How can I make it into AM in the U.K
I am struggling to see a realistic path right now. Here is my story, I'm a Taiwanese born naturalized American. I was educated in the US, I speak English as my main language, fluent in Chinese, conversational Italian (still learning), basic Korean (Mom is Korean). I originally went to University in the US in 2010, I had to leave university in my final year due to a bad car accident in 2014. I returned to Taiwan where my family could help as I rehabbed since I was on my own in the US and had a leg injury.
One thing led to another, my mom got cancer, I got called to do my military conscription for 14 months, and I was working in entertainment and did some really cool things like working as a project manager to bring the first televised MMA fight in Taiwan. My last job was as an operations manager for a fitness gym. I finally returned to school last year with a school that allowed me to finished my remaining courses online with distance programs. During this time, I got engaged with an Italian girl. I am currently living in Italy learning Italian, and I will be completing my B.S in Business admin and finance in April.
I applied to a bunch of MSc in Finance programs in London, waiting for Queen Mary's, King's, Imperial, UCL, and Cass to reply. I got into Westminster quickly, but that's my worst-case scenario safety school. My problem is, it;s looking like my only finance-related expereince that I can put on my resume is not going to pull through with the current coronavirus in NY. So It's entirely possible, I will be going into a 1 year grad school program with no experience in finance. I am now 27. I'm not sure if I can actually find an "in" at this point. I thought going to London will give me a chance to network, and I won't have to worry on a work visa because the UK just reintroduced a 2-year post-grad visa. And my fiancee will be gaining permanent residency by the time that runs out and we will have married. So I can stay with her as a spouse and work as per my understanding.
What do you guys think? Can I make it with I keep grinding? My current GPA is 4.0 at the university I'm studying at but it was 3.0 when I went to college in 2010-2014. I have matured and take things more seriously now and actually try. Can the Msc at a decent to good school give me a shot? I was thinking of investment analyst in AM but would be open to sales and marketing to find an "in" at any investment analyst roles.
Do not go to Westminster, it will be a complete waste of time and still quite a lot of money. I am a brit who was kind of in your situation, not target background trying make up for it with MSc etc...anyway I did MSc Finance at at top 10 and am in a junior FO position.
If you are able to get top 10 MSc Finance you could easily get a middle office role and try to work from there, but accept it would be very difficult (but possible if you have serious grit) and you'll still have to do CFA if you want to get into FO from there. Best chance (in terms of FO progression) if you do get into top 10 is trading assistant at a HF and lever that into FO via their smaller structure. MO in IB to FO is a no-go.
Sorry just saw this, no absolutely not. You could only go as low as Durham IMO.
How about Henley Business School from Uni of Reading. I heard their ICMA centre for finance is ranked well and improving in filtering into front office roles the last few years.
You are not listening, stop trying to rationalise alternative masters courses
Would recommend:
Best of luck my man.
Things might have changed a bit in the last 10 years, but just a couple of points on the schools being mentioned (esp. Henley) and your goals:
Go to the top school you can get into. Even if you only get Westminster (which I am a bit biased against after meeting several people who studied there), it's still better than not having anything. It may help you at least get a BO/MO role.
The move from BO to FO is very difficult, it's an easier move to FO in IB after starting in Big4 Audit and going to Big4 Advisory. But you're not too focused on FO from what you say. BO/MO is decent money, although the work tends to be more boring for most people than FO. Just one extra point here, recruiters in London would almost all know the difference between doing BO and FO at a BB.
And perhaps the most relevant point, Reading/ICMA/Henley was not automatically screened out when applying for IB jobs. I actually studied there on exchange more than 10 years ago and applied to IB analyst jobs without networking or an internship. Didn't get the jobs, but got interviews at MM and BB. And it definitely wasn't my eastern european no-name school that got me interviews. A good friend of mine did an internship from Reading at a BB in IB, then got the full time offer and is still there.