Are you VP material?
Often I notice the lack of WSO posts about the vice presidents of an investment bank. Why is this the case? Is everyone simply concerned with breaking into the industry or perhaps surviving their analyst/associate stints? Perhaps. Are the daydreams of a top B-school or the hop, skip and jump over to The Buy Side consuming all monkey brains?
Definite possibility.
But what about "the lifers" as I often hear them called? Joe Biden status awaits...why so little talk about it...
How many of you guys look forward to making VP? How many of you would rather commit Seppuku with a Mont Blanc pen or better yet, the plastic white knife from your midnight General Tso's delivery.
I'm taking a rant break today and posting one of my favorite Monkey Business quotes on the subject.
Curious to hear some good VP war stories and perhaps a cry of despair or two at the future to come...
The vice presidents are a crew of processing robots, few with any life outside the office. The vice presidents are making roughly half a million bucks a year, but they don't have any time to spend it. When and if they do get out of the office, they sleep. This turns them into a hapless bunch of angry young men and women who can't understand why they have become so frustrated. They want to have relationships and become functioning members of the human race, like their friends outside the investment banking realm, but they don't have the time. Usually, the only dates they can get are with gold diggers who want to get their claws into a piece of that healthy paycheck. The nice boys and girls in the city, the ones that the vice presidents wish they were dating, are busy screwing the unemployed artists and musicians who have no money but plenty of time.The vice presidents are making too much money to change careers because no other organization, with the exception of another investment bank, will hire a vice president and pay him half a million dollars a year to process deals. The vice presidents don't really take any financial risks. If they're willing to shamelessly kiss every upper-level ass they see and run around all night churning documents, they know that they'll continue to get a fat paycheck. The problem is that the vice presidents are making all this money, but they're not content. They're a miserable crew because they're trapped. Like caged animals. Imagine a prisoner of war kept shackled in a moldy basement for five years with no light, nothing but shoe leather to eat, absolutely no bathing privileges, and occasional doses of electroshock therapy. That's the vice president.
Midas,
I think the issue here is that I've probably got more industry experience than 75% of the folks on this forum, but right now, I really don't care about making VP.
I care about being able to fund track days/races, wreck dives, and hang gliding while still being about to retire at 40. They can call me "Code Janitor" for all I care if I feel I'm getting respect from the firm in the aggregate. Titles are one of MANY ways that firms give you respect.
We've discussed the VP process in the past- part of it comes down to your performance, but the year you get it is largely driven by politics that are WILDLY beyond your control.
Part of the process... I'm a soldier, won't mind going through it.
If you're in banking from the getgo (i.e. not a career changer entering banking after MBA) and you make it to VP in banking, you're essentially a disappointment.
There is no good reason why anyone would, given the option, choose to stay in banking over move to PE. The hours are better, the pay is better, the work isn't all that different and you're not a bitch to the client.
This is my opinion atleast. So when I see someone who started their career in banking and is now at the VP/MD level in banking, aside from a bold faced name MD, thats usually an indication to me that they couldn't make it to the buyside or lacked the willingness (for whatever reason) to even pursue the transition.
This tells me that they are an inferior being and that I can crush their skull with my left hand (and I'm right handed).
Indeed, when you are MD at GS or a mere VP at JPM, you are a bum...
I wish I could be such a retard in a few years! By the way, you're a moron!
I think he was referring to guys who start as analysts at a BB that stay on to the VP/MD level. Guys who start as associates and move up are bright, but they won't have the PE options that an analyst has (at least from what I've read on this sit)
Well, my take is that if you make it to MD in banking or PE, you suck at saving money and lack the will to retire at 40.
Net of tax, I live on about $30K/year + sporting expenses ($5-10K). Assuming a conservative 2.5% return on capital, I can retire when I hit $2 million in post-tax savings.
Gotta say that your choice of Roger Moore is nicely reflective of the preceding quote, btw.
Or you either have expensive habits or loftier goals than retiring with $10-ish million in the bank.
There's more to life than money. A lot more. Spending more than a quarter of a lifetime in an industry obsessed with money indicates that you might be missing out on the important stuff.
