All right, monkeys. Welcome to recruiting season. I am your interviewer.
No, seriously. I really might be your interviewer. This upcoming week your very own Auntie Bankerella will be hitting up several universities in a couple of different cities. I’ll be giving presentations, speaking at a panel, holding dinners, and, inevitably, interviewing a couple dozen of you monkeys.
Why would I do this when I have real work to do? Is it because I want my firm to have first dibs on the new generation of top talent? Is it because I want to fill my firm with alumni of my school to consolidate our power base? Is it because I lost a bet with HR? Is it so I can see how many monkeys post here next week saying, “Help, this [x] at [x firm] gave me her business card at a networking event and said I could call; what should I say and what questions should I ask?”
Hell no. I recruit because I’m fucking tired.
Because it gives me a chance to work a little less and get a full night's sleep. Because I get to disconnect for a few hours on planes (I get my best thinking done that way). Because for once I can sit in a restaurant and enjoy a drink and a meal without worrying about fishbowl issues. Because, alone and anonymous in a different city, I can do things I wouldn’t ordinarily be able to do. Things that definitively have nothing to do with undergraduate or MBA recruiting.
And I’m sorry to tell you folks, but if you want to go to second rounds at my firm from these schools, you have to go through me one way or another. Sucks for you, but it is what it is.
Great. So how do you get past this 30-something raging douchebitch interviewer who needs another two hours to sleep off her champagne hangover and doesn’t want to listen to your carefully crafted spiel on why you are the perfect fit for her firm?
I’ll give you the serious answers to that next time. Today I’ll be discussing what to do if you really just want to get dinged quickly before you ever get a shot at an interview.
Here are the no-fail techniques:
1: The EIS hustle. You got there early to position yourself strategically: front row, end seat next to the aisle. You spend the last five minutes of the talk locked onto me like a missile, your notebook closed, your pen put away, your thighs tensed, ready to spring. When the talk ends, you leap up and elbow past fourteen people to make it to me before anyone else does. Your eyes are soulless, your shoes are polished, your hand’s extended, you’re charging, you’re ten feet from me, eight, seven, six....
I see you. I know you. I was you. You’re a douchebag.
I give you total props for trying this hard, and I may shrug off this behavior if you do everything else exactly right. After all, I have to talk to people after the session; it might as well be you. But don’t monopolize my time. Or I will ask you for your business card, write “ding” on the back of it, and stick it in the receipts pocket of my bag. (In other words, I WILL see the card again and remember to follow up with the entire recruiting team to make sure they know your status.)
2: “My question is, do you know how great I am?” The purpose of a question is to ask a question, or to show that you can open your mouth without embarrassing yourself and me. The purpose of a question is not simply to kiss my ass or show yourself off. Do not fall into the habit of “I have a question. [Insert long, completely self-serving, declarative statement here.] What do you think about that?”
What do I think about that? I think you’re a douchebag. What’s worse and less forgivable, I think you lack even the tiny modicum of social awareness you need to survive in my world.
3: The pre-interview interview. I don’t care how awesome you are, all you can get out of me before round one is a pass to round one. You’re not getting the offer today, no matter how hard you try. So don’t treat my time the way you would if we were in the interview room, with long-winded answers and endless additional questions.
If you get the interview, you get thirty minutes on my calendar to showboat all you want. If you don’t have the interview yet, every second you take from me has to come from somewhere else in my life.
So step right up to me, shake my hand, introduce yourself very briefly (less than five seconds), lob me a fast softball question, listen to my answer, maybe ask a very brief followup, take my card, and go. Don’t expect it to turn into an interview. And don’t send me a followup email asking when the next round is. You haven’t had the first round yet.
4: Awkward Turtle’s school of ass-kissing. You’re only 21. Your only internship so far has been in brokerage operations. The banker in front of you has the power to change your life. You only get one shot, one opportunity to seize everything you ever wanted. (Cue the music here.) You gonna let it slip? No. You’re going to get on your knees and kiss this banker’s ass longer and harder and better than any ass has ever been kissed. And until you figure out what kind of ass-kissing this person likes, you’re going with the pray-and-spray approach: you will grovel and hang on every word the person says.
