I go to Harvard, class of 2008. I'm reasonably sure many of you here go to my school, and probably sit in my classes. Just thought I'd give a brief rundown of what I thought the recruiting process was like here for investment banking. This does not apply to S&T, though I did apply to S&T jobs as well.
Information meetings: All the BBs did these. The 'serious' candidates went, most people didn't. These are mostly useless unless you meet an analyst or HR person that you really click with. Otherwise, there's no correlation between showing up for these and getting interviews. So if you're busy and don't love networking, there's no point.
Cover letters: Also useless, at least for the larger banks. They spend 15-20 seconds on each candidate out of a massive resume book, so no one cares about your cover letter. They might spot-check though, so don't be too much of a douche.
Resume: All-important. Make it pretty, round up your GPA if you have to. Spend hours and hours on this. Send it to your friends for peer review. Do everything you can to make sure it's perfect, because this is pretty much all they care about.
Getting interviews: A citigroup HR person told me that over 300 people applied for 30 interview slots for investment banking. It's probably worse for GS/MS. At a school like Harvard, that means that it is an intensely competitive selection process. It also means that getting interviews can be a total crapshoot, especially when so many of your peers have 3.6+ and prior summer internship experience. A few kids got a ton of interviews, and there seemed to be the same crowd at every interview, so I'd say the same pool of 50-70 kids were the ones who got interviews for the BBs. The kids who got interviews came from all sorts of backgrounds. I'm not an economics major, nor were many of the people interviewing. They tell you that not having a finance experience is ok, but if you look at the competition, you basically have to do something finance related your sophomore summer if you don't have a 3.9+. I did a finance internship, and it helped.
Interview process: Highly fit-oriented. We're not Wharton. Also a bit of a crapshoot. People here are very well spoken and always prepared, so it was a matter of getting inteviewers that you clicked with. A few technical questions, but nothing that can't be found in the vault guide. A few of the firms had one-round processes, but most had two, some had both on campus. No one got final rounds or offers from all of their interviews.
Getting hired: I ended up with a few offers from BBs and will be working at a top tier bank in nyc. People like to think that Harvard kids will get hired by BBs for sure. This is not the case. Most people who want to do investment banking do not get jobs through the recruiting process. GS/MS/LEH hire a lot of candidates from harvard, but for investment banking specifically, LEH takes 5-7, MS takes 5-7, GS around 7-10. A few of those spots are "reserved" for minority candidates that don't go through SEO. Similar story for JPM, CITI, and the rest. Some boutiques do show up, notably Lazard, though they take even fewer, anywhere from 1 to 3. In total you're looking at less than 50 summer analyst hires at the "prestigious" investment banks in investment banking. It's a very competitive process to say the least.
Conclusion: Get a finance internship sophomore year. Get a 3.6+. Anything less, and you're at risk. Polish your resume. Read the vault guide. Read the WSJ. Network, but realize that from a highly-recruited target it might not do you that much good. Recognize that luck is at least 30% of the process.
I would like to hear about how people on the board have done, especially guys from other schools. Wharton, anyone?
Not too hard to get a 3.6 with the rampant grade inflation at Harvard. I believe the median gpa is around there.
Hard part is getting in the first place...
i understand that its competitive, but you are talking pure campus recruiting. most of us get into ibanking not through our university, but through connections and contacts. You have a shot at every bank who is coming for u, but in addition to that you still can get interviews through contacts and network, so you are pretty much have twice the chance of getting interviews. Also much easier to get internships your freshman and sophomore year coming from harvard, as not as prestigious companies such as the big 4 and other fortune 500 companies love harvard kids
but it still SIGNIFICANTLY increases the odds of getting a job.
For arguments sake, let's say the average hiring rate at Bulge Brackets is 1% of all the applications they receive. (I think this is roughly accurate based on my own recruiting classes and some friends' classes).
Just using the numbers in the post above, assume there are 50 spots for Harvard kids out of 300 who want them. That's a 16.7% chance of getting a job.
16.7% > 1% by a huge margin. Even if the hire rate is 5%, that margin is still huge.
Secondly, let's talk about getting interviews. The problem when you go to a non-target is that you are not only competing against other people at your school, rather you are competing against ALL OTHER non-target schools for SIGNIFICANTLY FEWER SPOTS!
