Alumni Spotlight: Tanner Lujan

Tanner Lujan '23 BSBA (Finance and Accounting) is a Financial Analyst I at Google in Chicago, IL. This spotlight is an update from Tanner's internship post in 2021: Tanner's Internship Spotlight

Current Role Insight: What do you do within your company/organization? Any projects or accomplishments to highlight?

As a Financial Analyst at Google, I focus on driving financial health and strategic planning. My role involves partnering with cross-functional teams to manage budgeting, forecasting, and resource allocation. One of my favorite aspects of the job is translating complex data into actionable insights that help leadership make informed decisions about product investments and long-term growth

Skills in Action: Are there any specific skills that you feel have really helped you?

A combination of technical proficiency and soft interpersonal skills has been vital. On the technical side, being comfortable with large-scale data analysis and financial modeling is a daily requirement. Increasingly, I’ve found that leveraging AI and machine learning tools is essential for streamlining these processes. I find myself routinely using them to automate data pulls as predictive modeling allows me to focus more on high-level strategy.

However, the ability to communicate those findings clearly to non-finance partners is the most critical. Being able to tell a story with data has been the biggest contributor to my professional development so far.