Just a general question here.
I went straight from undergrad to grad school, knowing that I wanted to get into ER and get my CFA. The grad program I chose was a CFA Partner school, but a non-target. Honestly, that's fine by me -- I didn't want to wait for a while before going to get my MBA. I don't have aspirations to be in IB or working in PE. I want to be in Asset Management
Having just graduated the MBA, and taking Level II in a month, I'm waiting to hear back about a full time offer. I was a finance undergrad and finance concentrated MBA, and did well grades-wise (over 3.8/4.0 for both). For those in the industry, can you explain why I may be having harder times getting an interview than some undergrad folks? Is it that people don't know what to pay you? Don't know where to put you? Expect you to leave faster? I understand the way that the Street is, but I also know that not every single person there went to an Ivy, and that smart, hard-working folks come from many schools.
Hopefully, this will be irrelevant soon and I'll have a job offer in hand. But until then, I'm just trying to make sense of the way that some HR folks think, and get some perspective of people in industry. Any interview I get, I just am honest and say, "I really like covering stocks, and want to be a great analyst. I want to learn, and am looking for someone willing to teach me."
Thoughts?
HR practices are extremely structured. Many recruiters bucket pre-mba and post-mba. You already know that you are light on work experience against post-mba candidates, so that's probably out (never say never). I have seen individuals with Masters degrees in highly quantitative subjects enter structured post-UG analyst programs at top tier BBs/AMs. Don't feel the compensation issue is prevalent here because you have no bargaining power given your lack of experience (which builds leverage much more than a degree unfort for u)... consequently they shouldn't be that worried about it and may just pay you flat to post-UG ppl however you will likely have a higher slope on your career progression.
This approach may be your problem. Yes, it's great to have a passion and want to learn. But you have to think of things from the hiring manager's perspective as well -- that is, what value is this guy going to add to my group? Hiring managers don't just want to pay people to learn, especially in ER where it's all about adding value to the research through new ideas/different ways of analyzing things.
In addition, instead of "wanting to be a great analyst" you need to proactively demonstrate that you have taken your love for analyzing stocks and are already on the way to becoming a great analyst. A great way to do this is have an actual portfolio (or a paper account) that clearly documents your thesis, ideas, research and investments. Take your portfolio to a hiring manager and show how you can help them be better.
Good deal, thanks for the input.
tan86 brings up a good point.
An MBA is going to be expected to deliver, so "teach me" is a not a good approach. If they need to teach you, then teaching an undergrad is much cheaper.
Are you looking for both sell side and buy side jobs?
Good news arrived Friday actually...accepted a sell-side job covering companies that I'm super interested in. Pumped I have a shot, and now not going to let them down and am going to work my tail off!
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