Heard a story of a diverse candidate getting a job over someone who was actually the best candidate...
Heard a story of a diverse candidate getting a job over someone who was actually the best candidate...seeing this more and more. Apparently, had they not met the diversity criteria, they would have been way below the basic benchmark to even apply and wouldn't have even been eligible (gpa, experience, etc). At what point does one hire the best candidate instead of the minority/gender preferred that HR wants? Have heard it's very hard to work with people who are hired based on criteria not related to being the best candidate...
If you don’t want to work with black people or women, just join a Latam team or Asia team. They’ll welcome your beliefs with open arms
Who cares what their race/ethnicity/gender is...the best candidate should get the job regardless if they are Asian or black or white.
They dont got hot latinas in LATAM groups?
Does this actually ever happen? From what I've seen and heard the diversity shit doesn't even help the targeted communities the way it's intended, as it's usually candidates from well educated and well off families that these opportunities help most. Candidates who probably would've been successful anyway.
No bank would ever take subpar candidates just for the sake of quotas.
Every bank takes subpar candidates for this purpose...you should see the shit asked to the candidates in the diversity/gender targeted interviews too...hardest question is why do you want to work here... that's at G S
I'm calling BS on that. Btw you sound lame asf, did you not get an offer or something?
As someone who has been through both BB and EB interviews, BB interviews are normally just very easy and nowhere near as technical
i know a black guy at Point72 who has a double major in Economics and Nuclear Physics from Brown University with a stellar GPA. People still try to argue that he wasn't qualified enough to get the job even though he's killing it at that HF. Don't listen to OP saying banks take subpar diverse candidates, to people like him/her black or minority candidates will never ever be up to par no matter their background.
Lol a double major in Economics and Nuclear Physics at Brown isn't respectable at all. First off, a double major at Brown means diddly squat. Their open curriculum means that any shithead can take 69 classes in Gender Studies and still declare a major in EECS. Second, Brown literally has the most atrocious grade inflation in the "Ivy League", (that's saying a lot, since we have shit-tier grade inflators like H and P where the average GPA is 3.88).
That black "human" sounds utterly unqualified. His double major is a facade to appear intelligent to those unaware of Brown's bullshit open curriculum.
Seen this countless times, like straight-up direction of "we can't hire [x group], it has to be [a, b, c, or d group]." It's very real, very illegal, and really shows you what a clown show all of this shit has become. I cannot think of a worse, or dumber, way of solving historical inequality by introducing and perpetuating present-day inequality. It's going to be ugly when the pendulum swings back.
The worst is all of the people that rabidly defend it and completely deny any of it is even going on. We all know it is, it’s happening at all levels of society, the only deniers are those that fully support it. It’s for that reason I find it scary because the people pushing it seem to be doing it with malice rather than trying to make things better.
It's pure lunacy. So grateful I graduated years ago and not into this current mess.
More LPs are asking about diversity within firms than ever before. There must be value-add otherwise firms wouldn’t pursue it.
Additionally, how is an emphasis on diverse hiring practices perpetuating inequality? Who is being undermined when a firm hires someone from a diverse background?
Re-read my post. I've seen hiring for a seat before where the direction was that it cannot be a person from [demographic x or y]. That is the very definition of discrimination. I don't think it's possible to explain that any more clearly.
The extra value that this most qualified candidate brings is less than the bank's reputation. Banks don't want to be accused of discrimination.
Honesty, it doesn’t take much to be “qualified” to do banking. It’s fairly basic work and during training it teaches you from scratch. I can’t speak for every bank, but at my EB the women/blacks do just as well as everyone else. Maybe they knew less finance/had less experience when they were sophomores going through recruiting, but they all have good GPAs and most are from top schools. Last year, the resumes for the diversity event all had 3.8+ except for like 2 kids
Id rather work in an office with hot bitches instead of in a cockfest of pale virgins who think they’re smart because they could do a paper LBO in their sophomore year
this, I'm unironically glad the diversity stuff exists. For two very simple reasons:
1) more women, so don't have to deal with a nasty ass sausage fest of incels
2) Don't know you, don't care, I'm already in, so not really my problem lmfao (good luck hardos)
Literally this lol
And when they take your simp balls as they get promoted over you, they still won’t have sex with you.
I'm all for diversity if it means we get some more quality trust fund WASPy broads from Dartmouth, USC or UMiami into my workplace. Problem is, those girls aren't interested because 90 hour work weeks don't appeal to their pea-sized brain when daddy is a global head at Apollo. So we're stuck with ghetto, impoverished criminals like Africxn-Americans or Latinxs.
fck u. racist loser
All interviews should be the same, no candidate should have easier questions than others no matter what
This is actually not true. Banks want the best candidates they can get, at both ANL and ASO level. That’s the pipeline for future VP/D/MD.
You were not the best candidate if you didn't get the job lol. Similar to how you can get all the technical questions right and still not get the job if interviewer/team does not think you are a good fit/likeable. Best candidate in banking is more than just how 'smart' you are - it is a relationship-based industry afterall.
I am diversity and to say that the questions I get aren’t easier is crazy talk. Went through a diversity event that lead to a superday and I barely got asked any technicals and it was all behavioral. I even went through EB full time recruiting and someone who went through the same process said theirs was harder. So I don’t know. Would I be in the position where I am today if it weren’t for diversity? Maybe.
I'm a nobody...I spent some time in the military and now go to a target, but from what I've seen as a sophomore prospect, I don't think things have changed much. The advantages have just swung to another demographic. Should the Philips Exeter kid at a target have a freshman summer internship at a MM PE firm? Did guys like Ken Moelis have to "grind the 400-question finance guide" to make sure they landed the job at Drexel back in the early 80's? What about the MD/Partner that pulls some strings to get their kid into the firm? Shit, even Schwartzman acknowledged that the interview process has become so technical that he probably wouldn't have landed a job a Blackstone when he was coming up in today's environment.
