Law School -> IB Advice Requested
Hi all,
Looking for some advice on my current situation. I just finished up 1L fall and, while I loved certain aspects of it, I'm firmly of the belief that finance generally and banking specifically is the better career path, or at least merits serious consideration.
For a bit of a longer backstory, I grew up wanting to be a lawyer and pretty much had the "traditional" pre-law path: always excelled in verbal subjects and lawyer family (this seems to be the norm at law school); then, in college, a Political Science major + business and English double minor and two Congressional internships. The first exposure to business I had was through my minor in undergrad, and I was surprised at how quickly I took a liking to b-law and finance. I thought that just meant I should look at being a capital markets or bankruptcy lawyer, but I'm beginning to think that banking would make more sense as a full time career.
First, there are the "pull" factors to banking. The things I enjoy about the law - solving complex problems, using analytical thinking, and using a mix of qualitative/quantitative skills - are equally, if not more, applicable to banking. For example, I loved contracts because of how analytical and logical it was. Banking seems like a better way to utilize these skills, at least early on, than law: a lot of young associates at law firms are stuck researching fairly boring issues for a good portion of the time (this may be the case for banking too, but I haven't heard this stressed nearly as much). Banking also seems to be more client-facing and involve more substantive negotiating, presenting, and persuasive speaking/argumentation - the traditional "lawyer" skills - than law, especially early on. Participating in contract negotiating competitions has been one of my favorite parts of law school, but most transactional associates at law firms don't get to participate in a negotiation in any capacity for at least three years - and good luck even getting to take a deposition before 10 years if you're in litigation. Banking also seems to offer more career flexibility: if I hated it, I wouldn't be stuck as a banker forever, unlike law.
Then, there are the push factors from law. Easily the biggest is that the banking culture doesn't seem as nasty and toxic as the law school culture, which has been by far my biggest complaint about law school. I love learning about the law, mostly, but I can not stand the culture. Assuming this doesn't change once you start practicing law, I'm not sure I can stand to be in this type of environment. I don't mind competitiveness, and I generally thrive in high-pressure environments, but the arrogance, pedantry, and willingness to sabotage other people visible throughout my grade is unbearable.
So, my questions are:
Are my observations about banking and banking as compared to law accurate?
If so, what should I be doing to prepare myself for a job in banking? I mentioned this earlier, but I had a business minor, so I have some familiarity with Excel, financial statements, DCF analysis, basic valuation techniques, and so on. I know I need to brush up, but at least it's a starting point. Should I take one of the courses on Excel? Should I apply for the Jd/Mba program at my school? I'm assuming I'm not in a position to apply for roles in finance this upcoming summer, but should I try to apply for an in-house legal position at some bank and try spin it to get a front-office job later down the line?
Useful background information:
-I go to a lower t20 law school on a heavy scholarship, where I haven't received any grades yet. I'm involved with several business-oriented clubs, plus a few that are just for fun. -My undergrad school is overall solid, but not spectacular (the Political Science program is a top program in that field, so it made a ton of sense for my goals at the time). I had a mid-3.8 gpa there, and I was involved with a few academic organizations.
-None of my work experience is really relevant to banking: two Congressional internships and random "fun" jobs
-I don't have a job lined up for next summer yet, but I'm in the initial stages of interviewing for biglaw summer associate positions
-Consider JD/MBA if available at your school
-Network now and maybe do some wall street prep while you have time to be ready for interviews
-Network as much as you can starting now to get ahead of next fall’s summer associate recruiting
-Middle market banks and other balance sheet type banks will likely be most receptive
-Lock down an M&A legal summer associate position to gain talking points for interviews as well as practical knowledge
-Emphasis on the networking and coffee chats. That is how summer associate positions are won.
Thank you; this is all extremely helpful. I’m currently looking into the Jd/Mba program, and it’s doable, but the timeline will be a crunch/the next few months won’t be very relaxing. I’m also applying for generic transactional summer associate jobs (and fund formation jobs in the offices that offer them). I’ll add one of the wall street courses to the list as well. The networking aspect might be a bit of a challenge — I don’t have a ton of connections in banking — but I’m sure that will change if I can get a law firm SA position. Thanks again for the advice; I really appreciate it.
Law SAs do very limited work on live deals, and certainly aren't contacting clients given you're not a licensed lawyer, so don't get your hopes up on meeting bankers during a summer internship. That said it is still relevant work and a natural reason to say you are interested in banking
What is your school's MBA ranking? JD/MBA is an idea, but if you didn't really have meaningful work experience pre-MBA banks won't be interested in you for an associate hire, so I question if it's worth it. What about a finance masters alongside the JD?
