How Many Calls to land Top SA

Kinda a dumb question given how much nuance is involved with recruiting, but it’s late and I’m bored.

Say you wanted to land first rounds at ~2 EBs, 2–3 BBs, and a couple of strong MM shops. Roughly how many total networking calls do you think the average person would need?

Assume you go to a solid school but not a super target and aren’t some insane networker, but you’re still above average and generally have solid conversations

What does that translate to on a per firm basis 5 calls/firm? 10? 15+?

Obviously there’s a huge difference between 10 shit calls and 10 calls where you actually build relationships and eventually get a referral, but curious as to what people’s experiences were.

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Think a solid goal is to talk to all the alumni from your school at that specific firm, which I'd imagine based on your post ("solid" "not super target") is 5-10 per bank. Issue with recruiting is there's too many variables and they're all out of your control (e.g. you don't know who has final call in giving interviews, you don't know who's actually willing or free to help recruit > managing their busy schedule). Try to email everyone you can and get as many people on the phone as you can, then you'll have left no stone unturned. 

Otherwise, what if that one person you were too lazy to call could've been the one who got you an interview? You'll never know.

 

Not about number at all, did 100 and got 5 interviews (ultimately landing at lower BB), main thing is finding who the decision maker is and getting close to them. EB interviews are pretty easy to come by imo just need a few good chats, but for BB it’s about getting lucky and getting along with who’s in charge (u can have tons of great calls but if they aren’t with VP+ who’s in the mood to vouch for u it’ll mean nothing). Around 80% of spots will be for nepo kids, so very large portion is out of your control and you can literally be perfect and still get nothing. Would expect 1 superday and 2-3 total interviews if ur a normal recruit (think 3.8+, 1 to 2 IB/PE internships, few leadership roles, etc). Lots of times u can do really well and still get fucked for a nepo kid. Best of luck, it’s a really awful process, but it’s worth it imo when thinking about rewards down the line. Focus on VPs, they seem to be highest ROI in terms of power and willingness to engage (the latter being more important) 

 

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