100+ hours a week

People def put it 100+ weeks, but that's not usually the norm. Don't expect to average under 90 at a legit place though.

50 hr weeks become 100 hr weeks when your VP makes it a habit to put work on your desk at 5pm instead of in the morning. consider it a part of the learning process.

that's the reality, not rumor. no banks will tell you they work analysts 100+ hours a week because they're trying to recruit. if you do your research and talk to any analyst at a top bank you would know that 100+ a week isn't even close to unheard of.

as a summer analyst i worked at least two weeks with 100+ hours. 80 hours/week is not a lot for an analyst and was a break. it would mean we had the weekends mostly off, but as an intern i worked every single day including fourth of july for 10 weeks. not exaggerating.

nonetheless, the days go by fast and you end up learning a ton, so don't let the hours hold you back.

Not sure if it's the hours that will hold him back.

I thought the same way when I was interning, and I never worked anything close to even 50 hours prior to interning. But once you get into the groove of things, you just don't think in terms of how many hours a week you're working. It becomes more of a 8am-12am (on average) thing. Sometimes I got lucky and got out before 11pm. Some days deals went live and it was 3am when I left just to find myself back in the office at 7am.

But if you really wanna think about it in terms of hours per week...

Think about it this way, 8am-12am would be like 80 hours M-F, still getting 6 hours of sleep. Then Sat and Sunday 6hours~ ish 12pm - 6pm at the office for a total of 92 hours.

This was my impression of the normal work week. If deals were on hold, I would clock much less, but when shit went live at the same time, 100+ was expected.

Anyways, you shouldn't need to worry about it, time passes by super quick anyways when you have like memos/comps/PP slides due the next day. Super. Quick.

Agree with the above though I must say things seem to have quieted down significantly with the markets being in their current state....

Also realize you aren't actually "working" 100 hours per week. IB is one of the least efficient industries when it come to using employees time. You often have little to do in the morning, then crap rolls downhill until it finally hits the analysts at 4pm.

I would fucking KILL for 80 hr wks... no work Friday and Saturday night, with free Sunday mornings... fucking bliss

My roommate did a 130hr week as an intern. Sunday was his quietest day and he worked 9am-1am. The thing is that not all weeks are like that, but every now and then it gets pretty brutal. The regular week is probably more in the 90hr mark in a BB. And of course they don´t tell you about it while recruiting, they want people to think exactly what you are thinking now. And like said above, 130hr means 130 hours in the office, not working.

Mine have been more varied. I have had 50 hr weeks and ones where I get 3 hours sleep the entire week/dont leave the office a few nights.

In this environment, expect to spend ALOT of time pitching.

LOL you think we're exaggerating? 100 hour weeks are COMMON in some groups. If you're an analyst and you're working only 80 hours a week, you got a great lifestyle group.

I've heard of 120-140 hour work weeks too. The 140 hour work week (average 4 hours away from office per day, multiple all nighters) was not by force, but by pure drive to be the best. Some people are willing to push the physical limits of their bodies to be the best they can.

Wasn't there a memo from some senior guy at DLJ back in the day that detailed an analyst's week and said that all of their analysts were expected to work 115 every week? Anyone else remember this or have a link to it?

http://sites.google.com/site/ubslatoobusy/

I think it was more like 90 was the norm as per the DLJ memo.

Weeks ranging from 80-130 hours, middle 50% 100-110. Needless to say, I jumped that ship

One of the guys I know who interned at a BB this summer had a 126 hour workweek.

Although I can't speak from explicit experience I've know analysts who routinely work over 100 and up to 120/wk.

100 hours is very real. Most of my weeks as an Analyst were 85-90, but there were plenty of weeks in the 100+ hour zone.

What I love is that prospective bankers throw around that "80-100 hour weeks" term like there's no difference between 80 or 100 hours. In reality, it's exponentially different.

80 hours in a week could be 9am-1am for 5 days and a free weekend, but when you start talking 100 hours you're averaging 9am-1am during the week and then wiping out your entire weekend...just in time to start all over on Monday.

120 Hours per week would make anyone go insane IMO. I think anywhere over 80 is pushing it, and certainly anything over 100 is just asinine. Don't these people understand work efficiency? I know I can't do the same work for more than about 3 hours without a good break. Not to mention the necessity of weekends / a few days off to recharge.

