“I am passionate about IB”

Agree 100%. 

I have no idea what job I would be working that would be cooler than what I currently do. I catch myself talking my friend or family's ears off about whatever deal I'm working on, all the time. 

However, I work at a reasonable firm that has reasonable work expectations for me. If you're getting cranked at a sweatshop I would imagine that sucks the joy out of the job nearly immediately. 

Yep, i was gonna disagree on OP's statement but saw that he's an (alleged) M&A analyst so i figured he's entitled to his opinion. What i can say that u can absolutely be passionate for FINANCE, not IBD - i figured OP could be referring to that.

i cba arguing/expading but do you think this is really passion about the job itself? because to me it sounds like you're passionate about success and used the job as a means to an end. sure, you find it interesting but does the underlying passion lie in the job itself or a passion for success, which manifested through ib?

Deal Team Six

I think you are completely wrong.

You can absolutely be passionate about IB, and the fact that you dont understand that is surprising given that you are allegedly an M&A analyst 1. 

Getting into IB alone takes passion. Other than HF / PE, find me other areas of finance that take the same amount of time / effort to get into.

You have to learn about complex financial models (most students build them in their limited free time to understand how they work) and study 10s to 100s of pages of technical questions. God forbid you want work at leading EB, in which case youve probably studied technicals for 100-200+ hours. This is dedication, which is usually a bi-product of passion. 

IBD is actually pretty cool. Working with C-suite members who make potentially billion dollar decisions every month is pretty interesting. You have more responsibility than just about anyone else your age, especially within finance. You are entering a field where you get to think critically from day one. People always say IBD doesnt require thought at the analyst level, but I bet you ever single top bucket analyst disagrees. Pulling the absolute best comps certainly does, especially for companies that bleed into multiple industries. Coming up with the right projections for the DCF certainly does. Carefully wording your emails to PE funds in order to get bids in before IOI deadlines does too, or you risk offending someone who may never forget it. 

So in summation, if getting in requires a lot of hard work and time, and the result is exciting, how are people not passionate about it? You are forced to go so above and beyond to get into IBD that if you arent passionate about it but still made it, congrats you are 100x smarter than me. I personally couldnt have landed my IBD internships alone without an extremely high level of passion. With the level of competition today, I doubt many people (except for 4.0 HYP kiddos) are getting IBD offers without some level of passion

Lol I agree getting into IB takes dedication but this is a bit cringe. Nobody is thinking of what comps to pull as an analyst; your VP/MD probably tells you to pull some old comps file and then you spend hours doing mindless spreads. DCF projections in banking are literally just dropping in board approved numbers and updating templates. No PE fund is going to make a decision to bid or not bid because of how you worded an email as an analyst.