For background: I’m a ASO3 in BB, consistently top ranked among my class.
I have a question to all A2As and VPs in IB - when is it ever getting better? When do the mundane tasks ever stop hitting you? I’ve been in this job for 5 years and had my year end feedback 3 days ago where consistently cherished my ability to work at levels far beyond my seniority. Fast forward to yesterday, when I get the great learning opportunity to update share price charts, turn all the comments on a deck myself, organize printings and pull a manual broker consensus. I am once again most junior on the deal team and held to the most mindless stuff ever. I have been working really hard for 5 years and never pulled back, but it’s getting to the point now where people are happy for me to take up to 5 steps up in seniority, but also expect me to do the stuff you would normally pond off to an intern. It’s draining my energy and I refuse to keep going like that. So the question is: objectively, is this normal? Am I just at a particularly sweaty shop or is this just happening to everyone?
Any thoughts / advice highly appreciated.
tbh No. the pressure increases several fold
Honestly the pressure isn’t the problem. It’s the ability to actually get rid of the ground work
I'm A2A and I don't refresh charts anymore - I'm guessing but I think your problem comes down to:
1. Staffing issue: Staffer doesn't staff you with analysts for some reason (which the post implies but not sure if this is the case - if this is the case you should flag to MD as this is a red flag in terms of junior capacity issues)
2. Trust issue: You don't trust the analyst to do work or do quickly enough (in this case you have to take time to train them and give back comments even though it takes time because that's how they will learn and contribute more in the long run)
Fellow a2a and have been in the same spot before. You should not be doing share price charts or a full deck from scratch. What sucks is when you work with shit analysts (need to redo the work yourself) or don’t get an analyst at all (shouldn’t happen). Your life gets infinitely better when you have a good analyst class beneath you - need to either push staffing to make sure you are working with strong analysts or leave to a better platform.
Thanks boss, this is super helpful. In theory we should be getting the best ANL classes but I feel like this is a recurring issue… at the risk of sounding like a boomer (“back in my days we were so much better analysts”) I won’t go further but what I’m sensing from your comment is that it is something you need to proactively push for?
I’ll be honest, I’ve tried advocating for myself with staffing and its not a true solution bc you will still get fucked with regularity.
What’s really changed things is the new crop of analysts we selected actually want to be there / learn / do great work. For a period of time during and immediately after COVID, that was not the case. If you are finding that is still not the case in your group, then I would consider leaving. It is literally night and day difference working with an analyst class that is trying…both in terms of freeing you up to focus on higher value work and in terms of stress / WLB.
.
It’s definitely not normal, but I suppose most banks face challenges with junior resource availability
The teams were meant to operate as a pyramid but they are at times becoming top-heavy rather than well-supported at the base
I’ve been in banking 25 years, A2A, run a group and have mentored 5+ A2As to MD.
The work you’re doing is not close to normal for a senior associate. There are three possible issues, which are not mutually exclusive.
1. As someone above said, you do not trust your analysts and do everything yourself. This is a self perpetuating vicious cycle because no one ever gets trained and you are also perceived internally as the lone warrior. This is career destroying if this is the case. My single piece of advice for successful careers in investment is that the most important thing you can do is develop people under you to do your job well. This is the only way you grow. I cannot emphasize this enough.
2. Your team perceives you as an effective lone warrior and does not give you the resource. This happened to me as an A2A promote because I was so effective getting work done that all the analyst resource was given to the MBA associates around me. In this instance, you need to look at whether you are singled out in staffing and work to fix that. There may be a perception that you are insufficiently managerial and need to fix that too.
3. Your team doesn’t have enough analyst resource: either they change this or you find a team that does.
The common thread to all of this is your situation is abnormal, and something needs to be fixed. Things won’t get better on their own.
THANK YOU SO MUCH! Firstly, you seem like exactly the type of person this industry needs in leadership positions. Great advice, thoughtful and genuinely caring. I really appreciate that.
If you don’t mind me asking, on your point 2), how did you overcome this? I do think there is a perception that people have of me as extremely reliable, hard working and committed. I don’t want to flatter myself but I do think people give me stuff being very confident that it gets done - I suppose that is principally a good thing. But it is a double edged sword because it means people will just keep dumping this kind of stuff on me. Was it similar with you? How did you change that?
again, I cannot thank you enough for this
Well I quit and lateraled to another institution where no one had institutional memory of me as a rock star analyst and gave me the staffing underneath I needed. In my personal case, it worked out very well but with the perspective of maturity, it’s always better to try to work things out where you are than reflexively quit.
To answer your question well, I would need to understand:
- how staffing works on your team and your relationship with the staffer
- the nature of your relationship with respected MDs and group head
- the sufficiency and quality of your analyst pool
- whether you believe your managerial style and approach may need improvement (and it’s always better to be honest with yourself)
Ignore the title, in my experience it has only gotten worse. The pressure increases exponentially. I don’t look above me (Ds/ MDs) and see people who are relaxed at all.
Not being relaxed is entirely different from taking on intern-level tasks.
I agree with the VP’s point above—if you haven’t yet learnt how to delegate, it’s time to accelerate that process.
Do you work in IB?
Fellow A2A here. Your experience is similar to mine in some respects. The ultimate deciding factor that dictates the amount of work I have to do on a project is the strength of my Analyst. The Analysts underneath me are a wide spectrum of talent. The top Analysts make my life easier and allow me to play a higher role on transactions whereas the bottom Analysts are as useful as an intern and I end up doing both the Associate and Analyst workstream. I've just accepted that this is how the industry is because your mileage will vary with Analysts and honestly because you are top ranked as an Associate, there is no guarantee that when you are a VP that your Associate is going to be able to do the same work as you when you were an Associate since many will be average or mediocre and since you are top ranked, your expectations are going to always be higher.
I think the best way to get over this hump is to accept that not everything will be able to be done with the highest attention to detail because you are not holding the pen and that's okay and you have to pick the deals where you do want to have everything done correctly and at the highest level and let the other deals pull along. The reality is your fellow Associates and Analysts who aren't top ranked are still executing and closing deals while not doing the same amount of work as you. It's possible to close a deal without every single workstream being perfect. I would focus on trying to delegate to Analysts and just accepting that it'll take time and it may not be perfect but for the deals where you need it to be perfect you will roll up your sleeves and get the job done if needed.
Honestly, super helpful! I appreciate that a lot! Thanks boss
Nobis vel nihil consectetur totam qui cum. Quia ipsum ex quae corrupti voluptatem. Autem qui similique et ipsam non iste. Non exercitationem quia dolorem autem omnis et fugit ex.
Rem ex voluptas aut dolorem tempora harum. Molestiae numquam dolores est ipsa. Voluptatem et explicabo vel. Et cum ratione distinctio. Asperiores est in dignissimos culpa quaerat accusantium vitae. Ipsum porro quis odio aut voluptas amet accusamus nam.
Dolorum accusamus autem sed voluptatem dicta harum autem placeat. Sunt eos quas quis in. Enim possimus voluptatum veritatis perspiciatis pariatur ut fugit. Voluptas consequatur recusandae soluta qui. Dolore tempora in voluptas libero dolores molestias ullam quis. Incidunt soluta sed doloremque omnis ut perspiciatis qui.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...