awards. His biggest achievement was when he became the world's first blind trader at JP Morgan, the largest bank in America. Goyal gets by by using screen-reading software to check his emails, read research reports and look at presentations. When he needs to read graphs, which the software cannot do, he goes through the data and tries to imagine the graph in his head. "I use a computer like everybody else," Goyal told Eastern Eye. "Financial markets are a very brutal place. Nobody would give me a large portfolio to manage if I could not generate the same or better return. The firm I work for is one of the biggest macro hedge fund companies. "Here it's your performance that matters. This is what I've wanted all my life - for people to not judge me on my disability but judge me on my merit." The 34-year-old left JP Morgan in 2012 and joined hedge fund Blue Crest Capital, where he works as a portfolio manager in the emerging markets fund. Recalling his journey, Goyal revealed that he was not born blind. In fact, growing up as a young boy in Mumbai, he was like any other happy child. He loved tennis and used to get coaching lessons. By the age of seven, however, Goyal was diagnosed with retinitis pigmentosa, a condition which caused his vision to gradually deteriorate. It was when the city trader was 19 years old that he nearly broke down after losing 95 per cent of his eyesight. He said: "There's two support systems I've had in my life. One is my family, parents and sisters. The second is my spiritual master Dr Balaji Tambe. "When I was 19, I was ready to give up my education. "I was going through the worst of my disease, I wasn't able to cope and lost my confidence. I didn't think I could pass my exams so I wanted to give up studies." But his mother forced Goyal to sit for the exam, and to his surprise he not only passed but received good grades. He left India at the age of 26 to do an MBA at Wharton Business School in America. While there, he secured an internship in the summer at J P Morgan. "It was really challenging trying to convince banks," Goyal explained. "Eventually JP Morgan made me an offer. "I did the work they gave me, I went through a set of interviews. Eventually the leadership of the bank was convinced and said: 'We'll take a chance on you'." When Goyal was studying at Wharton Business School, he was given the Joseph P Wharton award for a student who symbolises the "Wharton Way of Life". He even became a vice-president at JP Morgan within two years. His philosophy in life is not to waste time lamenting about problems, but rather spend time finding the right solutions for them. "The human mind and body is amazing," Goyal said. "When you have less of one thing, you can make it up easily with something else. "When I have a problem, I start looking for solutions. I don't sit and ponder too much about the problem. "Knowledge always trumps everything. Gathering knowledge, working hard and letting it play out on its own. It will work out eventually." The GG2 Leadership Awards recognise and reward the achievements of Britain's minority communities. For more information and a full list of this year's winners, go to www.gg2.net/Awards Regards, Shiv Clean India Campaign: Let us also chip in! Register at the dedicated AccessIndia list for discussing accessibility of mobile phones / Tabs on: http://mail.accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/mobile.accessindia_accessindia.org.in Search for old postings at: http://www.mail-archive.com/accessindia@accessindia.org.in/ To unsubscribe send a message to accessindia-requ...@accessindia.org.in with the subject unsubscribe. To change your subscription to digest mode or make any other changes, please visit the list home page at http://accessindia.org.in/mailman/listinfo/accessindia_accessindia.org.in Disclaimer: 1. Contents of the mails, factual, or otherwise, reflect the thinking of the person sending the mail and AI in no way relates itself to its veracity; 2. AI cannot be held liable for any commission/omission based on the mails sent through this mailing list..
