Conferences for networking

Is it worthwhile (as a student/prospective monkey) to attend IB/M&A/PE conferences to network?

Below is the conference that piqued my interest, but I see ads for similar conferences all the time. https://chapters.acg.org/philadelphia/conference2…

Some of them can be quite pricy, but this one is only like $500. Just curious if others have tried attending events like this and if it has been a good way to network.

9 Comments
 

I was wondering the same thing. Was thinking about going to the Deal & Deal Maker's conference... but really don't have the money for it and found out about it too late to try to find a back door way in.

And... I could be wrong, but $500 is REALLY cheap... I'd say marginally suspect. The D&DM was somewhere around $2900 and there was a PE conference a while back that I wanted to try to go to that was similarly priced.

Can anyone comment on some of the benefits from attending these events for someone not in IBD/PE? I know any exposure is good, but it would have to yield some pretty good results to fork up a couple of grand.

 

CDN - You make a good point: even if they aren't paying out of pocket to attend these events, the attendees are all there to network for themselves. The top-flight people (e.g. speakers/hosts) are looking to network with each other and fend off the masses, while the lower level people are trying to meet people above them and generally drum up business (specific targets depend on the event). In any case it is a bit hard to imagine why anyone would want to waste their time talking to me.

And, definitely realize that informational interviews (w/alumni, etc.) are a better overall strategy, but just thought this might be a way to augment that.

 

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