All of this to say, I humbly suggest that technicals and some stats are overblown. Clients care about diversity, therefore the street must care about diversity. These clients seem to not want a bunch of white shoe bankers who went to the right school advising them.
.
Couldn't agree more
The diversity meme has to end bro, it's the same dynamic as taxes in big cities:
"NO, NOOOOO NNONOMOONONOOOO, you just CAN'T let the TWO black girls get MY spot, NO NOMONONONO this will DESTROY banking."
>>ignores targets, ignores people more qualified than them, ignores networking harder, ignores prepping better, ignores improving their resume, ignores applying to more places, etc.
"NO, NOOONONONONOO NOT MY TAXES, do you REALLY think I want these COMMUNISTS taking my SACRED 2% of income taxes and WASTING THEM on PUBLIC EDUCATION???? HAHA you IDIOT!"
>>ignores federal defense budget, ignores foreign aid, ignores social security and other state socialism, ignores tax evasion, ignores tax avoidance, ignores government officials stealing, ignores 'humanitarian aid', etc
It depends. Some firms do have quotas they need to hit. Perhaps they had multiple best candidates they already extended offers to and this was just bad luck of the draw.
To your last point on difficulty working with those based on criteria not related to being the best candidate. I assume 'best' means 1) technically efficient/knowledgable, 2) high understanding of the firm's business, 3) is a personality fit, and 4) comes from schools that are widely considered targets. Typically, I'd say those types--assuming they aren't total jerks--are easy to work with because they fit the mold. This does not imply, however, those different from those types are somehow challenging to work with. Maybe the beginning requires some polishing, but they weren't hired solely for their diversity. If that were the case, then anyone could be hired. I think--and I'm not commenting on if this is right or wrong--most people suffer from Availability bias here and they automatically assume all diversity hires that beat out qualified non-diverse candidates are underqualified/won't be good at the job. I don't know the answer, but is there any hard evidence that supports this? Meaning, more frequently than not there is a higher probability of a diversity hire being a 'bad' employee/teammate? Not just the anecdotal 'I heard of this guy...' but an actual pattern?
Either way, if you go into it thinking this person will be a failure, bad, whatever, and treat them as such, then it is a self-fulfilling prophecy. I'm not saying become the most hyper SJW or be disingenuous and if the person truly is underperforming and it is impacting the team/firm, then speak up and present the objective facts, but maybe give them a chance first before writing them off.
End overly progressive rant. Thx
I commented this earlier but I'll shamelessly copy and past it because its relevant:
i know a black guy at Point72 who has a double major in Economics and Nuclear Physics from Brown University with a stellar GPA. People still try to argue that he wasn't qualified enough to get the job even though he's killing it at that HF. To people like OP, black or minority candidates will never ever be up to par no matter their background.
I actually saw something similar during my internship, because of the race of another intern, no one was willing to help him with his final project or any mentoring despite the fact he came from MIT, a lot of people from the start threw up their hands and didn't want to offer any assistance, he had to learn everything from silently shadowing and when it was time to present he blew every other intern out the water. Now if he wasn't a genius and was of average intelligence, he would have stumbled a lot during that internship and people will blame "diversity hires" instead of looking inward.
I know this sounds ridiculous, but for your first example he may very well on paper have been less qualified than the majority of his class if he's sitting in a quant research role (which I'm guessing based on the STEM degree). The comp packages are several hundred thousand dollars for a first year and it only goes up. Thus, you see a lot of PhDs and rockstar Master's people in these seats. Getting it out of undergrad, no matter how talented you are is very near impossible unless you had a noteworthy research publication, olympiad experience, and the stellar GPA that your friend has. And even then it's not guaranteed.
I agree that if he's doing well it's a bit silly to keep arguing about his past qualifications, but I'm reasonably confident a lot more has to do with it the fact that he made it with a Bachelor's, not the color of his skin. People who had to spend more years in college and way more in tuition probably feel insecure that an undergrad made it in and is outperforming them. All of this is to say that race is definitely not the major factor at play here.
Justice Thomas put a 25 cent sticker on his Ivy League law degree because he said that’s it’s value after affirmative action. Best he can do is have a chip on his shoulder and advocate for ending these racist policies in the future.
From the bank's point of view, it's better to have a more diverse group of bankers. Let's be real - a) junior bankers don't need any real technical proficiency to excel at the job (and any that is needed can easily be taught), and b) banking becomes more and more sales orientated as you rise up.
What does this mean? It means banks want a diverse group of juniors who will hopefully one day grow into a diverse group of seniors that will attract business from the increasingly diverse corporate world. F500 CEOs are 90% white men today - that will likely not be the case in 20, 30 years and it will absolutely provide banks and other middlemen an advantage to have diverse bankers to attract more business.
At the end of the day, the kid who got every single complex technical right and knows how to do a paper LBO will likely be just as good of an analyst as the English major who knows the 3 valuation methods after going through the training program. Prior knowledge / technical skills from school and self study do not translate to being an actually good analyst.
If companies only wanted to hire the best candidates, they would forgo interviews all together and hire the guy with the most impressive resume. How do you know the minority or woman in this case wasn't just more personable?
Because the "best" also means having social skills. They can pretty much tell by who was a varsity athlete or frat/sorority star, but interviews filter out the unintelligble, stammering idiots.
Written like someone who has never passed an interview round in his life
https://twitter.com/conceptualjames/status/1492282568741466122?s=21
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