Also, banking is not going to be any better on personalities - people are arrogant AF and generally some really toxic personalities throughout the profession. If that is your reason for leaving I would at least give a year of full-time M&A law a try, things can be a lot different than school - work is inherently way more of a team sport, school is very much a competition for internships and rankings. If anything, I think it'd be easier to lateral into banking with some actual M&A law experience, instead of trying to get in from law school. You're in a weird spot where you're past the analyst recruiting stage but not enough work experience for associate recruiting. A year of two of M&A law would get you past that barrier.
Thanks for the reply.
My school’s MBA ranking is top 20. It doesn’t offer a dual degree program for Masters in Finance (or Masters in Econ, for that matter, although I’m not sure if that would be too helpful.
Thanks for the info on SA work. I guess it shouldn’t be a surprise that the SAs don’t work on many important tasks: I’ve heard that most SA assignments are very, very inconsequential.
That’s disappointing to hear about the banking culture, for sure. The law culture wasn’t the only reason I want to switch, but it was a big one. The people at firms do seem happier than the students.
I didnt thoroughly read your post but think I got the gist. I think I can provide some color and for context, I was previously an attorney (briefly) in Big Law. Now in my second year of my MBA and summered as an associate in IB this past summer.
A lot of your analysis and assumptions are directionally correct - however, I think a previous comment nailed it that the personalities aren't much different, but also culture isn't better. It's essentially the same "type" of person; high-achieving, ambitious, etc. Just like you'll find good people in law, you'll find the same in banking but there are definitely tough personalities in both professions. I also noticed you mentioned a lot of the cons of continuing on in law being that "early on" you don't get to do x or y, etc - and while that's definitely true, you'll be stuck doing doc review and researching precedent and issues for a partner with little exposure to clients, etc, the work in law, long term is much more intellectually stimulating and challenging. The analytical rigor and ability to use law and logic to solve issues in an interesting way is greater and you are in a position where the client really can't push back on your analysis or conclusion because you truly are the subject matter expertise. In banking, it's more pandering to the client, even at the senior banker levels, if the client doesn't like or agree with the numbers you came up with, it's changed because they're the client and that's what they want and if you don't, they'll go to the next bank. In law, they have no idea and put full trust in your analysis and counsel. It is true however, that at the junior levels, banking is a much "cooler" job and you get high level exposure to senior bankers as well as C-suite level clients. You're a powerpoint monkey, but I'd take that over doc review any day. The people in law are smarter and wittier but bankers are also smart but i've had several people in bankers tell me the job leads to "brain mush" because apparently after the learning curve, the job isn't challenging anymore and is fairly easy, thus why they say a monkey can do it. The issues and challenges in law are never ending, and therefore I never saw or heard anyone complain about brain mush.
I obviously left law to go to banking so i have my own reasons - i think it's a much better job, personally but there are others who would probably disagree. I have met a bunch of former m&a lawyers who are now bankers. One reason is it feels like bankers "facilitate" deals while lawyers are middlemen doing paperwork and they seemed to be the ones that get shit on when they redline an issue and the deal is in jeopardy. I wasn't there long enough to know if that's true but that's the feedback I've gotten from those folks. It's a proactive vs reactive approach I guess you could say and which side you want to align with. Now for options, I met a couple kids during my mba associate recruiting who were in JD only programs - so there's an option to recruit for summer associate positions after your 2L year - having a network would make this super important as well so I would start networking and doing coffee chats - maybe also use the WSO mentor program to have someone help you with "your story" because that is going to be the most important part of any conversation/interview you have with banks/bankers - I think what you wrote above makes sense but it has to be polished and logically make sense to bankers when they hear why you now want to be in finance and not in law. Other options are go be a lawyer and see how it is for a year - you could probably lateral out after a year (like many have) and into a banking role or you could leave law and go get your mba and get in that way (that's what I did, I DO NOT advise this lol)
This is all super helpful, especially the information about the work losing some of its appeal after the learning curve. I understand that its pretty common for people to switch from banking to other careers, e.g. private equity and hedge fund roles, after 5-10 years. Does the post-learning curve fatigue apply in those situations/finance at large, or is it just a banking thing? Obviously, that’s a long way away, but I think its relevant to at least look at downrange career prospects.
If you’re willing, I’d love to hear why you think banking is a better job. I do think that proactively solving problems instead of reacting to them sounds like a good plan for me.
