When I'm interviewing candidates, I like to see that they have lived or worked in different countries, even if it's just studying overseas for a semester or doing a volunteer job in another country.
I similarly like to see someone whose background indicates they straddle two cultures eg someone who speaks native Spanish at home but has an Anglo-American education.
Why? Because this sort of experience indicates they have experienced more than one culture. That typically means that they have a much stronger appreciation that the "usual" way of doing things is often different from culture to culture.
In an investment banking context, this has several advantages:
- More able to realise that "this is the way it's done" for any activity is not the only way it can be done and may not be the best/most efficient method
- More culturally sensitive to differences, less likely to offend/look like an uncosmopolitan person in front of clients or colleagues
- More flexible, open minded and able to deal with new situations, new experiences and cope with "fish out of water" experiences
- When looking at an industry or product, more likely to appreciate that the way a product is typically marketed, regulated by government and consumed in one market doesn't apply to all markets
- Related to the last point, a greater appreciation of how an industry or regulation can change and the opportunities and risks that presents to a company's business model
The two last points are particularly important and, in my view, the key points to make when selling yourself in an interview based on your overseas experience. Once you've learned how two cultures/markets do an everyday thing differently, you can identify opportunities/threats better in either of them. Often, people who have only ever lived in one culture/market are so used to the "ordinary" way things are done, they can't think outside of their experience and so can't identify these opportunities and threats.
So, if you're in an interview and you've got some overseas experience on your resume or your background straddles more than one culture, this is how I would market it. Be sure to have 1 - 2 examples handy.
I actually understand your point, however, I don't think many people see it that way.
Many may not, but if you're in an interview and it's the most interesting or saleable thing on your resume, you've got a perfect chance to sell the experience in the right way. An interviewer may not think it has value at first glance, but you can discuss its value as it relates to investment banking, with examples which specifically demonstrate the sort of business analysis risks that an interviewer wants his/her recruits to have.
Thank you for your insight.
I asked you in another thread about talking about significant experience gained after having led a fnance club in an interview, and you said that you would discount it because there would be no way to verify it. In a similar vein, how would you tell whether someone was lying about international experience?
I agree with your points about individuals with multi-cultural backgrounds but getting wasted in a foreign country for a semester doesn't make one a better candidate.
As someone with a multicultural background and experiences in three different countries, I can attest that this definitely works with some people. I marketed my experiences using some of the points above. It just depends from bank to bank. The way I used it is I would look at the list of people interviewing me, do some preliminary LinkedIn research on their profiles and based on their exposure to international experiences, I would emphasize my background more. If not, I'd briefly mention it and then move on to my other strong points. Great post!
Having lived abroad for a few years and traveled extensively both for work and pleasure I agree with you but I don't hold it against an American candidate, especially when they're just out of school, if they haven't simply because they may not have had the chance. If your parents are typical Americans who may not even have a passport or you didn't have the money in college to study abroad, or your program didn't allow it (I seem to remember engineers at my school not having the option unless they wanted to stay an entire extra year) there's not much you can do about it.
I agree that it definitely gives a much more open minded approach to life in general and business specifically when you get to see how things work in another country, and it can be better or worse in that other country, but you get to compare it to how things are done in the US and you can think of a way to improve it, or you get to see why things work better in the US for example.
I'd be interested to get your take on China in the same vein. I believe you wrote that you spent a long time living there working in PE. I've done business there a few times but never lived there or spent more than 2 or 3 weeks at a time so I have a pretty basic understanding of the people and how things work but you obviously have a much greater understanding of the culture and people. I've almost always come away from my business dealings in China with the attitude that this is how it's done here (which I accept, I'm in their country), in a very specific way, and that's how it's supposed to be done the world over, it all revolves around such government influence or outright control of so much of the private sector, the media is very tightly controlled and until pretty recently travel was restricted for a couple of generations so no one saw the outside world, nor did they even have the stories like at least I did from my grandfather's generation who were in WWII and told stories of Europe and Japan. As China has started to do business outside of China and invest globally, I'm interested how they'll adapt to doing business in other countries, especially the US and Western Europe, because they are almost the complete opposite of what you described in your original post: they've been institutionally isolated since basically WWII.
