Hey all -
I had read in multiple threads where people have mentioned 1st year analysts already quitting ~6 months in. Any idea where they are exiting too?
Seems like WFH and difficulties in ramping up have made life pretty hard on new 1st years. Curious what people have heard / thoughts.
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I know or 5 first years that left (2 weeks after training ended, 3 months, 3 months, 6 months, 6 months)
two weeks after training? unless there was some personal problem going on that is pathetic. no one enters IB without knowing its gonna be a grind
Burnout.
It's a legit thing. You reach a point where a 2-week break from work sounds better than a $60k bonus.
I applaud people who quit when they feel their health is suffering because of it. However, it's important to have a solid backup plan if you do.
The job is fucking brutal, especially coming off a senior spring where you’re totally checked out. I’m sure ZoomU just exacerbated the issue.
I’ve considered leaving so many times... WFH makes it impossible to learn much especially when your associates can’t be bothered to teach but expect you to know 100%. You think it’s easy to learn and memorize Keyboard and ppt skills when you’re alone in your bedroom?
Anyways, know of a couple from CS, two from UBS and one from GS about to head out after ~7m. IB is just not worth it if you’re doing all the work and no play and you’ve never experienced the play bc of wfh.
I think about it every day
Outlook at my MM isn't pretty. Stub hits in a month and 5-6 associates and a few 2nd years are leaving because they are just done. Don't know if they have things lined up.
On a second note, multiple VPs of mine are so convinced that they will never be in the office on a regular basis again and have moved to the suburbs.
As for my perspective on being a first-year wfh... I think about quitting every day.
Put In my 2 weeks, feels liberating
Working with my family on some stuff.
Do you think the large number of analysts leaving early will shift the banking culture at all? Seems like empty seats and time spent finding replacements is worse than simply offering a moderately better analyst lifestyle.
from what I've heard WFH has shifted the culture to a point that is unsustainable. Expectation of working absurd hours every day all week bc of quarantine. they are going to need to ease up if everybody quits.
We just have to do weekly calls now. Not only do I have to work until 3am every night, I have to get up at 8am to take a zoom call to feel like a “family”
Almost half my class has quit and this doesn’t seem to be uncommon across banks with WFH. Banking is a hard job in general, but deal flow has increased since WFH and the amount of pitching has increased even more given that there is no travel and you can do zoom calls back to back. On top of this, the work relationship feels extremely transactional and there are limited opportunities for mentorship. No more taking phone calls from the office with the team, sitting at table with MD and asking questions about materials, grabbing coffee with colleagues, eating dinner with other analysts, etc. Essentially you are left with far more work and very little human interaction. Imagine what sitting alone in a room outputting PPT pages for 90+ hours a week before even beginning to think about recruiting does to your mental and physical health. Can’t blame anyone for quitting and can’t imagine anyone would hold it against you.
Seriously, the transactional feeling and lack of mentorship fucking blows. We’ve lost three analysts and an associate in four months which means more work for the rest of us, and we’ve essentially been told to suck it up. Every project and turn of materials is just another request through email with the occasional offer to talk about it for five minutes. At times I feel like an outsourced resource, not a member of a team. Seriously have considered leaving with nothing lined up so many times but just keep telling myself it will get better (even if marginally) when we’re allowed back in the office and have new analysts and associates in the summer. I don’t fault anyone actually taking the plunge though, and any of the recruits on here telling people living through this to suck it up can piss off.
I cant stress enough how we are getting the worse analyst experience you could imagine. All work, no play, none of the soft benefits that made this job bearable. People used to leave saying banking was tough but they can look back fondly on the memories in the pit and the fun thursday nights, but now...
Wrong. With no commute its now "you have time for more work and to be on more conference calls"
Its worse. When mds were commuting over an hour to new canaan or wherever they were less involved and less able to provide comments. Or their kids had soccer practice or they had a swinger event to attend. Those are all shut down now. Idle mds are bad mds.
