Goldman Sachs is Anti-Ivy-League?

Gives hope to non-targets? Browse random IBD ANALYSTS (not VP, MD, etc.) in LinkedIn and you will see a very clear trend: almost nobody has Ivy League degrees. My guess is something like 1/3 at the most, and of those with ivy degrees on their profile we see a clear bias towards business/business-like ivies like Wharton and Princeton. I'm looking mostly at NYC but I imagine the trend gets even more severe outside of Manhattan.

Compare that to Morgan Stanley...

 

Most front-office employees at GS are NOT on LinkedIn. It is discouraged.

Most GS employees on LinkedIn are back office, outside contractors, etc.

********************************* “The American father is never seen in London. He passes his life entirely in Wall Street and communicates with his family once a month by means of a telegram in cipher.” - Oscar Wilde
 
veritas14:
Most front-office employees at GS are NOT on LinkedIn. It is discouraged.

Most GS employees on LinkedIn are back office, outside contractors, etc.

Uhh, most of the FO GS guys I know are on linkedin.

And there does seem to be some credence to this- GS does on-campus recruitment for FO positions at most flagship state schools in addition to a number of "non-target" private schools. Obviously target school kids probably are overrepresented there relative to the population of students at Rutgers, but I do think it's more than just a rumor that GS puts less emphasis on which college you attended than other banks.

 
 

The first three profiles are of people that actually work in banking, and they did go to pretty respectable schools (IIT, Northwestern, etc) if not ivy leagues. IIT is the best engineering college in India (an acceptance rate of 1% in a country of over a billion people), and Northwestern is a top 5 MBA school. The other profiles are of VPs in non-banking divisions.

 

That's like going to a dating website and looking at the girls and finding that none of them are gorgeous, and determining that there are no gorgeous girls in existence. Or worse yet, looking at public profiles on said dating site, which many are not. They don't need dating sites to meet people, and if they are on there, you bet they will be private profiles.

 

Take my argument as one that is evidential not conclusive: we have good evidence to suggest that Goldman Sachs does not select heavily for Ivy League grads.

Here is another piece of evidence: whatever social stigma prevents ivy league grads from putting their Goldman cred on LinkedIn would also probably exist at MS, yet there we don't see that trend. Therefore we have more evidence to suggest that Goldman does not select heavily for Ivy League grads.

 
Best Response
22bells:
Take my argument as one that is evidential not conclusive: we have good evidence to suggest that Goldman Sachs does not select heavily for Ivy League grads.

Here is another piece of evidence: whatever social stigma prevents ivy league grads from putting their Goldman cred on LinkedIn would also probably exist at MS, yet there we don't see that trend. Therefore we have more evidence to suggest that Goldman does not select heavily for Ivy League grads.

Your 2nd point holds water (if stated facts are true), unless Goldman specifically has a policy of discouraging a LinkedIn presence. Perhaps non-Ivy grads are more likely to disregard such a policy than Ivy grads. Or perhaps many simply lie about being in a FO position, and are actually somewhere else within Goldman.

PS - I am arguing strictly for the sake of arguing, couldn't care less if this is actually true or not, so feel free to disregard

 

I'm not quite sure if this is a troll post or not, but I'll assume it's real and give an answer.

GS recruiting focuses on hiring the best. period. There's some bias to HYP, but not as much as at other firms. That said, GS has one of the largest HYP representations I've seen. This speaks more of HYP quality than of any HYP blinders recruiters wear. So yea, you'll see fair few non-targets, but these are the creme de la creme.

Another explanation has to do with GS's own prestige (I've observed this myself, and have had people at other BBs confirm this). Let's assume 100 mad-legit non-target (btw NW, IIT are targets fyi so they're excluded from the non-taget list) are interested in FO finance. These 100 will blow most ivy leaguers out of the water. A large % (say 40) of these 100 will goto GS b/c they are essentially the best. Assuming 10 other firms ... that translates to 6 per firm assuming a uniform distribution across those 10 (distribution and number are not necessarily true, but you get the point).

 

Based on the class breakouts we always see posted here, those numbers make sense.

1/3rd is small? If any major global firm is hiring more than 40% of their workforce from 6 schools that would be a bit excessive. Business Majors should get internships easier, know they want banking early, thus more of them should be hried. Same reason most of the boutiques hire undergrad biz kids.

 

Declaring a firm is "anti-Ivy League" because of a LinkedIn search is probably one of the more absurd pieces of analysis I have heard of...don't you have better things to do than stalk GS-ers on LinkedIn?

If you really want to know about a firms culture why dont you get to know/ask someone who WORKS there rather than engage in this rediculous speculation, or spend your time focusing on getting a good GPA and preparing for campus recruiting

otherwise, who cares? not like you can do anything about it...

 
deal_mkr:
Declaring a firm is "anti-Ivy League" because of a LinkedIn search is probably one of the more absurd pieces of analysis I have heard of...don't you have better things to do than stalk GS-ers on LinkedIn?

If you really want to know about a firms culture why dont you get to know/ask someone who WORKS there rather than engage in this rediculous speculation, or spend your time focusing on getting a good GPA and preparing for campus recruiting

otherwise, who cares? not like you can do anything about it...

+1

 

"That said, GS has one of the largest HYP representations I've seen."

There is not a single Yale 2010 grad working in GS IBD according to LinkedIn. I count 3 Harvard 2010ers. I count 2 Princeton 2010ers (I know for a fact is understated). Of course these are just samples, and there are more HYP kids at GS who didn't post it on their LinkedIn, but so too is that the case for other firms.

Point remains: this is low for GS when compared to other firms. And this is HYP!

 

I know a few yale 2010's at GS ibd this year. stop using linkedin to form generalizations and reporting your results as if there's any certainty. and get a life too, none of this has any influence on you. everything important matters at the level of the individual.

there are effing morehouse kids with 3.5s sitting next to hyp kids with a 3.8 in econ. it all comes down to the person.

 

My personal experience is that in none of my Goldman Sachs interviews did I get a question about my time at college, in any way, shape, or form. Everything could get filed under three or four categories. Markets/economic trends, personal character under pressure, and why I thought I was the best candidate in the applicant pool. I did not mention my school, nor did they, and they never really cared that I go to a state school outside of the USN top 100 (far outside I may add). I got the interview through cold emailing, no OCR, and from there I made sure to impress the right people. Just like any place else. This was for S&T, can't speak for IBD as I was never interested in that career path.

 

Can't comment on IBD, but I've looked through the Goldman class of 2010 S&T face book and Harvard, Princeton, and Wharton makeup a huge percentage of the class. My memory could be incorrect, but I'd guess, that year S&T was about 2/3 target schools, if not more. I would be shocked if IBD was that much different.

Hi, Eric Stratton, rush chairman, damn glad to meet you.
 

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