Given that I live on $35K/year, I have a better lifestyle than 90% of the people on this planet. I've got it pretty good. I work in an air-conditioned office. In the winter, my apartment is heated by clean-burning natural gas. I have the ability to rent a car and go hang gliding on the weekends. Instead of heating a pot of rice over a wood burning fire, I get to order in Indian food and grab a few beers when I get home. Religious organizations and ethnic groups aren't actively trying to kill me, or if they are, the police at least have a decent handle on on the law and order situation around here. I've got it pretty darn good.
So why should I spend my life slaving away to make the top 0.1% in terms of lifestyle? The most valuable thing we have is free time. And the bottom line is that PE takes 50 solid hours/week out of time to go hang gliding, sailing, or do track days.
Why retire when you can keep working?
Am i missing something here?
Living off 30k a year is nice and dandy when you are young and single, but what about when you get married and have kids?
Or have you already factored in your geekiness into the equation and determined there is no way you are ever getting hitched? (I say this in half-jest)
In all seriousness, if wifey has $2 million saved up, too, we'll both be able to retire at 40 AND put two kids through college.
Age-------Title-------Gross-------After Tax-------Net of Expenses-------Saved-------Cumulative Savings 22-------Analyst 1-------110K-------71-------37-------37 23-------Analyst 2-------140K-------91-------56-------93 24-------Analyst 3-------170K-------110-------76-------168 25-------Associate 1-------200K-------130-------95-------263 26-------Associate 2-------240K-------156-------121-------384 27-------Associate 3-------280K-------182-------147-------531 28-------VP 1-------330K-------215-------180-------710 29-------VP 2-------380K-------247-------212-------922 30-------VP 3-------440K-------286-------251-------1,175 31-------VP 4-------520K-------338-------303-------1,477 32-------MD 1-------650K-------423-------388-------1,864 33-------MD 2-------750K-------487-------452-------2,316
Accordingly, you won't be retiring until you're 33 and a second year MD... AKA just when you're hitting your stride compensation-wise. You'll be nearly doubling your Lifetime-To-Date life savings every 3 years thereafter... and thats when you're planning on retiring? Why would you work so hard to get somewhere and retire just when you start realizing the fruits of your labor?
Its easy to have this perspective now. When it took you 10 years to save $2 million and you can increase that figure 25% by working one more incremental year, I'd like to see you pack it in.
nice analysis but now that you've broken it out for us, i had to laugh. an MD making $750,000 a year but living off of $35k. Hilariously naive. I get where he's coming from but life just doesn't work like that.
Marcus & Illini,
Think you'll both enjoy
.
Each for his own reasons.
p.s. may want to lower the volume if watching at work.
Awesome. Anyone know what song that is?
It's just a wordplay on something Remy Martin said on the M.O.P. remix of "Ante Up" going off your commendable fondness for skullcrushery, I'd figure it was already in your ipod or soon to be...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lOfG4UMl-4
Says it's from a movie called, "Gangsta Rap: The Glockumentary" but that there no known artist.
Regards
Haha good find! That's a Romanian ad btw.
Alas, I can't. Firm blocks YouTube.
Hey, just some more cheap entertainment to add to the conservative man's entertainment budget for when you hit the pad.
Bahaha!!! Old James Bond reruns are surprisingly cheap.
Agreed, but remember...he boffed Grace Jones in one of them, so default risk is high.
I dream of and aim to become one in next 3-5 years. Save the money for couple of years and they do whatever you want to do.
Hey Marcus,
Not going to lie I kind of agree with most of your points. My only question is have you taken into account people who actually enjoy banking? As weird as it may sounds, I think there are actually some who do. And yes, they're likely masochists haha.
That doesn't really make any sense considering that everything there is to like about banking is also present in PE albeit with a much better lifestyle in terms of work-life balance, money, prestige and autonomy.
I guess I could see this if you lack the self-confidence to take a view on an investment and stake the LP's money on it. So I could see how if you don't want have to make investment decisions and/or be responsible for the performance of an investment (at a VP/MD level thats the role you'll be taking on in PE), you can stick to banking.
Aside from investment/decision consequences, to prefer banking over PE means you, in addition to other things: 1- enjoy be the client's bitch, literally... so when he says jump, you not only say how high, but you then jump at 4 different heights, 3 different ways just to show him how you'll "go the extra mile" to "add value" 2- enjoy making mindless review/mark-up of documents in order to decide to italicize this word and unitalicize the word, double underline the total on page 14 and single underline the totals on pages 16, 21 and 33
awesome video. Marcus - google fk the bitch slap that ho lyrics, you may find it.
