Lack of diversity in Banking/Finance
Let me start off by making a couple of points:
Everything I will say is strictly my opinion or experiences that I have had
My experiences have led me to have a certain mindset and I am simply posting to see if anyone else feels this way or has any comments
To keep it simple, I think there is a major diversity issue in Banking. From my personal experiences, I have seen over 40 banks where the team is literally nothing but white people. I have been to super-days where 100% of the employees in a bank are White. The one rare non-white person you will see will be working as a receptionist. I recently went to a super-day where there were 53 people there in total. 3 of them were minorities, 50 of them white. Now I understand that there is a way larger population of white people in general to minorities but I personally do not think this is all by coincidence. I am also not saying that these people are being racist against minorities but someone please help me understand why this is. I understand Finance is a white dominated industry, but I honestly do not think that minorities are given a fair chance in Banking.
This has gotten to the point where I feel inferior in an interview when there is a white male also interviewing. I don't expect anyone that is white to understand how I feel because it is very difficult to explain when you are the minority. Is there anyone that also feels this or am I the only person?
This issue extends far beyond banking/finance. Think about how competitive the IB process is, for example. Most of the kids that make it have basically been groomed for it. Went to a great private school and got straight A's, made it to a target school and started networking and leveraging their resources from day 1 in order to get in front of the right people.
Now consider this - 39% of African-American children/adolescents and 33% of Latinos in the US are living at the poverty level. I'm a minority that was blessed enough to grow up with a supportive family, amazing resources, and the right mindset to break into IB; however, many are not as fortunate. I have a friend who grew up in the inner city. His school system was drug/gang ridden and provided close to 0 opportunity to succeed. He had never heard of the SAT/ACT until the end of his junior year. His dad wasn't around, his mom was on drugs and he took care of his little sister. He could list at least 10x the amount of people he knew that had been shot or had gone to jail than had gone to college. He was lucky enough to be one of the most gifted athletes in the country and had people take him under his wing to make sure that he could make it to the next level.
My point is this - Many minorities grow up without the resources or platform needed to make it into high finance. That, in combination with the fact that there are far less blacks/Hispanics than there are whites in the US, lead to horrible placement numbers for minorities. All of these diversity organizations and accelerated processes are amazing, but from my experience I've seen that the majority of those kids already had the resources they needed to break in (grew up wealthy, strong family support, went to a target school, etc). *Obviously generalizing here
To fix the diversity numbers in high finance, we first have to fix the systemic issues that have led to minorities making up the vast majority of the lowest socioeconomic class.
Disclaimer - I do know/believe that anyone is capable of breaking in no matter where they start from. I'm just saying the probability of making it as a minority coming from below the poverty line is very low.
I am a minority and not only a regular minority, but an extreme one that is most likely on this forum to run into issues and I've had 0 racial issues dealing with ibankers/doing deals. In general, smart people like the ones you find in banking are not racist.
...and yeah it's not a hiring-issue, it's a societal issue. Keep in mind people were injecting black people with syphillis for shits and giggles until very recently: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_syphilis_experiment
FWIW, I ran into way more overt racism in high school from my teachers and when I was trying to get regular blue collar jobs.
Minorities actually are not given a fair chance. There was a study done years ago where recruiters were given the same resume, but with different names (white name vs black name), and the white named resumes scored higher with the recruiters.
As stated, it's not just in banking. It's a generational issue though. I know it happened to myself. When I graduated college, I didn't really know the different avenues in banking. Actually most people don't. I think that's where a lot of minorities start, and they don't really understand where to go.
Another big part is how to act/dress/talk. They have to be learned. To an extent, a lot of it is inside baseball. One overarching thing also, is people like to be with people they resonate with. Banking is not a zero sum game to get the smartest person, or person who works the hardest; coworkers also have to connect. A white MD might take a slightly less smart associate who is also white (or black or asian) because they can talk about sports vs a someone else who knows very little about sports. I think this goes the other way too, to an extent. Meaning, I think some minorities who grew up poor see the problems in the community and may become a social worker/teacher vs trying to make the most money possible.
On your interviewing issue, what can breed confidence is being prepared. Think about a topic you know really well, vs one you don't. How easy can you talk about the one you know, vs the one you don't. Feel that confidence during an interview.