Except this banker just wants to get through the session.
Even if they love ass-kissing, it is slightly embarrassing to be seen enjoying the ass-kissing of an undergrad. More importantly, that sweaty, enthusiastic, wide-eyed ass-kissing is too high-energy. It takes too much work to even receive it.
If you're going to do it, be smooth about it. Be calm, be relaxed, meet as equals. Then throw ‘em a little smooch, real slick and subtle and down-low, like a throwaway line. More believable. Feels good. Make it something that doesn’t require a response, because responding to ass-kissing is usually awkward. But don’t worry; they heard it. No one misses a compliment.
5: The good old girl network. As a smart, hardworking girl, you’re not asking for a free pass to the head of the line, just for a little helping hand. A good word in the right ear. Is that so wrong? After all, you’ve worked hard to get where you are, and you deserve it. After all, we girls have to stick together, right?
As if you’re worried I might not notice you’re female, you make veiled allusions to a cause, to “the female experience”. You ask for mentorship five minutes after meeting me. You talk about how inspiring it is to meet a successful female in the business.
Maybe you ask me what my husband does for a living, about my childcare arrangements or maternity leave. You definitely ask about my hours. Maybe you google me and then show up with all sorts of exaggerated reasons (your sorority, your undergrad, your family background) why you’re just like me.
But, as we say where I come from, that and fifty cents will get you a cup of coffee.
If you’re a woman, your goal in handling me should be to behave like everyone else and get the same chance everyone else gets. If you try to get special treatment out of me because we share a gender, I will ding you so hard in undergrad that you’ll still be dinged when you come out of b-school five years later.
You're so hard, haha.
*I'm
Bankerella, I would be mortified if you were my interviewer. Thank God I'm not on a campus.
Bankerella, Hit me up when you're in my City. We can go out, have a nice dinner, and do things that you wouldn't normally be able to do....
ah shit.
Truth right here
no offense but i seriously think you belong in a mental institution
"these nerds be crazy, you sure you want this?" - Marine in front of 60 Wall
True story
I second that.
Bankerella, I know this guy named Darnell, works at UPS, you guys would totally hit it off.
Do you know his gmat score ?
Can someone save me the read and see if number 5 is about some girl on girl action?
I have a question is a habit I picked up and the worst part is I have no idea how I did.
Somewhere post job offer.... which is even worse.
100 times worse is "I have a quick question" followed by a question that is anything but quick.
I normally do. Quick question.
Trying to get away from that also......
Now more into the (below I view positively-agree?) Do you have time? I got a question regarding____________
Or I just dive right in
Anytime I hear quick question. I dive into a turtle. or quick task.
Always anything but quick.
Bankerella, next time you go recruiting dont forget that you provide a service on behalf of your firm to kids you recruit and nothing more. You are an employee. You are in charge of that one little moment and I can see it gives you a huge boner. To all the kids that go recruit dont kiss ass, especially to people like op, show respect, act strong and even if you are desperate never show weakness. Value your experiences, education and abilities. Good recruiters will see and appreciate that.
BeerSaturns,
A) She's a chick so I doubt she gets a boner B) This post was supposed to provide some entertainment, and some truth... So take it easy psycho and let bankerella entertain us
Great post
Cloners, dude.
clit boner.
Bro... chicks totally get boners... You've never heard of a chick boner before? JV dude... JV
I've said it before but I'll say it again. Let me know when you come to London. I'll show you my BB credentials.
BB stands for Butt Bureau
I go from the jailhouse to the penthouse in one day.
"Don't look at my car, Don't look at my clothes, And label my as a loser, 'Cause I am royalty"
"Im a GIRL and a banker - a grrl banker!! XD don't hit on me you silly boys!!"
Deal : )
You would think these things would be common sense at target schools (assuming that is where you are recruiting)...
