There are 3 regrets I've had in job searching. What are yours?
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My 3rd internship at BlackRock, I was putting bologna on my plate with Ralph Schlosstein (Ex-COO of BlackRock, now CEO of Evercore) next to me. "Hungry are we?" Me: "Yeah what's a poor college kid to do?" I walk away not saying anything else to him.
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At Bloomberg B-Discovered Day, Dan Doctoroff the CEO gives a speech on taking risks and even tells us where his office is. I wanted to send a thank you or some sort of letter. I thought about emailing Mike Bloomberg after reading his book. "5 minutes of your time, it won't even cost you a dime." Never did. I prepared 4 weeks for BB. After a final round, rejected with a generic email.
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In 2008, Not asking my VP for a junior internship. Entire team gets laid off Feb 09. Called her to catch up and make sure things were okay, was told "if only you had asked [for an internship.]."
I believe in "80% of life is showing up" and "what's the worst that can happen if you ask?"
Make sure you don't ever have regrets. Go to that info session, call that rich uncle, follow up with that MD who liked you. Take the initiative and have CONFIDENCE.
why did you have 3 internships at blackrock?
Asked back: Summer, Winter-Spring, Summer
If you just play the numbers game, you are going to get a position which is an approximate match for your education and experience.
"what's the worst that can happen if you ask?"
totally agree, you take enough risks and sooner or later one will pay off
Well you could piss somebody off, you're conversation could get posted on the internet, everybody will laugh at you, and you'll be forced to delete all your social accounts while you're black balled from the industry.
What? You asked.....
No crazy "I am always awake for Citi" stunts though. Just asking for info interviews, meetups, coffee, etc.
Thanks for posting this. Never hurts to reach out to someone.
Love the first tag.
you realize she got the interview with Citi and some other banks called her because of that presentation, right?
Haha, really? Well....now I'm not so sympathetic.
I chatted with her on LinkedIn and gave her some PR/damage control advice. She just wants it all to go away. I'm pretty sure she doesn't like be on the Huffington Post.
Kudos to her, though, for making it a meme.
http://dealbreaker.com/tag/always-awake-with-citi/
Read the article, it's short. IBs are always pitching themselves to clients, it would make sense they would prefer someone who can pitch themselves to them.
I was a summer intern in 2004 at a bank in chicago and CEO talked to all the summers over lunch. As he finished up he said to email him if we had any questions.. That afternoon I emailed him and asked if he would like to have breakfast as I would like to learn more about how he spent the early years of his career. 3 weeks later he called me and asked if I was free for breakfast next day. Turns out in 6 years I was first person to email him. I ended up accepting the job and two years later resigned. He was first person I emailed and he said to stay in touch. We have overr the years and he is one of my best resources.
^ silver banana right there.
VENUSAUR LIKES BANANA
...AND CRAP
At Goldman IBD recently I accidentally mentioned to the recruiter that I had already accepted an offer at another top BB.
As soon as interviews were over I got a call saying that they do not put out offers to people who have already formally accepted a position.... FML
Shake it off. The beauty of this forum is, we can learn from each others mistakes. I asked a Colonel in the military once, "How do you know if your making the right decisions?", he replied "From past experience and mistakes."
Thanks for your kind advice, much appreciated buddy
Last night, I'm leaving the office around 8ish with my wife (she had come in to visit me). One of the co-heads of my group gets into the elevator with us. He smiles at me and I'm sitting there like "shit, I should say something." So I say "John, this is my wife ____ ." And he launches into this huge conversation with her about where she's going to school, how his wife went to the same place, sits on the board of trustees, etc. etc. Will anything come out of it? Who knows. But to the OP's point, you miss all the shots you don't take.
Great post wolfy, I think the advice can and should be applied to all areas of life. Whether it's networking with a CEO or asking out that special someone, you don't want to miss that moment, because you never know what's gonna happen!
I play on a softball team with a bunch of 40something guys who work at Morgan Stanley/Goldman/S&P/BoA, etc. I'm still in graduate school, (and a non target at that) and the first summer I played with them I felt awkward asking them for help with my job search. The next year when they found out I was looking for a job within finance they all offered to help. I had three VPs and two EDs sending emails to HR and group heads for me. It lead to three phones interviews, one recent in person interview, and my contact at Goldman is bringing me for a day to sit with a trader and see what a day in the life is like there.
You never know what can happen.
totally agree. ! SB for you.
I think this is true. I've found that success comes best when you just seize opportunities with no pre-conceptions or expectations. Taking various opportunities that were presented to me I managed to end up making good friends with people in top positions at mega hedgefunds and very senior people at BBs.
But to add to that - you still need to be balanced and not annoyingly persistent. One email is ok, and monty's story is extremely encouraging, but I've seen kids who thought they should be proactive but were complete tools. So as interns they'd stalk MDs who barely knew them and ask them to lunches, REPEATEDLY, in the most naive tool fashion. Please don't be those people.
This pep talk has sparked me up.
Im going to throw that hail mary at this girl who Im into but comes from a very different culture, so was upset about minor things, that are very different in our society!!
I agree completely with this. I'm non-target canadian school with low grades but CFA, and learned everything I could outside, and reached out to a number of companies and followed up and I'm working at a boutique. Which isn't anything special, but I didn't expect to get into any top banks, so it's success for me and a stepping stone. But reaching out has been my game and it works well. I've met with CEOs, and MDs and developed relationships. Never know if theyll pay out but everytime i sit down for lunch with them I learn something new, or become more motivated, and when the market picks up I might have a shot with more experience. Best thing I did was open myself up and try meeting as many people as I could. In terms of being persistent,, do it in the right way. Send an email, and follow up once. I met an MD and he had to bail on me a couple times last minute (once i got the restaurant and the hostess said the reservation was cancelled - legitimate reasons and he apologized sincerely both times and said he would make it up to me), i stuck with it, and he gave me 2 hours of his time over lunch because i was so persistent and told me hed hire me on the spot if they weren't laying off and would call me when the opportunity comes up.
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