Did My Team Set Me Up to Miss VP?

Looking for brutally honest opinions from people who have been through Associate → VP promotion discussions. If I’m being screwed, tell me. If I’m being entitled / missing something obvious, tell me that too.

I’m a senior Associate at a BB, up for VP this year. My MD has now told me there’s roughly a 50% chance I don’t make it.

The decision should effectively be made by October, so there is basically no runway left to “fix” anything.

Here’s why I’m pissed.

My feedback is GOOD. My MD literally says that. This isn’t a situation where I’ve been told I’m a weak performer, can’t execute, have bad reviews, etc. I’ve progressed and the feedback is positive.

The argument instead seems to be: “We’d like to see you operate more at VP level / leverage juniors / supervise more / step up more.”

Okay. Fair enough.

Except I’ve been asking to do exactly that for ages.

My team has been chronically short of juniors. I repeatedly asked for junior support, more exposure and more responsibility. Instead, I was basically told to be patient and flexible.

So I was.

If analyst-level work needed doing and there was nobody there to do it, I did it. I worked down because the team needed me to. I didn’t throw my toys out of the pram and say “I’m a senior Associate, that’s beneath me.”

Meanwhile, peers at my level have had proper junior leverage — in some cases multiple juniors — and even Associates below me have had junior support.

I’ve basically been the one senior Associate operating without it.

And now the solution my MD is proposing is:

“We’ll give you a junior so you can demonstrate more of the VP role.”

Seriously?

That’s literally what I’ve been asking for.

So you deny me the setup that allows a senior Associate to demonstrate leverage, I cover the gap and do the junior work because I’m trying to be a team player, and then at promotion time you tell me I haven’t demonstrated enough leverage and might need another YEAR?

How is that not circular?

When I’ve worked with other MDs / teams and actually had the appropriate setup, I’ve had zero problem running execution, coordinating juniors, managing comments and workstreams and taking ownership. I know I can do the job.

The timing also seems ridiculous.

The first time I understood this could genuinely prevent my VP promotion was at mid-year in July.

Then summer happens.

Now we’re in September.

Decision by October.

When exactly was I supposed to completely change the evidence base for my promotion case? If I genuinely wasn’t VP-ready, why wasn’t I told six or nine months ago and given the opportunities/resources to fix it?

There’s another uncomfortable part of this.

I have a Director immediately above me. The team structure is already awkward, and my understanding is that if I step up, the structure around her potentially becomes difficult / her own position may ultimately need to change. I cannot prove that this is driving anything, and I don’t know what has been said in promotion discussions behind closed doors, but I’d be lying if I said I don’t wonder whether there is an incentive problem here.

There have been comments to me previously along the lines of “be patient, things will sort themselves out / the structure will change eventually.”

I was patient.

Now I’m potentially the one paying for that patience with another year as an Associate.

What makes this even harder to swallow is that being held back at A→VP is historically VERY unusual in my team. I know it happens elsewhere in banking. But in this particular team, people generally progress.

I’ve also watched lateral hires come in at VP level who, frankly, I would not consider stronger bankers than me — including people struggling with fairly basic execution / presentation work — yet apparently the bar for me internally is that I need another year despite good feedback.

Maybe that comparison is irrelevant. Tell me if it is.

But right now I feel like I’ve been put in a position where it was almost impossible to win:

No juniors → work down → be patient → team player → promotion time → “you haven’t demonstrated enough VP-level leverage.”

And apparently NOW I get the junior.

I’m already interviewing externally and, irrespective of what happens, I’m increasingly convinced I need to leave. This situation is probably the final straw.

But I still have ~one month before this is decided and I don’t want to roll over if I’m being unfairly assessed.

So I genuinely want brutally honest advice from senior bankers / people who have sat in promotion committees:

Am I being screwed here, or am I looking at this the wrong way?

Would you go directly to the group head / senior management and make the case now?

Would you put the staffing history and lack of leverage formally on record before the promotion decision?

Would you explicitly ask what evidence says I’m not VP-ready despite good feedback?

Is one month realistically enough to change anything, or does “50% chance” at this stage basically mean the decision has already been made and my MD is managing expectations?

And if you were already interviewing externally, would you still fight this internally or just keep your head down, collect the paycheck and GTFO?

Genuinely happy to be told I’m wrong. I just want perspectives from people who understand how these decisions actually get made.