For Harvard (again using the numbers in the post above) 30 out 300 will get interviews. So that's 10%. BUT what is even more important is that of those 30, 5-7 will get jobs!
Now take a non-target, maybe there are only a few kids at each non-target school, but the number of non-target schools is massive. Where it gets troublesome is that for ALL of these non-targets there may only be 2-3 spots available. So even you get a similar interview percentage (10%, which, you don't, it's probably less than 5% of all non-targets get interviewed), you are still competing for fewer positions.
Just to finish this off with one final point, the post mentions that it was often the same people getting interviews. This is another huge point. Many people at target schools interview with multiple banks, which again increases their odds of getting something. It gives them practice and prepares them for it.
As a non-target student, you are extremely lucky if you get an interview with even one bank, and then you have to nail it first time.
So while a target school is no guarantee, there should be absolutely no argument about it "being harder" to get a banking job from a target because of "all the competition." It's just a fallacy.
I go to Stern, definitely a target school. It's pretty interesting - Competition's always really tough here, and I always think in the back of my head, "damn, those Harvard and Wharton kids probably have it so easy compared to us." That's kind of funny though.
For my school, it's a bit different. Not only do you need the 3.5+ and have to have some kind of ridiculous knowledge of the markets, but it's the norm to have a BB bank or big hedge fund job on your resume - it's near impossible without it (unless you have a 3.9/4.0). I guess it's a blessing and a curse that comes with going to school in Manhattan.
But yes, the recruiting process seems very similar with Harvard. Tough competition, and a select, specific quota for most recruiters to fill, usually around 5-7 per bank, for IBD /S&T.
It's damn hard to get anything above a 3.3 here. The Stern curve is notorious for a reason, I suppose.
Non-targets - good luck. I have a couple of friends dispersed throughout other non-target schools, and if they even win a spot, it's with a less prestigious location, or division. Almost never Manhattan, or key headquarters. Good luck with the chase.
Do you mean that to get a junior year internship, you need previous BB or hedge fund experience - or are you talking about getting the full-time position?
It's late and I loathe to write long posts. Thing that jumped out at me the most this recruiting season (for juniors) was that each kid I know that has a 3.9+ did not get an interview with GS.
oh wow...how did that happen?!
Though it would be different from school to school, I'll take a shot at telling the non-target story..
Background: * Attending a state school known more for athletics than academics (aren't they all, though?)
July - August: Since I was already in NYC, I decided to do some informationals with a few of the BBs. Reception at any of them was lukewarm at best. Everyone told me the process was going to be very difficult, and the BBs would have only 10-15 spots for all the non-targets combined.
September - November: Made 2 additional trips to NYC for pre-1st round interviews at the BBs, essentially meeting with analysts and associates who would grill me with technical questions to make sure I wasn't an idiot, and some behavioral and fit questions to make sure I could engage in conversation without breaking into a flopsweat. Analysts/Associates would then report back to HR giving a thumbs up/down.
Concurrently completed online applications, and emailed any connections at banks asking if they could "pull" for me to get an interview.
November - January: Got invited for 1st round interviews at different times for each of the BBs. This means having to drop everything with 2-3 days notice, fly up to NYC at my own expense, stay in a hotel, all for a 1 hour interview. Only one bank allowed me to do the 1st round over the phone. My interviewers were 2nd/3rd year analysts/associates also from non-target schools. Interviews were typically 1/2 behavioral/fit and 1/2 technical, which I thought was strange since all of my friends at target schools reported having their initial rounds be primarily fit.
January - February: Received invitations for final rounds from a few BBs, but quite a few of them told me I wouldn't be interviewing until target recruiting was finished (Early - Mid March). Fuck that. 4 of the BBs actually interviewed non-targets prior to targets, so these were the ones I would be focusing on. Final interview dates ranged from middle of January to middle of February.
Final Rounds: HR would either give non-targets their own superday, or split us up and fit us into any remaining spots from target superdays. For some reason, 2 of my superdays were with people from Columbia. Asking around, I got the impression that there were usually 5 non-target kids interviewing for 1 spot, unless we were placed into a target school's superday in which case we were competing with that school's candidates for the general offer pool.
