Goldman Sachs CEO's advice for young people

I prefer advice like "don't trust anyone over the age of 30"

I'm cool as a cucumber but I am not satisfied.

To be honest, this advice is very bland and only applies to a select group of people. Most people are complacent/lost and giving them this advice, would be irresponsible. I am young, but the advice that I would give is find out your ultimate passion (the earlier the better) and then pursue it. I know this is obvious, but I think a lot of people on here are in the investment industry because of its prestigious nature, or because they went to a good school and that is the default option. No shame in being a teacher, artist, chef, musician, if you are truly going after it and it is your passion.

If someone who has made it to the top through hard grinding and competitiveness told me to "Chill out", I'd kindly reply "suck out"

He climbed the ladder and pulled it up behind himself

Needs more context. I don't think the point is: become a burner. I think the point is: don't wind yourself up too tight around a quarter-life existential crisis. Good things take time, patience, and often follow a winding road with some unexpected twists and turns. Along the way and while you figure it out, wash the dishes to wash the dishes, as the Buddhist saying goes, or festina lente, make haste slowly, per the old Roman adage which I picked up from Hong Kong Golf Club's motto. In no way is what I just described mutually exclusive from "get good grades, go to a good school, and get a good job out of undergrad with the aim of being a functioning, tax-paying member of society." As a millennial, anecdotally I've observed that we get hit with a lot of "you must follow your passion" propaganda, which sometimes comes from a good place and sometimes doesn't, meaning sometimes it gets conflated with "if you aren't doing something ultra-disruptive and making the world a better place in an obvious way right at this moment, you're a mindless corporate drone." (Gen-X, much?) In tech culture and hipsterdom's respective rejections of the status quo, they have become their own status quo.

I think you hit the nail on the head. Certainly you want to be successful and do well but people do generally need to chill the fck out. I can't think of how many times now I go to a recruiting event and good candidates are just hanging on to my every word and blasting me via email or telephone asking for constant updates etc. Other times I've had candidates at a recruiting event from one target school asking if they should transfer to another slightly more "target school" to better position themselves. I came from a somewhat atypical background but people just need to chill out. No wonder so many people have anxiety these days.

I respect the guy a great deal but it's hard to " chill out" these days when banks are shrinking by the day and you're in a fight to be the best analyst/associate or whatever around so they have no reason at all to let you go when they lean your team out.

Edit: you should always try to perform as best as possible, I just do not really get the sense that there is a positive outlook right now for this industry.

dings a nice, humble 3.9 GPA HYP kid for not having a BB internship during sophomore summer

Lol @ listening to any boomer's career advice. "Just grow up in the best economic conditions that any generation has ever had in history."

That's a trap, don't listen to him, all my friends who chilled out are unemployed and poor as garbage.

They will all end up selling peanuts, until they realize that they need to stop chilling out and start balling hard to make a living.

I'd think what he did mean both 1. "Chill out! It's not the end of the world." 2. "Chill out! The worst is yet to come!"

I would interpret his comment as- "give your best, and if things don't work out, chill out. Do not compare yourself with others. There will ALWAYS be someone more successful than you are, chill out. "

.

Yep, more like "so you've got 4.0 from HYP, 3 IB internships, and 30 letters of reference...chill, you'll be fine"

A lot of people claiming hypocrisy which while true is missing the point. His definition of "young people" are those HYP, 4.0, BB internship, etc. people. A lot of applicants who fall under that category have "fit" issues in interviews, and differentiate themselves almost entirely from showing the interviewers that they are confident, sociable, and not uptight.

He probably read that "How does models and bottles work?" thread.

Call me crazy, but I always prefer tighter to looser. Could be a Texas thing.

He clearly meant "Chill out...stop recruiting for the buyside after 6 months and let us get a return on the money we spend training you."

I just don't "get" advice like this. It's very easy to tell someone to chill out when you're perched atop GS and worth millions.

People here don't realize there's a certain sweet spot between "freaking out every hour of the day trying to become a multimillionaire" and genuinely just working your ass off and trying to pursue greatness. Insomuch in that I think there has to be a certain finesse in which you pursue your overly-ambitious dreams. You can't be the panicky kid in an interview who can't hold a conversation, but spends 200 hours doing excel models to prep for it.

This is spot on man

This is ridiculous advice. Does he not realize that a "chilled out" personality is not likely to make it into finance in the first place? If he himself was so chill, he would still be selling peanuts at yankee stadium.

You can only connect the dots backwards... focus on meeting people, learning as much as you can, and having fun. There are new markets everywhere: find them and exploit them. J Aron was a bucket shop when Blankfein joined them. Don't follow somebody else's path: find blank spots on the map!

seems like good advice to me. the advice isn't geared towards non-target folks who get their shit together and have banking aspirations. it goes out to tryhards at top schools who have a singular, devoted desire to get an investment banking position from the moment they arrive on campus, eager to get on "the path" before they even know what they're really passionate about.

Have friend who was goldman intern in the room when he gave the same advice to the current class a few weeks back. People are misinterpreting him. He wasn't talking about chilling out 'in general' It's in reference to his sales & trading background, where he would be in a perpetual state of stress all the time because every small thing was the only important thing and he often lost sight of the bigger picture, and also to his greater interest in history than finance. He worked extremely hard in life, but he wasn't focused on where he ended up from the outset. His point was "keep eye on big picture without imagining you know where you'll actually end up". Nothing more.