Thanks
Again, I'm not a full time IB associate yet so I cant speak to the post learning curve fatigue. I think a lot of it comes down to personality type. Some enjoy knowing exactly how to do the job after they feel comfortable in the position. I also realized through my internship and speaking with many other bankers and people in different finance roles that my lifespan in IB will be limited because, in my opinion, it has its own drawbacks for my personality type. I am already having networking conversations with the buyside with the goal of leaving after 1-2 years in IB.
To answer why I think banking is a better job than law, I would reiterate some of the things I mentioned above; I also felt like I was a middle man in law and didnt enjoy being in the reactive role. I also just find finance very interesting compared to some esoteric legal concepts and I HATED being a junior lawyer. There is a huge disconnect between law school and the actual practice of law which was disenchanting for me. Further, like you mentioned, the exit options from IB are more broad and interesting than from being a law associate.
Nah I get what you mean about the law school culture. I used to be in med school and it was similar to that. I actually ended up doing a year in our adjacent business school and the med students were more toxic than the kids from other degrees who were going into finance. I think it's something to do with how med and law students are always together and literally competing against each other whilst also being pigeon holed into the same career. For example at least in banking your peers will go into a variety of exit opps and many may leave finance altogether whereas in law and med its basically you all competing against each other for the rest of your career. Which i think generates a more toxic culture of competitiveness.
I think the curve and the limited 1L summer options are a huge part of it. I’m generally very competitive, but it gets kind of annoying when the competitiveness manifests itself in petty/stupid ways. I’ve heard that, generally, it improves after law school, but there’s always a certain degree of toxicity in the practice.
How did you go from med school to finance and spin that? That seems like a much bigger shift than law-finance, although having the med school background, I’m guessing, was certainly more impressive to employers than a law degree
Yeah 100%. It's so annoying when you try and ask people questions or help with stuff and you can sense they don't want to tell you so you feel like you're dragging it out of them.
I'm in the UK so med is undergrad here so recruiting was a lot more straightforward than what I expected as it was basically just recruiting like everyone else. Also in the UK the course you study doesn't really matter at least compared to the US so it was more of a plus that I had a "diverse" background compared to other people studying more common degrees.
Another thing to keep in mind is that there are areas of the financial profession where legal knowledge is more applicable, so more complex areas like restructuring or takeover defense might value a story that says this is bringing my two interests/passions together. Competing with MBAs who went back to school just to get a banking job and have somewhat applicable finance/investing experience would be a tougher battle in the more generalist programs/roles.
Awesome; I’ll definitely check those areas out. Do you have to articulate a clear interest in one specific practice area in Ib? If not, is it at least helpful to? I ask because a fair number of summer associate legal positions let you rotate between multiple practice groups that can be as diverse as tax to corporate to litigation to IP. So, I’m curious if banking is similar
Banking analysts/associates don't rotate. Analyst offers are sometimes generalist with placement happening later, as an associate you usually recruit directly into a specific industry or product group, so you have to have a reason / knowledge of that area. Many MBAs recruit for their pre-MBA industry because it's a natural move.
Restructuring is definitely a very law-friendly group given the amount of complexity involved but you have to know your stuff to land RX. There is a whole separate group of technicals, timing runs earlier than other groups, etc.
For context, I am someone who is about to graduate law school and work in an investment banking role. I am not going to talk much about the actual job of ib/pe/vc/etc but I can provide you with a lot of insight in regards to what you can do to make yourself as attractive of a candidate for full-time roles as possible.
To begin with, you need to be able to explain why you went to law school and why you are interested in finance now. There are many ways to respond to this but this will be something you need to be able to handle comfortably.
Don’t focus on legal internships. They aren’t bad or anything but try to get an M&A-type internship this summer. Don’t worry too much about if it is IB or not as most those opportunities are probably unavailable to you now. Look at corporate development roles. Also, look at M&A tax or transaction advisory roles at the larger accounting firms (Big 4, Grant Thornton, etc). I had an M&A tax internship and I was able to work on $30b deals, internal restructurings for $40b companies, and spinoffs for $22b companies. I can put “Summer M&A Associate” on my resume and I explain my job as doing due diligence on M&A deals and working on corporate restructurings. I didn’t focus on the tax part of my work when interviewing. I focused on the M&A part. M&A tax is a very execution-based role. You don’t really do strategic work. There is no “why do this deal?” It is all “Here is what the client is trying to do so help the client execute it.” It isn’t perfect. IB roles or corp dev roles would likely be better for you but M&A tax teams often hire a lot of lawyers so they won’t be turned off by that. It may actually be a benefit. The point is you want to get some type of M&A role for this summer. That will open up a lot more opportunities for you for the summer after 2L. You can stick in M&A work. You’ll be able to pivot to most fields in finance (outside of larger pe/vc firms and other opportunities like that) with that background. If you can’t get an internship like that this summer, don’t worry. You should try to do work as close to IB as you can. Most recruiting for internships this summer at law firms won’t allow you to choose a specific field like securities law or M&A. Those internships are often very generic, you get placed where they need help, or rotational. If you can find legal opportunities that allow you to get that specific experience that is good too although that will be a challenge. I know tax sucks (I am a cpa who interned in a tax field so I know the pain) but that is where a lot of opportunities likely would be. There are a ton of roles on the tax side of transactions. If there is a specific industry you are interested in (like I am with aerospace and defense), you could look for in-house legal internships. This wouldn’t be ideal but if you want to have an industry focus this is not a bad option.
