Viet-Linh Pham, '13

Financial Analyst, Oregon Health Authority Public Health Division

Major: Accounting

UP prepared me for my career by teaching me how to learn. Accounting is such a broad field, there’s no way 4 years can teach you everything you need to know for every possible job. But with a solid foundation in accounting theory I was able to take what I learned and apply it in different jobs and industries.

I also relied on the Career Center a lot during my time at UP (and once or twice as an alum). They got me through the grueling public accounting recruiting process my sophomore and junior years, and although it didn’t result in an internship or job offer, I still use the skills I learned from it today.

The countless resume reviews taught me to write in clear, concise language. Very useful when writing emails to executives who read my emails in six seconds, on their phones, while eating lunch and walking! And my favorite Career Center interview tip: when you get a question that takes you off guard, to say “That’s a great question, please give me a minute to think about it.” When I’ve taken those few seconds to take a breath and think, what I want to say usually comes more easily.

My junior year I started volunteering with CASH Oregon after being introduced by my tax professor. The organization facilitates the IRS’ Volunteer Income Tax Assistance (VITA) Program where trained volunteers prepared returns for underserved populations. The person who facilitated the site I worked in (New Columbia Opportunity Center) was an internal auditor for Clark County, WA and helped me get my internship. I kept volunteering with CASH Oregon after graduation and was even the site facilitator for New Columbia for a season. It was really gratifying to meet volunteers who were current UP students, doing the things I was doing just a few years prior.

The minute I graduated I felt like a lit fuse was burning and that the explosion was the end of my student loan grace period. I focused on what was in my control and took tiny steps towards a daunting goal and was able to pay off my loans in half the time. Now I look back and wonder why I was ever scared. I hope I will eventually feel that way about the challenges I face today!

After a wonderful internship doing internal audit at Clark County my junior year I knew that I wanted a career in the public sector doing governmental accounting. That being said, my first role was in the Portland craft beer industry!

I was having a really hard time finding a job and was unemployed for about 2 months after graduation. Many of my classmates had been hired by public accounting firms before we even graduated so it was a really discouraging time for me.

One day I unexpectedly received an email from my advisor at UP: her friend was a business consultant and one of his clients had a startup manufacturing craft brewing equipment called Portland Kettle Works and needed a bookkeeper. I suddenly found myself working in an industry and on a career path so far away from what I had originally intended. And you know what? I loved every minute of it!

I stayed with Portland Kettle Works for three years and in that time we tripled the size of the company. During my time there, I was promoted to accounting manager and managed my own team of bookkeepers. The startup setting gave me the freedom to learn, grow and experiment professionally.

Later, a friend who worked for the State of Oregon shared a position opening at the Oregon Health Authority’s Public Health Division.  I wasn’t interested in looking for a new job at the time but decided to apply anyway. I figured I had nothing to lose and it was a good opportunity to practice interviewing and see if my suit still fit. I fell in love with the mission of the agency and accepted a position as a financial analyst.

I’m still here almost four years later. Trading the comfort of my first job for something in a completely different sector was scary at first and there were many days in the first few months when I felt like I had made a mistake, but even if I didn’t know it at the time, I had finally ended up where I wanted to be. A large portion of my job is to manage the contracts by which Oregon’s 36 Counties and 9 federally recognized Tribes get state funding to support public health work in their areas.

As I write this, we’re 4 months deep in the COVID-19 outbreak. These few months have pushed me to my limit both professionally and personally but they’ve also been an affirmation of why I chose to work in the public sector in the first place: changing institutions from the inside to build better systems.