Feel like I made the wrong choice by getting into IB
I'm a student with some IB internship experience about to start an internship at LAZ/ROTH/PJT in a couple of months but honestly I feel like I made a mistake. I got into IB because I liked finance and my environment hyped it up, but honestly I do not care at all about cranking out slides on some industrials widget company or yet another SaaS provider so I can get into PE later (which also doesn't really interest me). I care way more about traditional banking, securities, and just financial markets in general rather than businesses in the real economy. Something like this just interests me way more than M&A. If you happen to read Matt Levine's news letter, maybe you get the gist of what I mean.
Does anybody have some tips about what to do? I'm thinking about DCM or other more market oriented fields, but I'm worried I'm already too deep into traditional IB to make the switch considering I graduate soon. Would I be better off just powering through the analyst years and making a move then? Would that even be possible? Any advice is appreciated!
I’m no expert but sounds like you’d be more interested in S&T, which you could very likely land post grad given your internship experiences. Why don’t you try chatting with people at different desks and discovering which product interests you the most?
FWIW - Just remember that you are going to be fresh out of college. You have all the power in the world to switch jobs/careers over the next few years, so definitely don't need to be stressed about being "stuck". I can guarantee you that you are not already too deep in traditional IB - you haven't even done your first year yet lol. The pull of IB is really that it gives you a great background and optionality to do a myriad of things after; PE just so happens to be the common path after, but is by no means the only one.
Sounds like you're about to start a job at a great IB - just go in with a great attitude and make note of what you like and don't like throughout your first year or two. The FT role is different from an internship. After that, leverage your experience to articulate what you enjoyed most (XYZ), and how the new job you're applying to lets you explore XYZ even more. The IB background will only land you more shots on goal and people will tend to give you the benefit of the doubt on certain things (like ability to grind, work hard, produce great quality deliverables, etc.) and make the transition easier.
Long way of saying just relax homie. It's not too late and just get the IB on your resume, get your bag, then use that experience to do what you want. You might even find you like IB and stay (edit: doubt it). Good luck!
I'd think of IB as a two year training program, and then you're free to do whatever you want afterwards. The skills you are learning are hard work, attention to detail, rigorous analytics, presentation skills, etc.
The whole finance world respects IB. So just think of it as your gateway to the world. And while you are working away in that first year you can put more thought into what you want to do longer term
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