I know they can throw their weight around in a place like Angola to wrap up natural resources, but when they try to buy a business or property in the US, for example, they won't be able to do that. As an example, we were raising a fund and were put in touch with the stereotypically crazy Chinese billionaire (and anyone who's done business in China has met the crazy billionaire) and after having to smoke really bad cigarettes and drink more tea and maotai than your body should ever be subjected to over multiple trips and meetings with him and his group he wanted to invest with us but he just couldn't wrap his mind around a fund concept: it was simply foreign to him. So we tried another track of him co-investing on a deal by deal basis, which he understood in concept but the conversation somehow turned to him giving us $100MM and agreeing to pay him 2x in something like 3 or 4 years (I forget the specifics because we didn't do it but it was something like this) because that's what he would do in China. He couldn't really wrap his mind around equity risk or debt because it's basically a foreign concept to the PRC and only in the last decade or two have they existed on the mainland. Even our guys in HK just shook their heads at those in the PRC. I have multiple examples of this where they just couldn't get the ways of western business. Maybe I'm reaching an incorrect conclusion though.
In the same general theme as your post, what are your thoughts on the Chinese doing business abroad after being sheltered for so many decades and not simply sheltered, but in a communist, command economy.
How does teaching English in a 'stan for several months rate on this scale, in your view?
Out of curiosity, which 'stan did you teach in?
I taught in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.
Thanks. I guess I can market having lived in 3 countries to date.
I always just felt that study abroad experiences and travels made the candidate more interesting. Who wants to spend the 5 minutes chit chatting about alternative betas when you could be talking about an awesome experience you had in a foreign land.
Never really tried to sell it beyond that.
as an american currently interning in switzerland i appreciate your opinions on how to market this experience.
@danin650 - I'd be interested, but I think with many interviewers you wouldn't want to get into this too much because you could derail the discussion into 5 minutes of "why the 'stans?". While I (or others) may be interested and fascinated, ultimately any offshore experience - exotic or not - would be a pretty weak centrepiece of your self-selling story.
My advice is that you can sell this as value-adding, but ultimately don't want to spend a long time on this.
Thanks for the advice. I was thinking it might be a good thing along the lines of putting myself into unfamiliar situations and having the ability to work in a diverse environment. I'm sure that's something that the banks like hearing and that won't devolve into a discussion of trivia like the different languages/ethnic groups/ethnic tensions/etc.
@Dingdong08 - good questions, difficult to respond to without launching into a long essay with ranty bits. A much better conversation to have over drinks, where after 5 minutes you can pretend you need to go to the bathroom to escape my waxing economical, philosophical, sociological and historical.
Are you coming to WSO drinks tonight?
there's wso drinks tonight? didnt see anything promoted unless it's something between you guys. the thing we promoted is before the conference, june 27th fyi
@"SSits", unfortunately I don't live in NYC but I'll be up there for one of the events eventually. I seem to be up there every couple of weeks anyway.
And after a couple of drinks I typically start waxing philosophical to the degree that only the drunkest of the drunk are still there when I wrap things up in the early hours of the morning.
I have a friend in Fairfield County, we always get together when I'm up that way, and I'm coming to Stamford this fall, would be curious to see how you wax philosophical.
@"SSits" I appreciate what you have to say, but as someone who's only travelled, never lived, I'd appreciate your advice to the many monkeys out there, who as @"Dingdong08" suggested, may have not had the First Bank of Mom & Dad stroking a check for an international experience. I've only taken surf trips and 1 family vacation, so I don't have the experience of one of my friends (2 years in China, 2 years in Europe, fluent in 3 languages, conversational in another 2), but I have to think there's a way to make up for that, am I wrong?
this isn't for me, this is just something that was on my mind when I was 20: saw tons of kids far better off financially than I was, going on summer trips to western Europe taking 2 economics classes but more often than not just partying and having a great time getting "cultured" while I'm stateside working like a dog.