I shoulda majored in Computer Science and became a Software Engineer
I've seen 5 people in my team of like 25 people quit WITHOUT jobs lined up. In the middle of a pandemic with historically high unemployment....
This is a Bb bank.
Wfh started off cool but has devolved to hell for all the juniors.
All the progress made the last 10 years to make IB more sustainable from a work life balance perspective are out the window.
I wouldn't recommend this job to anyone now. Not even taking networking calls from laterals or alumni or students because I cannot in good faith help someone join this industry.
WFH has devolved in my group. The first month, WFH was novel and senior bankers cared about junior bankers well-being (didn’t want you up till 3AM turning unimportant comments given the public health crisis, etc). Additionally, a lot of processes were put on hold and clients weren’t taking meetings so there wasn’t a ton of work to go around. After a bit, people slowly realized WFH was the norm and that it would be around for a long time. Client meetings started happening at a normal pace and the senior bankers stopped caring as much about everyone’s health (just like how people stopped sanitizing their groceries and freaking out about everything). After even more time and as Zoom became the norm, meetings started getting scheduled back to back and the number of meetings eclipsed pre-pandemic levels. On top of this, processes put on hold began to resume. As even more time went on, new processes began to launch. All of this on top of the paused processes and increased number of meeting. After more time, the cadence new processes launched was also above pre pandemic levels. In November, the Dow hit 30,000. Every 2021 IPO was pushed forward and the numbers of bakeoffs increased exponentially. At this point, analysts have more BD meetings, the paused processes from pre-COVID, the many processes launched post-COVID and an obscene number of very involved RFPs. Given the level of work, most working relationships also became purely transactional.
Advice to all the current college students. It's not too late to change your major to comp science and work in tech. Let this thread be a warning to you all.
One of the best parts of being an IB Analyst is being in a bullpen with likeminded people and in bigger cities more built for that life style. When you take away the team comradery and these cities (primarily NYC and SF) completely shut down, you lose one of the most redeeming qualities of this job. It complete strips the "Play Hard" out of "Work Hard Play Hard".
I contemplate leaving weekly because there are just better ways to make money than doing IB in this type of environment.
Please keep this thread alive - people are starting to take notice.
Patrick sticky this on the top page if possible - you are our only hope.
Agreed—happy to see the traction this thread has been getting. All of us went into the job expecting long hours and cancelled plans, but I don’t think anyone signed up for what WFH has become. Tired of people saying “be fortunate for your job,” “put in your dues,” “you knew banking would be hard.” What is happening to junior bankers is not acceptable and people should not have to feel guilty about speaking out. No one can work over 30 days straight outputting PPT slides while being alone in a room (which has happened to multiple people I know). It’s not a coincidence that multiple analysts have quit in a short timeframe (with no job too) when the completion rate for the analyst program has historically been near 100%.
The best part is that when bonuses hit the bank accounts of associates and VPs in another month or two, I think the entire industry is going to see a bloodbath in turnover. They’ve had it just as bad, especially junior associates; oh boy...
From my eyes in my seat - I see tons of juniors get ramped up quick in the office but when they are home, it's not as easy you imagine for them. WFH is not ideal for these kids when they are started out there career.
2nd point I'd like to make - I was speaking to 2nd year analyst and she was complaining about the hours. Look I get it but if your not cut out for it or if it's the first time you've worked hard in your life. Then sorry you picked the wrong path. 80/100 hr for 1/2 years is nothing kids. It's more like 40-60 hours of work and the rest is BS'ing around. I can imagine you had a good life in college and now your have to work. This is the real world kid.
Lol I think you're missing the whole point here. Sure, 80 - 100 work weeks during normal times were not as bad, first because most people didn't actually pull those kinds of hours on consistent basis pre-COVID, and second because as long as you weren't cranking on a live deal, you probably had things to break up your time. You walk to lunch and dinner with your other analysts, fck around with the other juniors in the bullpen, and the workflow fluctuates. But with COVID it's actually working 80 - 100 hours straight without any breaks, no opportunity to build camaraderie with your team, and a constant, never-ending stream of work. All while being stuck in your apartment (usually alone). That makes a big difference here.
