How fast to ramp on entire coverage universe?
Joined a BB research team this summer after 2+ years in big 4 accounting.
Accounting background is good from a modeling perspective, so I feel fine there. Moreso feeling a bit swamped ramping on every single name in our coverage universe. We cover 30+ names and often times lines get crossed in my brain/forget individual company specifics. It seems like other associates know all the minutia on all names and don't get mixed up easily.
Not sure if it's an organization issue or just something that comes with time. So I guess two pronged question - 1) how do I ramp quickly and keep the knowledge? 2) how to stay organized with info in such a large coverage universe?
How to stay organized: Take good notes is a first and must. Keep adding to it. Find a note taking style that works for you (OneNote, Evernote, etc.) You can read articles about good note taking but these are other people (or my) style, taking some of that and form your own style.
Speed to ramp is a function of how much work you are willing to put (on the job and off it) and your aptitude. I certainly get tons of questions on shortcuts or how to do something the fastest way - I'm not sure if there is any. Just put in the work and it comes with time. Knowledge compounds linearly first and then exponentially, especially when you cover only one sector on the sell-side, over time you develop pattern recognitions.
The only thing I can say is you should learn the industry analysis framework (read Porter, Greenwald or Helmer) so you start to understand the interactions between companies in your sector and how they change over time. Greatest thing about an industry analysis framework is its universally applicable to every industry on this planet.
Also you obviously have access to the history of these companies - read the previously published notes, what happened? why this company lost market share? why that one gained? etc.
Thanks Dick - extremely helpful response. One more to help me frame my expectations: if you were on a team w a new joiner, when would you expect them to be in a position to take solo client calls w smaller clients? 6mth mark?
I’d say 6 months mark is too early. Unless you have done ER before and just covering new names, then that would be possible. Otherwise, it generally takes at least 3-4 quarters of earnings to have a basic understanding of the companies/sector. More importantly, it really depends on whether there’s an experienced associate/VP (or a hands on lead analyst) on the team who is willing to go through the ins and out with you, to help you ramp up on the names. Of course, it the company is very small and easy to understand like consumer/every day tech, then it maybe possible.
What anonymous_IV said
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