FINALLY! GOT IT- TOP MM FT OFFER- THANK YOU WSO
Hey all (apologize for long post but its been a long journey)-
I've been waiting over a year and a half now to post this, and glad I can now. This thread is here to share my journey w/others, free to answer questions if you have and just showing those junior monkeys that dont get BB or MM offers for SA that it CAN BE DONE. DONT GIVE UP UNTIL YOU DIE OR GET WHAT YOU WANT :)
Before School
I came into school (semi-target) business major not knowing anything about finance at all. Hell if I had to guess as a freshman or even sophomore what IB was, I would have said something BS like "oh its when people invest in stocks and companies right?" Reason for this was that I thought I wanted to work in operations management, but thats besides the point.
September of Junior Year
I stumbled upon this addicting site called WSO. A world of knowledge and information was available 24 hours a day 7 days a week at the edge of my finger tips, FOR FREE! I started poking around here, M&I, bought the Rosenbaum book, bought the WSO technical guide, downloaded sample models from (macabacus) and searched every term i found under the sun on investopedia to learn everything in layman terms and a high level "fin-ance" explanation
October of my Junior Year
My school started having on campus info sessions with all the BBs and some MMs/boutiques. I went to them and loved it. First one i didnt know shit, what to ask, who to talk to, how to convert into a informational interview later on, etc. So, i went to my online bible (WSO) and started searching good questions to ask bankers.
Couple more info sessions go by, I talk to bankers, hold great convos and remain sociable/personable and convert them into informational phone interviews later on. Had about 6-10 banks that I thought I had GREAT chances of getting offers from. HA! I was never more wrong.
I start sending people my resume for help and they give feedback and I always got the same question, why do you have a sub 3.5 GPA? This wasnt terrible but they were getting resumes left and right from kids at my school or targets with 3.7/3.8+ and 1-2 boutique internships when all I had was a PWM one. Great, my blue balls were starting to go away.
End of My Winter Break
Of the OCR slots i did resume drops for, i received 0/12. Literally. This was a stab to the heart. My stomach flipped. WTF. I networked, I talked to the right people I studied. Fuck banking, I'll never be able to compete with these Target/Semi target kids that have known about banking for the past 3 years, when i barely have been prepping for it for 3 months.
I run across an alumni, he looks at my resume, we talk, he goes "Dude, you're handling this the wrong way. Use this rejection to get up and go harder. Your GPA is hard to change, but your work experience is more malleable. Get something under your belt before FT recruitment hits".
Okay i agree but what to do? Cold call! I start cold emailing/cold calling until I finally get an unpaid internship position near my school at a no-name boutique bank. Long story short, I said fuck partying, i need this experience if i want a FT offer. Ended up staying at the boutique from January of junior year to end of August. Yup, 9 mnths. Why? because i wanted it bad enough. I wanted to prove to myself that the gpa on my resume is just a padding to someone's ego, not a measure of how smart or capable I am.
FT recruitment comes around and the blue balls are back :)
Thanks to EXTENSIVE NETWORKING and tons of hours spent on WSO I was able to land 16 first round interviews. I would tear each time I got an email or phone call back for a superday/first round email. i literally poured sweat, lack of sleep and hard work into getting these interviews
I had solid deals to talk about that I worked on, ex: debt/equity financings, M&A sell sides and an LBO and was willing to put the hours, 20-25 hrs a week during school year and 80ish hrs/week in the summer.
FT Recruiting
Interviews went well, had some with lower tier bulges (ex- Wells Fargo, BAML), elite boutiques (ex- Lazard, Guggenheim) and several top MM (ex- HW, Jefferies, HLHZ) firms.
When i received the phone call for my offer, my heart skipped a beat. i went numb. i had the person on the phone repeat what he/she just said because i thought i heard incorrectly "um sorry, i lost service, can you repeat what you just said?" LOL
So monkeys, YOU CAN DO IT TOO. I'm actual proof that someone with: sub 3.5 GPA + no solid experience going into SA, can turn it all around by reading WSO, Rosenbaum all the guides etc, NETWORKING x100 CAN = a top FT offer
its gonna feel good to be paid after working so long for free :)
Feel free to ask questions if you're going through SA or FT recruiting still or if you want to share a motivational story too. Keep on trucking and you WILL get there eventually!
PS- i'd donate some of my signing bonus to WSO if i knew how, i LITERALLY would NOT have gotten it if it were not for this site
This is awesome. Congrats!
way to go dude
Great congrats that was one hell of a ride, can't wait for the day i can write a post like this!
good work dude, party now while you have the time!
Congratulations ! Tremendous story. You're well on your way. Go celebrate!
Was in the same boat as you last year - semi-target, sub-3.5 GPA, no SA experience, but somehow managed to land a FT top MM offer. Congrats! I know exactly how you felt on that phone call when you got the offer, nothing better!
Congrats, man. I lol'd at the whole "sorry, I lost service. can you repeat what you just said?" part.
:)
Nice one man! way to stick with it. I'm similar position as you were. I know I'll make it, just don't know when
Keep on trucking!! You'll make it eventually
Congrats man!!! I'm still plugging away as a junior with no internship in sight.
Congrats! I'm sure people still going through the process might find your LinkedIn tips helpful if you want to post them up.
congratz! could you talk about how you cold call to get the internship? thanksss!
I always really enjoy these posts, well done.
Congratulations!!!
Can you share some of your linkedin techniques?
Love your determination. If you could you that post on networking, that'd be awesome.
Great story, congrats!! It's be really nice if you could share your networking techniques as well :))
Done- http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/part-2-finally-got-it-top-mm-ft-o…
hope it helps...took me like a solid 20 min to write haha
Thank you! ;)
Congrats
Congrats! This is really motivating, I'd like to mention that the link didn't work above ^ for your networking techniques, however I am interested as well!
Congratulations dude! This story is incredibly motivating for those trying to network via cold email/cold call constantly.
I keep coming back to this post for motivation. Congrats!
Congrats!
How has your career been so far? I'd love to hear a follow up on this story! I am also a student who wants to land an internship as well,cans this gave me a boost of motivation!
Congrats man. Update us on your journey!
Congrats man! What were you saying during your cold calls/emails to boutiques? I find this the trickiest thing as it's kind of hard and weird to know what to say as a random kid reaching out
Ut sunt qui aliquam autem. Praesentium maxime voluptatem cumque autem optio commodi ut sit. Ea error eos iusto culpa corporis ducimus est. Aliquam quia officia consequatur aliquam et id. Error pariatur iusto commodi.
Quibusdam assumenda sunt quibusdam adipisci. Consequuntur earum aliquid nulla aut occaecati.
Ut ut omnis et quam. Repellat velit reiciendis aut aut aut doloremque. Nemo quia et amet debitis saepe accusantium ut. Aliquid in dolor id aliquam voluptatem ab. Aut facilis et fuga ratione fugiat saepe. Ut neque consequatur nulla aut non placeat. Rerum minus neque aut deserunt enim.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...
Et quo exercitationem quidem ipsa tenetur et sunt. Amet quos vel totam a ad nemo earum. Rerum fugit dolorem repellat dolor non.