Hi all,
I know post-MBA banking is generally a career decision, but I'm wondering what interesting exits people have seen from the post-MBA level in banking. I have a solid finance background and am thinking about going into banking post-MBA, but I'm worried that the options are essentially only: 1) stay in banking forever, 2) exit to PE, or 3) exit to corp dev type roles. Consultants get the interesting strategy and business leadership roles. Do theses ever happen for ex-post-MBA bankers? Have you seen ex-bankers do anything interesting in management/strategy? Curious what people have seen.
Thanks!
Bump?
I've seen people go all over the place post-banking (with an MBA), including various startups, business strategy roles (Chief Strategy Officer, VP of Strategy, etc.), a few in operations, some are now at the level of CEO / CFO / COO (of a business that they didn't start). A handful went into other areas of a business like HR or Sales and a few actually went into consulting. However, the majority take one of the paths that you mentioned so it's really about what is going to be most available to you as opportunities. If you want to do strategy at a business, I would recommend seeing what you can find directly post-MBA.
That’s interesting to hear the diversity of exits you’ve seen. I wonder if most people do corp dev/PE out of lack of options to do strategy or because they just like finance roles more (which would make sense for Ed-bankers). Regardless, I am considering banking first because I genuinely like it; just not sure if I’ll ever want to be in a more strategic role.
It's probably a mix of a handful of things. Those roles are marketed to you in banking, so they are easy to find and get interviews (most people don't love hustling to find opportunities). They also have similarities to banking with a new flavor to them, so you get to step out of your comfort zone a bit but not in a drastic way. Like you mentioned, individuals may like finance and these roles preserve some of the things that they enjoy, while offering new challenges and experiences. I also think they are risk-averse options in the sense that you are unlikely to fail at them because you have a skillset built to transition into them (many have walked the path before and been just fine).
The more diverse options are much harder to find and you have to convince someone that you are well-equipped for it over someone that may have more direct experience. I think it's pretty doable and you can make the argument that putting a good "business athlete" in a strategy or other role should work out well.
You could start a searchfund…
Have actually considered that (or just outright buying an operating company) as an option. The risk there though is a bit high for my personality.
If fundamentally, you find corporate strategy more interesting than corp dev, I don’t really understand why you’d do banking over consulting in the first place…
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