Finance Jobs for Lawyers
Any recommendations on how a mid-level corporate attorney with strong pedigree and deal experience at top firms can transition to a job in private equity or investment banking? I've worked on a wide range of financings, securities offerings and mergers and acquisitions (distressed, strategic, sponsor) and am interested in moving to the other side of the industry.
I imagine that some financial modeling background is a must, and if so, how best to acquire it without getting an MBA.
Suggestions welcome; jokes appreciated. Thanks.
Restructuring/distressed is probably the field where you could leverage your law experience the most as it involves some of the trickier legal situations you can find in finance. Networking is your best ticket at this point since you aren't aiming for entry-level programs.
Advice needed for a law school grad looking to get into finance (Originally Posted: 10/01/2012)
I'm a recent law school graduate in Boston with some retail banking experience and an undergraduate degree finance. I'm also a former professional athlete and I'm currently looking for entry level opportunities with any private equity, venture capital, or investment bank firms. I don't really know where to start looking and who to contact so I was hoping someone could give me some advice on where to look. Perhaps someone knows of any boutique firms or firms who are willing to work with non MBA graduates. Anything would help.
Also, I forgot to mention that I am primarily looking to stay in Boston if possible.
How old are you?
Find a list of boutiques in Boston and start contacting them. Pick up the phone and call.
I'm 29 years old. Also I plan on making phone calls daily to boutique firms, however are there any are willing to take on non-MBA graduates?
Just curious: why you jumping around between different careers? I only ask because it may give an insight on how to 'sell' your story aka pitch banks for a job...
UFO, I'm not necessarily jumping around, I've always had interest in finance given my undergrad degree and I went into law school with the thought of working in M & A's or business law. I'm also looking for legal/compliance stuff within banks. Anyways, I guess I'll just have to keep cold calling and networking.
Better yet, can you post a resume on razume? Long story short, you have a lot of networking to do, and you can also look for jobs in the compliance/legal departments to get a foot in the door.
This. Compliance is a great way to get your foot into the door and compliance departments are extremely active right now thanks to Dodd-Frank regulations. Plus you work like 40 hour work weeks. :)
Banking + Law School (Originally Posted: 06/08/2008)
I was wondering..how many of you bankers out there have JD degrees? Is it fairly common? Also, would doing banking out of undergrad and then applying to Law School be looked upon favorably? I'm sure it would but I don't know how much it'd help in making up for a lower GPA when applying to top schools.
Don't have any answers but would be interested in hearing what people say as well.
I'm sure it appears to admirable, but from the bits of research I gathered when I was wondering if a MBA/JD would be better then just a MBA, it seemed to be that there is little benefit in a lot of cases. I realize your question is a bit different, but it seems that legal stuff is almost always outsourced so having anything more than a general knowledge of business would probably benefit you only marginally...at least as a banker.
As far as getting a job, I'm sure it would look great on a resume and would add a little bit of diversification to an application process where recruiters often champion unique experiences.
law school admissions is generally pretty rigorous and "technical" compared to b-school. What I mean is, top law schools tend to care mostly about GPA and LSAT score. Obviously, they like the "well-rounded" candidate and blah blah blah, but id say 80% of the weight is put on gpa/lsat.
Work experience is not really as heavily factored in for law school apps as in b-school applications. There are a bunch of people in banking who have jd's. I can count off the top of my head 10 people who have JDs at my bank. Some did corporate law before making the jump to banking, others were straight out of law school. Having a JD, in my opinion, is only really helpful if you've practiced before. You know the terrain of legal documents a lot better and are able to offer a lot opinion and insight to offering memos, confidentiality agreements, etc. The few people who are in banking straight from JD don't really add much value on the legal front.
JD/MBA from top schools like Stanford/Columbia/Harvard will definately be advantageous if you were to do it right after undergrad. If you already have banking experience, it would be a waste of time but doesnt hurt.
I know of a few partners and senior MD types at banks and PE firms who have JD/MBAs... personally I don't think it adds that much, I mean you're not going to open up a whole new set of jobs or anything by having both - you can either work in law or in finance (or other fields you typically go into after an MBA).
Doing banking beforehand would not help much with law school admissions - HerSerendipity is correct in that GPA/LSAT score are weighted much more heavily than anything else. Sometimes you can get in with lower scores if you have an "unusual" background but doing banking would hardly be considered "unusual."
I think it's far more common to jump from law to finance rather than the other way around.
You can certainly do banking prior to law school, but I doubt it will help cover up a lower GPA that much since admissions is very numbers-driven.
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