I have no idea how or why you guys do this lol

It sucks, you'll hate pretty much every moment of your life as an analyst. 100 hour weeks are common and you can expect more than 50% of your weeks to cross this threshold. However, once you finish up your 2-3 years and start your next job, you'll be so ridiculously glad that you did it.

Not all of the time, but some of the time people stay until 1am or 2 am because they are waiting for a turn that never comes.........they could have been gone by 10:30 or 11.

I agree with OP I think many of you are full of shit when you say you do 100+ hour work weeks.

Bankers invented the 100+ hour work week to scare others away.

I'm surprised you have yet to encounter it in your info. interviews. I too was skeptical but had a roommate past summer doing IB at a 2nd tier BB and basically his "normal" hours were: 9am-2am M-F 12pm-10pm 12pm-10pm

Quite frequently it was even longer, at one week M-F he went to work 9am-5am. Yeah.... no joke

I would agree to work 100 hours a week only if I get paid hourly and with no price discrimination.

The problem is not the hours but the lack of sleep, drinking 3-4 coffees to keep alert, forgetting anything and everything, but work and doing it over and over again...that's what suckss.

if you want more comfortable hours, get your ass in S&T. IBD have no regard for analysts in the office because you are a cost center and not a revenue generator. All the MDs and VPs have been through that and guess what?? None of them gives a shit about an analyst wanting to jump off the building from not having a personal life and devoting all of their time to work.

times are tough, they are doing more with less people. shit, even in S&T a lot of the guys are putting in longer hours than before because we have to prospect harder for clients and if you want to bring in fresh biz, you better have a pitch ready for whatever the fuck they need that you can provide.

How have you not gone weeks with all nighters, 3-5 hour sleep days, etc. during college days....Are you always sleeping in on sundays, lol. I know plenty of people who are sleeping 3-5 hours every day, all nighters before tests/papers, don't sleep in very often on weekends, and stay alive with coffee. If you really need it, just down a few energy drinks. YOu'd be surprised of what you're body's capable of

I've been told that the 100+ hour work weeks don't feel that bad when you're constantly working, from the people I know who worked at BBs this past summer.

I know of a guy who worked 120 hours per week for months. He literally melted his brain and is now worthless.

You didn't believe it at first? Hahaha.

I've pulled several 100s, four 115s, and countless 80s and 90s. We whore ourselves out for the $.

my longest stretch was 56 hours straight from a sunday morning. it was dealio time. not for me anymore. i am too old.

I read once that hourly pay doing i-banking right out of school pay on average 15-23/hr...i made more than that at my summer internship sophomore year.

So how much do hours drop off as an associate? Or are they still low enough to be there 90+ hours with you?

140 hours means you're literally living in the office...

I'm sorry dude that's on you or the staffer for failing to speak up and delegate. You should never have to work more than a handful of 120+ hour weeks in your entire analyst stint

From my friends in the industry it definitely seems to be true. In addition to the money I'm sure it's also relatively entertaining to be able to brag about 100 hrs. a week - sounds kind of like a mental marathon.

Can we stop with this horse shit? 90hr+ weeks? Yes.

90 hrs of work per week? No. The IB will be lucky to get 55 hours of actual work from an analyst out of a 90+ week.

I don't understand why people complain. The first few eyars of college I worked in a warehouse during my summers. 50 hours per week and I was actually working 45+ of those hours.

I can see it being hard on folks with kids but for single people it shouldn't be a big deal. Will your social life suffer? Depends what social life you had prior to it.

It's an antiquated system if you ask me. The problem also stems from the fact that many Associates, VP's, and SVP's are not good managers of people. They may be good at banking but they can't manage people for shit ad at the lower levels it's as much about managing people as banking.

doesn't even seem like that much money. $110k? for 120 hour weeks? How quickly does that ramp up? You'd have to be tossing numbers at me like $500k+ in 4-5 years for me to even think about working that much to get there. Even then I'd probably say no. After a few years of consulting, you can go get a F500 Director gig and push close to $200k for 40 hours a week. That seems like a far better ratio of effort to $$.

At the MM I was at this summer 60 to 80in the office was the norm, but I brought work home.

After reading all this I calculated how many hours I spent in the office last week - 100 hours from Sun to Fri. Monday to Thursday 16 hours each, Friday 12 hours, and 9 hours and 15 hours last Sat and Sun.