Ah, my mistake. Thanks @AndyLoius
I agree, however, given the volume of applications and candidates it doesn't really make an important difference during the screening process, at least here in Europe. I've lived in six different countries (growing up, studying, working) and didn't really see any benefit on my job research for IB/AM. On a personal level however, absolutely; growing up and studying and working in different countries has definitively helped me become a more open minded, better rounded person than I would have been had I grown up in one place.
Really liked this and also found it to be quite true. Growing up on the border (where I went to school) and having to go back and forth constantly to visit my dad was always brought up in interviews.
I think cultural experience can be a strength if you can utilize it in a tangible way. It is not, however, necessarily a valuble experience per se. Also, where I come from "mixed cultural background" stands out more as a trendy buzzword and a political stand than something that makes a tangible difference. Not saying that it need to be though.
I hail from the States but have lived all around the world. Travel certainly makes one more interesting and intellectually versatile. On a more practical, pragmatic, "what can you do for me" note, here is what I would say if I was trying to market myself to a discerning employer:
1) Multicultural: Because I've spent time living abroad in a foreign setting, I am more acquainted with non-American cultures, and am therefore more approachable and empathetic to foreigners in the United States. This means more doors open. If I speak another language, that means even more doors are open. This means I might know someone from China willing to pay all-cash for an apartment in Manhattan, or someone willing to drop money for a EB-5. I am more likely to know these people because I have spent time in uncomfortable foreign settings, and people that are doing the same thing here (cultural acclimation) will confide in me more because I know what they're going through.
2) Globalized: Because I've spent time living abroad, and have had the luxury and privilege of moving around geographically, I have a better sense of what's happening around the world. If know of workers at Foxconn jumping off ledges, I recognize its importance immediately because I know that iPhones have been selling like crazy back in the States. Why? Because I've been to both places. Some guy in the United States (or China) that can't point to countries on a map may not as easily make this inference. By having lived outside the States, I have intellectually emancipated myself from the groupthink that happens when I am one of a crowd. More specifically, this means that I realize that there's more to life than work, because I have been exposed to people who weren't raised in a culture defined by a Protestant work ethic. I will realize that nationalism is nothing but a social construct, and that great minds across the world think alike.
3) Passionate: At the end of the day, I have the balls to pursue what I actually enjoy doing. Unlike most of my peers, who are simply following the Joneses, I have taken the path less traveled. I have done so not so much for external validation, but because I inherently enjoy doing it. There is something that defines me other than just being another (likely lagging) participant in the rat race, and I have a track record of doing things that fall outside the purview of my professional responsibilities. For this reason, you can expect me to stick through the hard times of whatever I devote myself to... because it'll be something I believe in.
So hire me.
Omnis voluptatem atque sit pariatur. Est consequuntur voluptatem ratione quibusdam voluptas. Ducimus earum ea ullam iure cum maxime. Ullam consequatur temporibus maiores similique. Porro porro ipsum doloribus explicabo occaecati sit voluptate.
Minima quasi ea libero qui voluptatem sint. Voluptas tempora molestiae et omnis. Voluptas minima saepe iure iste doloribus pariatur. Expedita illum tempore et soluta error eos. Temporibus dolorem ab qui dolores et reprehenderit. Dolores debitis ducimus repellat minus consequuntur voluptate.
Magnam iusto distinctio alias natus dolore neque. Porro quasi excepturi ex necessitatibus id ut corrupti.
Consequatur eos nostrum fuga reprehenderit. Omnis autem et modi necessitatibus. In ea dolorem aperiam magni atque ut sequi ipsum.
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...
Eius quam aliquid nam possimus ut quis error. Minima ex nisi quas. In debitis consequatur laborum magni eos.
Voluptatum animi dolorem amet dolores. Alias consequatur dolore sed reprehenderit velit enim voluptatem soluta. Neque sequi rerum ut quis ratione.
Quod ut velit molestiae omnis beatae est. Dolores repudiandae cum dolorum. Nam iusto maxime ipsa iusto. Debitis maxime est accusamus et aut qui in beatae. Pariatur est quam voluptates eos aut. Eos quaerat voluptatem ut culpa accusantium nisi.