You need to network. You won’t need to know everyone down to the janitor at every firm but you need to have people see you as an actual human and not just an applicant. This is fairly standard advice for non-traditional applicants so you probably heard this before but you need to take this to heart.
Your grades will matter. You need to be competitive with the finance undergrads. That puts you behind the 8 ball because those grades are harder to get on a law school curve.
Feel free to ask me whatever you like. I am glad to help. But just remember I am a 3L who went straight from undergrad to law school and, while almost all of my work experience is related to finance (corp dev, m&a tax, etc), it has been at the intern level. I can provide advice on how to do well for your internship but I don’t have full-time IB experience.
Thank you; this is very helpful. I’m planning on sending out applications to a few non-law jobs for the upcoming summer, and, from what you said, it might make sense to prioritize those if my goal is eventually non-law?
One thing you said: you are a CPA. How big of an impact do you think that had on your recruiting, and how much of a leg up did it give you in applying to non-law jobs as a law student vs your typical student. Like I mentioned earlier, I have very little business experience from undergrad
Also, classes to take: assuming corporate, securities, bankruptcy, secured credit, and as much tax as possible. Anything else? My school offers a seminar-style class in Hedge Fund and Private Equity law, but I’m not sure if this would be available for a Jd/Mba student
I would certainly prioritize the non-legal roles. That isn't to say there is no point where a legal role would make sense just that it is less likely to.
I did not get the actual license until this fall (as a 3L). The only real place it has helped me in is restructuring. Once I got the license and put it on my resume the responses basically flipped from 50/50 to 80/20. It did not make an impact on IB/PE/RE opportunities. I think it made a small impact on corp dev but I can't really tell. It could have been just the normal fluctuations from going through this process.
A few things in regards to your minimal experience. I would go to the Mergers and Inquisitions website and read basically every article in the investment banking section. The interview stuff. The on the job stuff. all of it. I would also do one of the modeling programs. It doesn't matter if it is Wall St Prep or Mergers and Inquisitions/Breaking into Wall St. In terms of the job, the PowerPoint education from one of these programs will be very helpful. You will also need to get competent in Excel for the interviews. You don't need to be as good as a 2nd year associate but you should be able to be given a company to look at and be able to make a reasonable effort at doing the modeling. I say this not necessarily because you will be asked to do Excel (although that is possible). It is because the best way to learn this finance stuff is simply to do it (or at least it is for me). Like Mergers and Inquisitions has a good interview guide that will cover a bunch of the questions. That will cover you for most technical questions in regards to most of the questions you are likely to see. However, while I haven't done the interviews myself, when I have talked with other students about finance it has been pretty easy for me to see who has just memorized things like the Mergers and Inquisition guide and who has actually done it before.
Based on your list this is the approximate rankings I would have in terms of most-to-least important to take: corporate - assuming this means classes like Business Organizations, securities, any M&A/corporate-level deals classes, transactional tax classes (ie: M&A tax), bankruptcy, PE, HF, general corporate tax. I would also look at the clinics. If there is something relevant to corporate law that could be useful. Also, if your law school has any accounting classes that should be something to look at. Likewise, and this is probably less obvious, the writing classes will likely be very helpful. Sure. IB does far more in PowerPoint and most the writing classes will be exclusively in Word. But getting good at communicating your ideas is very valuable. It is a soft skill that will help you. It is at least as important as the technical finance/Excel/accounting skills. So absolutely make sure you get the subject matter classes in but don't forget about soft skills like that.