I work in the S&T, almost half a year into this role as a new graduate. As one poster above pointed out, things are definitely getting more brutal for the traditionally "chilled out" dudes in the markets.

I guess my question is - once you are above the certain limit, is there any relation between the hours and "how good you are at your job"? I feel like, ok for me 80% of the time those long hours are unavoiable since I need to cover other markets or put together some analyst shit. But for the remaining 20%, I'm in the office for the betterment of my boss and whatever the project/ trades I'm working at the moment. If I subtract that 20% I think I may well end up working around 90-95 hours a week (but definitely above 90 hours), getting some sleep, etc.

And there is a real difference between 90, 80 hours and 100 hours, from my experience (i.e. I have less suicidal thoughts during the weekday when I put up 90 hours)

100+ IS A rumour?

more like 0.3 std deviations from the average lol

Consultant Life > IB Life... im just saying i will do better Drake voice

dude, doing it right now it fucking blows balls with a goddamn shotgun. 9am - 3am / 4am (2nd yr analysts come in around 10am) and then most weekends are just like a normal workday (~12pm till 1 or 2am). the earliest i've left was at 11pm one night because i had to stay 3 days in a row for a pagent. i'm at the worst shape in my life, can't even hit on this hot broad that sorta digs me cuz i'd rather let excel mind fuck me, and not to mention the verbal abuse you get on a daily basis.

but there're at least 200 kids out there who would sell their organs and wipe out the MD's ex-wife who he pays half his comp to as allimony. as much as i like to bitch about my job i don't regret it a single bit and you better fucking know i'm gonna pull through this shit for 2 more years

I think what people on this forum are describing is a type of fireman's job where they stay at the office for long periods of time with nothing to do. There is no way any human that works in a high level intellectual capacity can work for more than ten or twelve hours a day for very extended period of time. What does happen is that people live too far away from the office to go home when a deal is going down and decide to sleep at their desks. Not a high quality of life, but doable.

It is exteremly difficult to calculate the actual number of hours an analyst will actually work. Emphasis on the word work. As has been stated above the idustry is highly ineffectient at delegating work load and managing time wisely. Not to say that people who work in IB can't mangage this shit because they easily can. It boils down to two things really that lead to the high amount of office time. One, its tradition, your boss did it, his boss did it ect ect. Two the odd nature of the business itself. You have to be there when your client needs you, not when the work needs you. That is the main factor of why the days are always on and off as far as work load goes. You might have 100 hours of office time in a week but in reality that might mean 70 to 75 hours of actual deal work. The rest is spent doing bs, doing nothing, getting yelled at by your bosses for no reason, helping other people, sleeping under your desk, lying that you have to much work to do and therefore your boss needs to find someone else, ect ect.

Not sure what you mean by "real PE", but the direct investing world is full of folks from the middle market banks. Dare I even say that the middle market banks have a growing presence in PE as their bulge bracket counterparts have struggled through the recession. Im sure you may have different impressions, but Im looking at things on a very large scale (ie all of the usa, not just NYC, and all direct investing, not just the multi billion dollar funds).

it's not as grueling as you think. most of the time you're just sitting there doing squat. it sounds horrible due to the number of hours away from your own bed but it's not like you're running up a mountain 20hrs a day

My post was in response to some people questioning the exit ops and saying things to the effect of "there aren't a lot of PE exit ops out there" or "PE isn't guaranteed after investment banking", which are both patently false. The maturation of megafund PE and large MM firms = guaranteed PE gigs for BB analysts.

By "real PE" I mean "real PE exit ops"... aka you are getting interviews with megafunds at least, and at worst you settle for a multi-billion $ fund. The exit ops are definitely worth it coming from a BB or elite boutique ("real PE exit ops", strong brand name, large network)--that was my point. Nothing against the 10-person middle market boutiques, but there's definitely exit op parity and no catchall answer for "IS INVESTMENT BANKING WORTH IT?"

Of course they're making $. If we're talking in pure money terms then most McDonald's and Wendy's franchisees are making tons more in FCF than bankers and PE guys

My point is that if you're expecting to work 100 hrs in investment banking, the question of "is this worth it?" is almost completely firm dependent... would I still be willing to sell my soul in banking if Piper Jaffray was my only offer? I wouldn't be so sure, given that the expected payoff is definitely much less...