This is incoherent and you sound tone deaf. Pack that shit back up.
Former N3 @ BB, left a little after bonuses. Started COVID with 5 N1s and 1N2 (me), which was brutal enough, and had 2 incoming analysts. I left along with 3 of the original N1s (now N2s) and everyone who is left is trying to get out ASAP.
Two of us started our exit opps early, one went to corp dev, and another lateraled to move closer to home.
Largely similar experience to others. WFH started okay, the only thing was A3+ engagement dropped off a cliff, which wasn’t the end of the world for me, but for the N1s they lost their only teachers. After a relatively okay Feb/March we got hit with a massive wave of liquidity discussions in April. This was followed by the MDs going SPAC crazy. Finally, the late summer / early fall became IPO bake-off hell. While all this new business was being chased, our paused mandates from pre-COVID started popping back up over the summer and we all realized we needed to jump ship. The new first years both got thrown off the deep end (example: N1 working with no associate, disengaged VP, and multiple MDs on a bake-off starting from week one), since all the senior analysts were pushing back aggressively. Not surprised by any N1 reactions, horrible time to join.
tl;dr: it depends.
I think it requires a return to the office for learning and the old "we're in the trenches together" camaraderie to return, which are the two things that actually make banking bearable under normal circumstances. There's a good chance it won't be the same as pre-COVID, but I don't think it'll disappear. Learning will probably get better, and it'll most likely start with analysts going to each others' desks to ask questions. I used to spend at least an hour every week answering random questions as a 2nd/3rd year (pre-COVID) and got almost no questions during COVID. When you're physically stuck with your team in the office for days or weeks on end without talking to anyone outside your group, the camaraderie will return.
TBH I disagree with some people on this thread about how they perceive work is created. Coverage MDs have an explicit universe with an actual list of company names and often have instructions from their bosses on what they should be discussing (e.g., COVID update + financing alternatives). If you happen to cover software as an MD and five of the companies you cover issue IPO RFPs in the same month, guess what? You probably have 5 bake-offs. If you happen to be a power and utilities MD and a LevFin MD pings you to say "hey -- here are all the companies that you cover that have maturities coming up in the next year" after your group head has told you to start scheduling meetings on the topic... etc. Idk how many of you have seen your MDs get yelled at by global heads for "missing" a deal (finding out that a deal was happening from an announcement on newswire), but it's cringy and I know the pressure has been cranked up. I don't sympathize with my MDs, because while their quality of life may have gotten worse, analyst quality of life is currently unbearable.
To answer your question poorly -- your quality of life largely depends on your workload and is offset by camaraderie, learning, and comp. Your workload frequently depends on the activity levels of your MDs clients, how hard management is riding your MDs, as well as if your staffer hates you. There's no way to guess what that will look like in the future.
My first thought when hearing about people quitting preemptively was one of annoyance or disbelief but as I've contemplated it, it isn't the craziest thing for one big reason (and yes there are several others but this is the biggest one for me). It's that if a first year analyst can't experience the gruel of the ramping-up process and the slogging which comes with those terrible first few months of the job with a sense of camaraderie and friendship with his/her analyst class, then the whole job in my eyes suddenly gets way tougher. Half the reason at least I was able to cope and excel in that environment was that I had not just colleagues but friends in it with me. Removing that aspect suddenly opens up people to not having that voice to lean on when you're making dark jokes or complaining about your latest staffing but instead makes you face it all alone and devoid of people who understand what you're doing. So to those who are in that situation I say stick it out and reach out to your junior colleagues in order to form those bonds virtually but don't give up just yet. It'll be worth it later on
First year at BB - not only Is wfh terrible like everyone pointed out — but it’s much harder to learn anything. Associates in my group can’t share screen or jump on the phone to walk through anything for shit. Even small shortcuts are just harder to learn ... you don’t see anyone doing it right next to you and forget about actually absorbing or learning the material. Somehow I feel I know less Corp fin than when I started 5 months ago.... Wondering if associates or VP realized how fucked out learning curve is because of the lack of mentorship (or associates responding one word to a literal 4 part question..)
bitcoin
Just FYI, ECM hours now are just as bad if not worse than coverage due to equity issuance volume through the roof and RFPs every week (~90/week due to the same BS because of COVID, mentioned in this thread). Agree that in normal times, ECM tended to be ~5-7 hours less at analyst level. But post-COVID, who knows how that will change. I personally wouldn't expect it to go back to normal and see ECM staying at 80-100 /week.
one thing not really mentioned is that many junior bankers are experiencing these hours in front of their family for the first time.