Which world is that ?
30s mean you are a sexual devient, n'est pas?
Hi, Ches, welcome to the twenty-first century western world. I know your trip through time and/or space must have been disorienting for you, but I'm sorry to say that I don't quite understand your question. Could you help me understand what the fuck a sexual deviant is? Preferably in the context of the culture that produced me?
He's offering you a French Tickler
Nice.
You would think it would be common sense at any school... I don't see what GPAs and SAT scores have to do with these tips.
Thanks for the good post but as always, its the comments that make the thread.
I am in love. Ding me, I don't care, just let me shake your hand Bankerella. Too bad you'd think Canada is so below you, actually we are above you, map-wise.
bankerella, if i see you at a recruiting sess i'll hand you my business card. turn it around. if it says, "hey banky-b how about the old lickaroo?" you'll know it's me. beep me your digits and head the fuck out, we can pick a rendezvous and have a quick old fashioned, since you're in a rush i won't hold back the nut bust if that's ok with you? holla at chadaddy.
Kenny, you're all class. Looking forward to seeing you on the road.
i want you to know i don't offer 'the old lickaroo' to just anyone.
I don't want a job at FOXCONN.
They're very selective. No need to kill yourself over it.
LOL
you sure have a lot of time to craft these carefully worded articles for being so busy.
Being a bit of a conspiracy theorist myself, I can't help but think Bankerella is the figment of a brilliant marketing scheme; a full-time blogger under the guise of a dominatrix banker hired to shake up the male-dominated forum in order to kick shit up and.bring buzz to the website.
I don't think so. This is a woman. Why is that she has got so much time on her hands, that could be that she is not currently working FT, or she may be working the 5 AM -2 PM hrs.
Anyways, Bankerella owes me coffee for defending her name.
Ha ha anyway she is awesome...
bankerella are you interviewing at princeton?
are you attractive enough to get hit on during these OCR?
bankerella : Interesting post but I say go take it out on those who deserve it. We keep seeing fresh undergrads hustling and bustling, stampeding-over-other-candidates and shyt just to get a place for an interview. I mean how fucked up is that ? Lets be fair. Those guys (and gals) kick ass for doing what they doing.
Lets not forget that as they google for the next big info. about interviews, they sure as hell got a chance to stumble upon some freaky ass shit like this too. And they still be coming back for more.
I say we give respect to those naive, uninitiated bunches of youth who chase their stupid dreams we once revered so much.
God knows they deserve it.
=)
I'll have what you have, ET.
A woman gets comfortable with her sexuality in her 30s more so than she is in her 20s. Research and the media are not wrong. Bankarella let's make a series, Game of Thrones style.
i feel like shitting all over the place when someone artificially inseminates floss into what they say. fuck my life.
+1
I've been at some interviews, internal meetings and had some internal conversations with staff where this was highlighted as a goal. The inside track was "We need to recruit more females, we need to promote more women to upper management." What we got told in the interviews were all the perks of being a women within the company, how the company supports women, how the interviewers had just got married/were going on maternity leave/were having a baby. I've never been more conscious of my gender before, but I didn't bring it up. I let the interviewers do it, because if it was important to them, they did. If they didn't, I assumed I got the job on the merits of my resume, references and interviewing techniques, not my gender.
The truth of the matter was, you had maybe a 20-60% ratio of other women to men interviewing with you. HR and inside management know if you are a female or not, and it won't promise you a job or a promotion because you are still competing with other females. And they won't throw a position at you, regardless of their female recruiting targets, if you still can't do the job and won't bring in the same ROI as other staff regardless of gender.
That said, I'd always ask about hours. It's more to do with the fact I'm quite comfortable working 60-80 hours a week (I know, not much on this forum), but I also have long term study goals. I want to know if I can continue to pursue further qualifications or not, and what my general hourly rate will work out being (although I won't ask you about remuneration, I'll look online for that). It's nothing to do with my gender.
Will this work Bankerella?
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