Feeling humiliated as a VP
Joined the team for ~1 year at a relatively new and small team.
We have a few analysts and associates but they joined for 6-9 months only.
While I get staffed on live deals quite often, I am almost always the go-to guy for MD/D on random housekeeping stuff like creds, case studies, deal flash, internal decks, etc.
And most of the time I have no support for analysts and associates because the analysts are very busy working on company profiles or buyer strips with their senior VPs / associates busy supervising them company profiling on things like bar chart colors.
Hell yeah, as a VP I am putting together case studies, creds and tombstones. The worst part is most of these are last minute requests coming in late evening with expected turnaround by tomorrow noon.
Tried pushing back but under current market this is tough. It feels soul crushing with a VP doing something even a senior analyst should not be doing.
Oh, I feel your pain, mate! It sounds like you're juggling a lot of tasks that aren't exactly in your job description. It's tough when you're the go-to guy for all the housekeeping stuff, especially when it's last-minute requests.
But remember, every job has its ups and downs. It's all about how you handle it. Here are a few tips that might help:
Delegate: If you have the authority, try to delegate some of these tasks to others. It's not about shirking responsibility, but about effective management of resources.
Prioritize: Not all tasks are created equal. Identify which tasks are most important and tackle those first.
Communicate: If you're feeling overwhelmed, it's important to communicate this to your superiors. They might not realize the extent of your workload.
Stay Positive: It's easier said than done, but try to stay positive. Remember, this is just a phase and it will pass.
Remember, even the best bananas get bruised sometimes. Hang in there!
Sources: Anyone else just want out of this shit?, The Work Always Gets Done, PJT Partners Viral Email Finally Hits the News!, Analysts + Associates: What would you like to see in a new-hire external VP?
Mate? Is this AI supposed to be British or American?
Britannia rules the waves 🇬🇧
Part of the job.
You joined a small team. What did you expect? You were always going to be knee deep in fieldwork, even as a VP. If you wanted to delegate, you should have scoped out the role and responsibilities for that team in the interview process, prior to joining.
If you did this, and the role isn’t what you expected (wouldn’t be the first time this has happened in the industry) then you need to be having conversations with your MD about it.
If those discussions aren’t baring fruit, either look to move on or bite the bullet until the market improves, then move on.
What year VP are you? This happens on smaller teams but should be less frequent when you are a VP3 and up for the next promotion. They will want to see you work more with clients and master deal execution. When you are a fresh promote, this is common.
Also calling this humiliating sounds like a bit of an overreaction no? Everybody has to do this on some level and small teams will naturally require people to play down (and up) more often. The work isn't humiliating but the way they talk to you can certainly make it so.
The issue is I am literally the only person doing it. And for the last 6 months, no other junior has done those work.
It is not like I am doing it because everyone else is busy but rather you have done it, so why don't you keep doing it. Even on the live deals, I have been doing it myself when we have 6 analysts and associates in my team and they were not staffed on any live.
Don’t you have any live deals or client deliverables to work on?
I do, and in fact I have the most live deals on my plate within my team.
When I try to pushback, response I got was "the analyst / associate is also working on a few deliverables". I spoke with the analysts to get a sense on staffing. The analysts told me their associates have been doing nothing besides giving formatting comments or drafting summary bullets after the analysts finished the slides. They are junior and new so they don't want to get into the fire with other people in the team though.
Hire me as an analyst I’ll take it off your plate lol
I have an idea but tell me if this is outlandish. Since you’re a small team can you propose hiring some mba interns? You can filter for people who have decent banking experience as MBAs and maybe have them fill in?
The most inefficient part of this story is the associates. I can understand VPs being asked to step down to analyst level tasks when there’s a lot of pitch/bitch work and not as many live deals. But I can’t understand associates being allowed to occupy themselves “supervising the analysts” on such tasks.
Maybe this is group dependent, but I thought VPs are responsible for communicating directly with clients/investors and originating new business. I could definitely see your point if that’s where your role is.
When I interned, I remember a VP called me on a Saturday to do put together some pages. When I called him back with questions, he scoffed at the idea that I would go to him instead of a junior, as he was a “VP.”
No disrespect but this sounds like entirely your fault. You have allowed yourself to be put into this position and you continue to allow it every day. It’s impossible for an IB professional with any backbone and communications skills (let alone an alleged VP) to allow themselves to be consistently putting together creds, profiles, doing intern work, etc while other more junior teammates sit back and relax.
I have seen associates and even senior analysts have something similar happen maybe 1-2 times and then efficiently, quickly, and professionally resolve it either by a personal conversation with teammates (works 85% of the time) or with staffer or MDs (works other 15%).
The fact that it’s gone on so long has probably led to the junior teammates losing all respect for you. Basically you’re just professionally cucked right now. By comparison, if I even THOUGHT about punting bitch work to my VPs, I would fear for my career despite them being very nice people. That’s the level of respect they have earned from us. If they pass on a request from an MD the only question is when they need it by, and if for some extreme reason we can’t agree to a timeframe, they go to the next analyst / associate with more capacity and the situation is resolved. And btw the tasks you’re doing generally get forwarded to our first year analysts, and in extreme cases go to experienced analysts. Go pick up the phone, make some calls, send some emails, and resolve this problem within the next 24 hours.
This
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My juniors don't work till 3am.
In fact the asso went home at 7pm. Analysts work till 12 just like me because they are busy doing all slides supposedly should be asso's work.
I raised this to the D and MD. Feedback I got was the associate is busy on a lot of projects (and analysts have subtly complained to me the associates have done NOTHING).
I am not sure why you are saying I am toxic. I am doing analyst work for deal flashes, creds, case studies and also work on some live situations. Meanwhile the associates are there to "review" the font colors or summarizing slides analysts made into an email to MD with analysts working till 12 to do endless pages of pitches?
So... VP and the analysts do everything, multiple associates but they just hang round being useless. Are they all recent MBA hires or something?
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