I went back home with my parents during the pandemic (like 90% of people I work with), and my dad thinks my boss and coworkers are actual sociopaths.
"I heard you on the phone last night at 4am...anything wrong?"
"no, just going over some comments on a powerpoint slide with my boss"
He's worked hard his whole life and done well in engineering, but he's frankly shocked and disturbed seeing his adult child go through these 100 hr weeks back to back to back. And he doesn't even spoil me/care about me too much.
Imagine the spoiled princess analyst then went home to be with parents and her father is now frankly disturbed his precious daughter is working absolute chit hours every night and can't even join him for dinner sometimes...I had a female analyst quit in my group because she said her brothers/parents literally gave her an intervention about how she was throwing her life away for some MD in the hamptons (100% srs) as they witnessed her getting crushed all year first hand.
VPS are working hours now like associates
Associates are working hours now like analysts
analysts are working hours now like moelis analysts
no wonder they all want to quit
...and the Moelis analysts?
Notice how they aren’t on the website
l
raise your hand if you’re gonna bounce post stub bonus in feb as a first year ...
I'm putting in my 2 week's today. Another 1st year in my group quit yesterday. Can add 2 to the list from a BB.
We both do not have roles lined up. And I'm perfectly ok with that.
Coming from a motivated individual who's always had a genuine interest in finance and investing I would have never taken the IB route knowing it would be like this. I'm constantly depressed and have developed nothing but apathy for the job and company. It's pretty sad to think that in less than a year you can made to resent something you once were so passionate about. My BB could literally implode tomorrow, and I genuinely wouldn't be able to care less. I used to be a fairly happy person with a balanced life of loving friends and family and now it's just constant anxiety from never ending work streams, and even when our team does get a little down time, I can't even enjoy it because I know another set of stress-filled and anxiety-inducing days followed by never ending nights is just around the corner.
Funny thing is I joined my team specifically because it seemed to have a better WLB than most lol. No exit plan lined up and I still have to fight the urge to call up the staffer and give my two weeks every single day. Deciding no money is worth the lack of interaction with loved ones and crippling mental health.
Feel the same way. I was genuinely excited for this role and my team and now have nothing but disdain and hatred towards this job and bank. I know that this is not specific to me or my group, but I am literally just thrown into projects with absolutely no guidance and frantically try to figure out what I am doing. The stress is so overwhelming and even when I know I don't have work, I still have anxiety. It is actually so brutal
Are you me? Feel exactly the same way. I know it's supposed to be drinking from the firehose, but it's so hard to get guidance without awkwardly constantly filling people's inboxes and messages with stupid questions. Half the time I'm not even working with an associate so it's even more difficult to bite the bullet and ask my VP/director. Part of it is the actual job (Excel, PPT, pitches, etc), but the other half is just so many different internal processes and approvals that don't have good instructions for and require experience to fill out (looking at you, KYC and internal transaction committee).
