Long time lurker/occasional contributor. I’ve made several transitions in my short career thus far- from Big4 Audit to Underwriting at a BB. I’ve found that my jobs have gotten somewhat more interesting as I moved seats though still feel that vast majority of my time (+70%) is spent doing mindless processing/administrative-like work that requires a lot of attention but little thought.
I make a decent living right now but I’m bored out of my mind for much of the time, which got me thinking- is the grass greener on the other side?
Would love to hear about people across the Street and how analytical you find your jobs. Especially hoping to get some color from folks on the investment side (which I hope to get to one day) to hear their thoughts here.
I define analytical as - learning through reading/speaking to people, synthesizing information, distilling your thoughts in the form of memos/models, etc.
What % of your day is spent performing analytical tasks? Would be helpful if people could respond with: role, asset class, type of institution, % of day spent on analytical functions, e.g.:
Equity Analyst, Large Caps, L/S HF, 50% etc.
I'll start- Underwriting, Leveraged Loans, BB, 30%
Hi rando511, any of these threads helpful:
More suggestions...
I hope those threads give you a bit more insight.
bump
LO AM. Typically 70-90%
It all becomes a grind though so think about what makes you happy. I love investing, but I had more fun as a high school assistant teacher.
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Being a bit facetious, but the grass is never greener. Growing up is learning that it's brown everywhere.
1st-Year Investment Associate, Private Equity, MM/LMM, 75%+ of my day is analytical, based on your definition. I really enjoy my job and I work with a great group of people. The work is intellectually stimulating, I'm comped fairly well, and the hours are heaven-on-earth compared to what I was doing in banking. I'm 6 months in and I have no real complaints. Does that answer your question?
What are hours like? And weekend work?
Depends where you work, obviously. In my case, I probably average like 60-65 hours/week in the normal course of business; when on a live deal you might see like 80 for a few weeks, depending on the stage of the deal and the type of deal, and on the rare occasion it will drift above that. Weekend work depends mostly on how much you got done during the week. It's not like banking where you have somebody above you cramming specified tasks down your throat under specified deadlines. People generally trust you to get your work done as needed and on-time however we see fit. If that means working until 3am on Friday and having the entire weekend to ourselves until Monday, then more power to you. You can generally count on like ~4-8 hours of weekend work if you assume log off Friday at ~7pm. So, it's definitely not a cake walk, but the hours are overall better than banking. I would caveat this by saying that the hours are ~different~ from banking as well. There is no "down time"; it's all gas no brakes from the minute you wake up until you log off for the night for the most part. The hours are also inherently more stressful because you're taking on more responsibility with less direct oversight, which for most former IB analysts is uncharted territory.
Thanks, that is helpful. What would you say the breakout was when you were in IB?
And do you feel like this analytical work you currently do directly contributes to the investment decision making process? Or is it more like the MD decided you're going after this target and you're validating his/her assumptions?
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