What do you (or did you) see yourself doing after 2-3 years as an IB analyst, that is the question! I'm sure many of you have checked out the results from the February survey, but you may not have checked out the results from the August 2006 survey. While the general impulse to move into private equity hasn't changed, the relative amounts for everything has changed quite a bit:
| August 2006 | February 2015 | |
| Private Equity / Venture Capital | 26% | 35% (31% / 4%) |
| Advanced Degree (MBA, MD, JD, etc.) | 22% | 13% |
| Promoted to Associate | 18% | 13% |
| Hedge Fund | 13% | 10% |
| Starting Your Own Business | 6% | 5% |
| Corporate Finance / Back Office | 4% | 4% |
| Consulting | 3% | 4% |
| Other | 3% | 4% |
| Retiring to a Tropical Island | 3% | 9% |
A quick note, I left off "Sales and Trading" and "Working for a Non-Profit" because they weren't included in both surveys. Additionally, "Hedge Fund" wasn't included until later in the polling so that number is likely understated. Lastly, in the 2006 survey, PE and VC were one option but in 2015, they were two options.
What do you monkeys see going on here? It seems like many of you are less interested/optimistic about being promoted to associate which was fairly interesting. However, what I found to be particularly surprising is that there was a huge shift out of graduate school that seemingly went into those looking to get into PE!
Is the MBA dying? Is PE its killer? Is IBD less attractive to new analysts? Or do new analysts simply have easier access to tropical islands? How come so few people want to go into corporate finance? What do you guys think?
Good info here. My guess would be that more people are looking to put off MBA for 2 more years after 2 years of IB. Another trend is that fewer people are going down the law path, as conventional wisdom has become that the market for lawyers is currently flooded.
One that isn't on the either poll is "Creating a startup". I know you could say its similar to starting your own business, but people can interpret it different ways and might not consider that a startup. I am sure the responses for that answer would have seen significant changes.
No the MBA isn't dying, and no PE isn't killing it - that's ridiculous. Agree with above though, and interesting results. In my mind, more to PE and fewer to banking make banking a more attractive option nowadays (especially as pay is coming back up).
agree. career trend is always mean reversing.
getting THE F*CK out of operations
I was hoping to see a higher number of comments here.... hmmmm....Im surprised to see the drop in Hedge Funds.
why so low venture capital ?
yeah, that drop off in advanced degrees is pretty dramatic...
seriously why so low venture capital ? i mean isn't a "sexy" thing being a VC in silicon valley? i ask because it's one of my goals
Fewer jobs in VC and fewer good firms - more concentrated in SF but less of a presence in NYC and other markets (where there are a ton of banking analysts)
Also, coming from banking you are taking a significant pay cut vs other opportunities or staying on
such as ? also i'm not in banking now
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