I'm afraid I can't handle banking hours

Awwwwww ze leetle man doesnt zink he can handle ze hours? Maybe you should go and verk in marketing, ja? Zen you can verk ze normal hours and sleep like baby every night, except I zink even baby only need 6 hours of the beddy byebye time

Typing this from my desk as we speak.

1. Shut the fuck up. Undergrad is a joke. 9 hours of sleep? Lol wait until you've acquired more than 3 chest hairs, kid. The real world doesn't allow for fucking nap time.

2. No, your body does not adjust. It will never adjust. Even when you have the opportunity to "catch up" on sleep on the weekends, your body will automatically startle itself awake at fucking 8am on a Saturday morning. Somehow manage to catch a solid 8 hours? Doesn't matter. You will forever be tired. Exhausted. Broken. Your soul will be shattered and you will be perpetually shrouded in a thick cloud of mental fog. You will not know what it feels like to be "recharged"--you are un-rechargeable.

3. Yes, I have concerns about this. Does it matter? No. The world cares not for your fucking concerns. You know what the world cares about? Seemingly impossible internal deadlines. Not bedtime. Deadline.

4. Yes, you will feel your body start to shutdown. The body is a remarkable thing, though, especially when it's adapted to running off of anxiety and amphetamines for fuel.

Don't think you can hack it? Go do recruiting for advertising or some shit, weakling.

You'll give up a lot more than sleep when compensation is on the line. You become driven by the deal

Many folks will be unsympathetic to your situation, especially given that most of us have lived through or are currently living through it

It's definitely a legitimate concern, and one to think about when attempting to move into the industry. Note that in all likelihood, you will be working very very hard regardless of which firm you eventually decide to join. During my first year, i don't suspect I fell below 70 hours, and 75-85 was the typical band. (if folks can provide more clarity on this to confirm, that would be fantastic.)

To your question of whether it gets better or if the hours go by: when you are driven by a deal, the last thing on your mind is sleep. adrenaline keeps you awake and you manage to blow through whatever you need to get through. overall, i would suggest that you go through the proper due diligence and really consider whether or not you really want to do banking. It's an unapologetic industry where you are expected to work hard and under quite fickle and unpredictable circumstances (as is the case with all client driven businesses.)

Dig deep and think to what drives you. if you wish to do this because you enjoy working in this field, and the nature of the work, you will be fine. If it's more the money without an underlying foundational base, you will collapse under the workload, pressure, duress, stress, and infinitesimal periods of sleep. I've seen people sleep under their desks for a few hours, cry openly after two nights of not sleeping, and a guy who used a public restroom and a few baby wipes to shower.

I sincerely implore you to consider your options. There are so many ways to build capital and make a respectable (not ridiculous) comp, within finance and elsewhere. Zuckerberg, Gates, Musk, and page & brin all worked countless hours to produce their product. it wouldn't surprise me if they matched or exceeded banking hours while their offerings were in development, but i'm sure they enjoyed every minute of it.

do what you love. love what you do. keep these two in mind, and you will go far :). all the best

To put it in simple terms. Do some soul searching and make sure this is something you want to do, because it is what excites you. Trust me, if that is the case, you will be amazed at how you acclimate to the hours. It is tough and it wears on you (trust me, after several years and age it only gets harder). From your post, it sounds like you are paralyzing yourself with fear. If you maintain that mindset you won't be able to cope. If you say "Screw it, this is what I want and I'm going to do it" I'm sure you'll be fine.

Harden the fuck up.

But on a lighter note...people have done it before, and are doing it now, and there is no reason why you cannot either.

You'll work, eat, sleep and when you aren't too exhausted.. You'll go out with friends at 2am and blow some of that cash. Working those hours makes the days long and weeks short, hopefully that makes sense. The offer isn't signed in blood, so if you really can't handle it... Try to move somewhere else after putting in a year.

Think you mean 12am btw. I think the body does adjust. I remember doing an internship where I was working 90 hours, and it was rough for the first couple of weeks. After that, it became normal. Still tiring but not terrible. Also, lots of caffeine helps

Honestly I didn't find it to be that bad, but I was also only an SA. I averaged probably 9:30-1:30 or so, with the occasional 4-6am, and never left before 12. Past 2-3 starts killing you a bit the next day but other than that I usually managed to get around 5-6 hours of sleep. Some weekend work on at least one day usually, maybe noon-9pm. I think the collegial atmosphere made it easier to deal with. Yeah we worked pretty long hours but we also laughed a lot and I got along well with my team. It's a bit like a continuation of school.

thought I would have trouble with the hours as I love my sleep as well.

but once you're in there you'll get used to it gradually... and people are damn important. having a great bunch of analyst friends helps you get by those looong nights

Hey Guys,

Thanks for the response. There are some very good answers here.

I knew I was going to get some tough love from some people, but there are a few things I wanted to clarify. I’ve done my due diligence and I know exactly what the hours are like. I am a very driven person who genuinely is interested in working on deals and closing them. I’m not some clueless kid that is going to take an offer and drop off because I want a better lifestyle or to sleep more as the OCR Gatekeeper seems to think.