This is essentially just a rehash of what's been said above, but this truly is insanity. Know of another analyst that quit this last week and there are a handful others that I personally know seriously considering putting in their notice before finishing their first year (honestly, wouldn't be surprised if ~15% across my BANK (top BB) are seriously considering this
Won't go into too much detail on what's causing this - think that's been covered pretty extensively by now. What I wish to re-emphasize is that finance is not the end all be all. I don't mean this in the angry "should have gone into tech" tone often seen on here. Rather, some of us joined IB because we were genuinely interested in finance, others joined for the clout/prestige, and others joined for the optionality it gave us. I've seen that as first-years join, it becomes much more difficult to imagine or visualize working in a different field, and many adapt a high-finance "tunnel vision" (i.e. glorifying BB - PE - HBS). Kids on wall street are amongst the most driven, talented, and psychotic kids I've ever seen (esp. after WFH, you can't work these hours and not be borderline psychotic), so I do think many of y'all should not be so scared to be risk-on if you have truly decided finance is not for you long-term. Why not join a startup in an industry you've been passionate about? What's there to lose? The startup goes bust and you need to find a new job? What's so scary about that. You have a brand name on your resume and are not even 24. Don't seek comfort in the risk-averse lifestyle you've been living - the risk-averse nature of it is only temporary. Say you join PE and get to VP. And then what? Each incremental promote becomes infinitely more difficult, and at that point, it'd be foolish to say that your job has little risk. Not here to promote making rash or stupid decisions, but perhaps this is something to nibble on over the next few weeks.
Lastly, as a separate note, I'm pretty convinced some of these seniors (i.e. Directors/MDs) are undoubtedly 100% narcissistic sociopaths lol. How can you see your deal team working inhumane hours and not even blink an eye? Or just say a simple "thank you for staying up all night for this"? Being in finance, we normalize this kind of behavior and don't even think it's strange. Lot of you even justify it saying "that's the price of success" or "it's the nature of the job". I personally know a handful of "fuck you" money individuals who have retired after selling their company, and trust me, none of these individuals display this kind of sociopathic behavior when they ran their companies - so it definetly is not "the price of success". Your MDs are either just assholes, or have become numb to it after 10+ years of being in the industry, which to be fair, it's hard to blame them for that. But I guess that still says something about their weak character / an absolute shell of a person that they've become. Seriously consider if that is someone you want to become. Let me know your thoughts - first years are going crazy lol and this thread is pretty sad but uplifting at the same time - good to know we're all getting shafted together
I remember when I actually hospitalized myself from overworking and checked my emails only to see them all being ETAs of when I’d get back. What a weird time to be alive.
l
In addition to the many good points made earlier (lack of socialization, crazy hours, zero fun) imo a large amount of the stress stems from the discrepancy between instruction and expectation. We are are given ASAP task after ASAP task with next to zero guidance and expected to just figure it out. When we inevitably can't read their minds, we then get a pissy email back saying we have to redo the task the "right" way. As an in-person SA, I felt like people actually took a second to explain things thoroughly, walk through it live, and take follow-up questions since they are standing right in front of you. If you didn't understand something your associate was right there to explain it. If people were in a meeting/on another call/visibly busy everyone could see and be aware of that. Now, your MD sends some four-word cryptic email about something that needed to be done five minutes ago and your associate is already staffed up the a$$ so can't take your questions that minute. Poorly worded MD emails and vague instructions are hardly new but WFH makes this 80x worse. On an internal level, it is really demoralizing feeling like you've been working crazy hard on the job for ~6 months and are still struggling this much and getting stuff wrong on a daily basis. Reading all these posts has really calmed my nerves though- a relief knowing I am not the only person who feels this way.
Exactly...6m in and I feel like I know jack shit.
^^^ And that makes recruiting to gtfo even harder. I feel like I would get decimated in an interview if pressed on my deals/"skills".
Haven't seen a ton of this on the thread (pleasant surprise) but I think it is worth noting: this isn't people being "softer than other generations" or "just not cut out for banking". Think about the sheer amount of networking, academic grinding, prepping for interviews, etc. it takes to get an SA position, and then pushing through the SA stint and winning a return offer. These analysts are clearly motivated, hard-working, and knew what banking entails. If these are the people who are feeling burnt out and quitting, then the issue is truly the banks.
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Hi, I'm a reporter looking to cover this. I think it's a really important story. Happy to talk without attribution -- I won't name you or your firm or compromise your identity. PM me here or on twitter @rossmatican -- you can find more of my contact info there (email, Signal, WhatsApp etc).