From what I have done in the industry so far, I love it and would enjoy that position at least for a year to get that experience.
Does PE really have higher salaries than Banking at the associate level? From conversations with some current analysts and headhunters, it seems that (for MM PE at least) the hours are better, but the pay is around the same (100k base + 100k-200k bonus at the pre-mba associate level, which is similar to banking associate pay).
I ask, because I've been strongly considering the possibility of staying in banking for the long run rather than moving over to the buyside. One reason being that I really enjoyed the work at my group. And I also like the fact that I don't have to worry about my investments 24/7.
In addition, I feel that the sellside offers a slightly more stable/secure job: - You can always move from sellside to buyside at higher levels (looking at profiles of partners and vps at various PE firms), but it's rare to see someone move from buyside back to sellside - You jump around for 2 year stints on the buyside, and usually need to go for an MBA, whereas you can move straight up in banking without having to worry about interviews/recruiting all the time
Once you reach senior levels, it's true that PE pays more than banking, but the hours seem to be worse in PE. I remember seeing a post on WSO mentioning that partners in PE are under much higher stress and stay very late at the office relative to MDs in banking.
Please feel free to shoot me down with any counter arguments.
I have no real contribution to make to this discussion, except for that the picture of the monkey at the top of the thread, Is probably one of the funniest things I have ever seen. Like laugh out loud in a quiet office funny. Animals doing human things, gets me everytime
+1
Some people get off on the sales process. They are natural born salesmen. Hence they are more driven to IB than PE. My old MD was a classic example of this. He just loved the chase of deals. His personality wouldn't fit as well in PE.
I think this captures it perfectly. After spending as many years as they have in IB to get to the VP level, effectively making money their #1 priority, They likely can't justify leaving money on the table to leave. They're pot committed. The whole career path is justified with the "I'll make as much as I can as quickly as I can and then retire," rationale, but I would think that many years of processing deals 24/7 would make it very difficult to just walk away.
Agree with Marcus. If you're starting as an analyst, GFL suffering through the 7-8 years of TORTURE you have to go through before you become a senior VP and start to live a somewhat normal life -- at least if you start as an associate, it's 4-5 years, which is far more reasonable. If you only have to spend 2-3 years grinding it out as an analyst then can go to the buyside and be a pre-MBA associate making as much or more as you would as an associate-promote (and as much as post-MBA associates), while working quite a bit less (and dealing with a lot less bullshit), you're crazy not to do it.
Spend two years as an associate, go enjoy your life at a top business school, get into a buyside role as a senior associate, and you'll be rolling in the cash, making way more than your post-MBA banking associate counterparts. And lifestyle? While those associates are cranking out 90+ hour weeks learning how to model, double-check work and make pretty Powerpoints, you'll be putting in easy 60 hour weeks doing interesting work and absolutely killing it. AND you avoid the bitch work.
Dude Illini, I know you pride yourself on being cheap or "thrifty" I'll call it but jesus what is the point of busting balls if you can't enjoy some of the money?
Pre-MBA PE Associates... 100k + 100k bonus at MM shop... accurate? I'll take 200k and 60 hour weeks...
200k is probably a little high post-2009 for average Pre-MBA PE Associate comp. $150K - $175K starting is more accurate I would think.
Maybe at a $500M fund.
^----- wow, this dude is so fucking stereotypical Asian. Laundromat, Verizon Store... hahah, this has got to be a joke. Are you half Korean and half Indian?
Thanks whitey. You should consider a career in profiling.
LMAO Marcus was actually right
Sounds like an excellent job to me. Why do people need a life (just for dating some girls) ?
am i the only person thinking this is a fucking stupid thread. why does everybody run their mouth about money and how much they make and wanna make, and " i want to make it in PE, IB Trading" bla blab alb
most of you are way off on the numbers as well. Too optimistic
Ummm... yeah, you are the only one.
Are you seriously asking "why is everyone talking about moving up through the ranks and how much money they will make along the process in a forum dominated by investment banking/wall street hopefuls?" And you think that the THREAD is stupid? Interesting.
Why don't you come over to my place and we can talk about how we can raise that salary of yours. You like Luey Hewis and the news?
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