That being said, I was mostly preoccupied with if my body would be able to take it. I was wondering if some people are just not wired to sustain sleep deprivation for long periods of time. (i.e. like those kids who dropped dead). Also, it’s the fact that if I don’t get an offer this semester I will have to extend the recruiting grind for another year to get an offer and I want to make sure it’s something that I will be able to handle if I am to spend the next 1-2 years of my life working towards it.

Cheers,

You definitely get used to it. That being said, on Saturday I usually just lie around in bed all day. And I am totally fine with that.

Apologies if this is a stupid recommendation, but OP did say he "never actually worked past 12pm on anything.. literally ever".

If that's what you're worried about, why don't you just try staying up late a couple of nights and see how it goes? Obviously not the same as doing it over a long period, but I feel like you are stressing yourself out because you've never seen your clock read midnight.

I used to stay up late as a kid doing stupid shit like playing video games so I was accustomed to the physical strain. The only real difference now is I stay up late but am doing something more useful.

Hm. I intend on transitioning into banking post-MBA. Will be interesting to work with individuals such as Krebs. To any prospective bankers reading this thread, I have spoken with ~30 thus far and the vast majority have been polite, respectful, and reasonable individuals. Perhaps this is just the public face and it is different in private - and I wouldn't be surprised if there is some degree of truth to that - but the whole overt machismo thing doesn't seem all that prevalent to me. Take my post with a grain of salt as I am not yet in the industry. However, I do certainly plan on treating my analysts with respect and helping to take some of the burden off of them when their hours become too difficult.

As a trader I read all of this, eat popcorn and laugh. Anybody got some silver bananas for me?

I think what Toronto guy says makes sense.

Also you can just skip to the buy side and avoid IB if you actually worked at PE for 2 summers. I didn't want to work 80 hr weeks either so I just didn't do IBD.

I suspect I genetically need more sleep than average, but in my experience, you do "adjust" in a way... Your body doesn't necessarily need less sleep, you just become a coffee connoisseur. In my first year, it became normal for me to pound 5 or 6 cups of joe each day.

The thing I am amazed at is you have never pulled an all nighter or worked past 12AM in undergrad. These were regular exercises for me and I graduated with a 3.86 GPA....

If you can't function on less than 8 hours of sleep, you are definitely in trouble. How often did you use caffeine in undergrad, if not frequent at all, caffeine will work wonders for you....

Caffeine pills, redbulls and 5hr energies were what I used for late night work sessions in undergrad. The effects of that were probably similar to watered down adderall although I never used that.

Those saying to just try staying up late and the "never worked past 12am" thing reminded me of this hilarious blast from the past: http://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/i-just-went-3-days-without-sleep-…

OP, agree with those who say to do it, work hard, and see how it goes. You may love it, you may crush it. You may hate it - just survive until your first bonus then bounce to something you like better. You'll still be happy you did it.

The longer I'm in finance, the more I realize how boring and pathetic 80-100 work weeks are. The money ain't worth it kid - get out while you can.

You should have taken that PE role bro (the one you mentioned in an earlier post). Even if you were to take the i-banking position you would have eventually burned out and moved on to the buyside anyways.

I am also suffering from last 2 years , I think it is best idea for give up some times .

Still no idea why so many of you yearn for ibd over Asset Management lol

Real talk, i wouldnt waste my life working 80 hours+/week consistently for any amount of time (and especially not in my 20's) unless I had a) pure passion for that work and b) had clear equity participation on the upside.

Mind boggling to me how many kids are willing to give up years of their life to be miserable for what is dont get me wrong, high comp, but its not amazing. Its not f*** you money by any means, and not nearly enough to make me throw away years of my life.

There are tons of roles out there that allow for a good balance between comp, upside potential and living life/not being miserable.

And if your argument is that there is always the upside of becoming the next BSD on wall street that is pulling in millions, think again. 99.9999% of the time to get to the pinnacle of any field requires a pure passion for the work. Why do you think Schwarzman and all these titans keep going? because deep down they do love this shit. All these top figure heads happen to have found their passion in finance. This applies to any field, find what you are willing to work 80 horus a week at iwthout being miserable, otherwise you will be 30 and miserable. You might have a fat bank account at this point but trust me if you are really honest with yourself you wouldhave happily had less money in the bank and more time for experiences.

I think you'd be surprised at how much you can tolerate. When I was in your shoes, I thought averaging 4hrs of sleep some weeks would wreck me, but if you actually enjoy finance and the people you work with, it's really not that bad. Plus, most groups won't be working you 100hrs consistently. In 2 years, I think I did 100hrs twice and never once stayed past 5am. Don't get me wrong, those are still absurd hours, but if it's a couple weeks a year you'll manage.

Also, believe it or not, you do have a degree of control over your schedule as an analyst. Don't be afraid to push back on some stuff if you get overwhelmed. You'll crash and burn otherwise.

This is why picking a good group is so important. Everyone is so concerned with the prestige of their group that they neglect how much group culture actually matters. When you interview with banks, always, always, always ask how associates and up interact with analysts. That alone will give you insight into group culture (just make sure to have you BS detector on high).