Approximate average stats of a non-target candidate who made it to superday (based on my experience):
Offers: Based on my experiences with 4 firms, every single one of my offers was exploding, usually with a 1-2 week deadline, and heavy pressure from the people you interviewed with to accept. During the final rounds, a question I got from 50+% of interviewers was some form of "If I give you an offer right now, would you accept?"
I'm not sure if this is the same with target school candidates, but other firms I was interviewing with were very open to moving up my interview date and accommodating me as soon as they learned that I had an offer from another BB.
Conclusion: If you want to get into a BB from a non-target, be prepared to make a lot of trips to NYC on your own dime. Unlike target schools, there is no formalized recruiting process - your interview date is whenever they can free up a couple of their analysts to talk with you.
In my experience, it was very difficult to get to the final rounds, but once I was there, I felt I had an advantage compared to kids at target schools because I was immediately separated from the remaining candidates.
As has been mentioned countless times on this forum, if you're from a non-target, it is not impossible to get into a BB, but it is going to take a LOT of initiative on your part.
YMMV.. Back to finals prep.
streetluck...that sounds really intense
This is an exceptional description of how it works for non-targets.
You have to create your network and kick the door in at these places to even have a shot at interviewing.
If you think that simply submitting an application online and waiting to be called is the way to go, you will usually be waiting a long time.
If you want it badly, you'll do whatever it takes. Fortunately, some people still respect that.
Its the same thing for associate level recruitment at B Schools as well. A previous stint as an analyst helps get interviews, same crowd etc etc. If you are a brilliant candidate, you can give up on networking. Else you need to do what everyone else does, even if there is no correlation with interview invites. I would further say that at Harvard its more difficult to outshine your peers compared to other unis. So networking with alumni, and there are tonnes of those..helps...only for the first interview though.
I come from a non target and I definitely did everything street luck mentioned to land an SA role...doesn't work if you don't - you almost always have to show them how badly you want the opportunity
similar to the uk "target" schools, oxbridge and the london unis (lse, ucl, imperial). very competitive, reliant on previous finance, good post veritas1234. Here in europe we put more stock in numericals and group exercises though.
Oxbridge and LSE are def targets i'd say....but from there onwards...the rest is up for grabs isnt it?
veritas, i've been told that analysts do skim cover letters. every so often you get the guy that goes on and on about the merits of working for Morgan Stanley on his Credit Suisse cover letter.
so pretty much u have to be a retard to not get a gig in ibanking at harvard
gsmsml, I'm guessing you don't go to harvard. For summer internships at BBs, there are way more people who want the job than actual places. If you are talking about fulltime positions including noname boutiques, then yes, most people who want to do banking get jobs. But for the BBs, it is still very competitive. The average GPA here is a 3.3, not a 3.6.
Actually, it is a 3.4
Who cares? The average student at Harvard is head and shoulders above 99% of the student body at most colleges, except the other ivys and a few select other schools. I'd rather work with an "average" 3.4 from Harvard than a 3.8 from Bucknell anyday.
How about a Harvard student with a gpa of 3.4 (average gpa) vs. a MIT/Princeton student with a gpa of 3.0-1 (average gpa)? Banks will not put these candidates on the same platform. That's my point; it's easier to construct that golden resume at H because of this. It's even worse at Yale and some other top notch schools.
i would agree with the original post. i'd revise the GPA significantly downwards for students with outside connections (parents, clubs, teams, etc) to make it through the 1st screen for interviews.
given the highly fit nature of the interviews, you need only prove a high level of confidence in something - economics, squash or crew.
Is it possible for a freshman at Harvard to get an internship?
what kind?
Anything related to iBanking? If so, where would I start looking? Does GS hire freshmen interns?
It doesn't have to be illustrious, just anything to get my feet wet.
anyone that can hold a conversation can get a non paid pwm internship. being from harvard you may very well be able to get something better. if you do something unpaid, check if you can get money from harvard. cornell has grants for students doing unpaid internships.
On top of this being the case at Harvard, might the same apply to Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and then Columbia, Duke, Penn Arts and Sciences, Brown, and Dartmouth (possibly higher GPA requirements for the non-top Ivies?)
I went to one of those and the process was pretty much the same as the one described for Harvard.
veritas, any idea how many people the top management consulting firms (M/B/B) hire from harvard?
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