I would also add that in addition to business classes offered at your law school, look at the business school. I am at an university that has one of the top real estate programs in the country. The law school recognized this and got a bunch of the business school's real estate classes to be co-listed with the law school so I can take those classes as if they were Torts or Crim Pro. I have taken about a semester of these types of classes. If your school doesn't offer opportunities like this, look at how many non-law school classes you can take. For example, at my school I think I can take 9 credit hours of non-law school classes that are coded as graduate level classes. In the spring I will be taking the M&A class at the business school. Check with your school to see to what extent you can do this and how to do this. Also keep in mind if there is a business class you want to take but can't formally enroll in the class you can reach out to the professor and explain how you want to take the class, that you are a law student so it isn't one you can enroll in, and ask if you can take it anyways. The teacher may say yes. I was able to do this as an undergrad. As an undergrad I sat in on, not as a formal audit, an M&A class offered by the law school. It is worth considering at least. For these types of business classes it may be worth talking to one of the business school's academic advisors. This isn't cheap but there is a good book put out by Lexis called the M&A Practice Guide, or something like that. That provides a very good overview of the process along with a lot of practical information (which is what you would hope from a $350 practice guide). This wouldn't be a bad book to add to the spring semester's book list and to read something like just one chapter a week.
In regards to to the HF/PE law classes, just ask. Someone is going to have that answer.
Went to law school, work in IB. Caveat that below is all just my opinion & perspective, not gospel by any means.
If you think you may find it interesting - I think you'll have better luck looking at restructuring groups than traditional M&A. Not saying you won't have luck in the latter just that restructuring groups tend to put something of a premium on law degrees, check out how many MBA/JDs there are on linkedin currently or formerly at Lazard, Evercore, Houlihan restructuring groups to validate this.
Unfortunately, I think your lack of real finance experience will be to your detriment, especially if you're looking to come in as an associate. Very broad brush - analysts in the industry tend to be really good at what they do from basically day 1, as they've been prepping for years and have a pretty big head start on you. So managing and providing guidance to the analysts will be tough, and the hiring managers know this. Thus I agree with people above who are recommending you get some sort of business-y internship under your belt, even if its just for resume validation. If that doesn't work out, doing a New York City Big Law internship will never be a bad thing.
Additionally, I think it may be a good idea to try to find an investment manager in your city that will let you do an in-semester internship? - Doesn't have to be a super reputable fund, I am sure there are a lot of 4-person private equity shops in your area that would be happy to have a law student do some grunt work a few days a week.
If you think there is any chance you ever may change your mind and actually want to go back to law, do the law internship and consider throwing a year or two at that. There is a path to go Law -> IB in the future, it's been done before, but I don't think I've ever seen anyone go IB -> Law, law firm pipeline is too structured and not well-suited for that.
Definitely apply to the MBA program. If it's not an extra year of your life and they don't make you pay a ton more money, it is a no-brainer, regardless of whether or not you do business or law. Law firms like hiring the dual degrees because they better understand what their clients do from day 1. IB obviously will prefer an MBA vs just the JD. Also, MBA is way easier than JD, so you get some easy credits under your belt. If you don't get in, fine, if you do but it turns out to be expensive and or another year of your life, think long and hard about it once you get to that bridge.
One last thought if you're dead set on IB, and don't START here, but chase associate positions at the firms and groups you really want, and then save a smaller group that you try to chase analyst roles at as a backup (pay will be worse, but honestly you're probably going to be better suited for this role to get up the learning curve quickly) and then you may just have to decide if you're comfortable taking a "lesser" role, which may be more easy to secure, in a field you actually enjoy and may have a long career in, rather than just going to be a New York City big law associate, which will have better pay, but you may flame out on pretty early if you do not care about it.
Thanks for the advice. A few questions:
1. for the in-semester, if you can swing it, I don't see any value in a law-focused one, big law firms won't care about that. think there is value in doing it at a LMM PE fund or a no-name hedge fund or family office in your area, especially if you end up doing a law internship over 2L summer. You'll have to be proactive on this, a process won't exist.
2. this one is tough, but if you don't get the 2L summer law internship through formal process I think you're iced out of that pipeline go forward, so pursue that as usual when that process starts. whereas you may be able to secure a more informal "off-cycle" banking internship or some other fund internship between 1L and 2L (maybe look at regional offices rather than NYC BB) that will give you insight into if you like it and should ultimately sit out on that 2L law school process in favor of MBA Associate cycle recruiting or ultimately reneg on a law offer if you get a banking job you like.
3. dual degrees tend to throw around a lot of money on scholarships - take a run at it, you might get it. 4 years is tough, but in your case it also makes it easier for you to run at both a banking and law internship, especially if its cheap and the MBA-program at your school isn't too poorly ranked. a consideration.
Quia in veniam est ut. Doloremque exercitationem rem non sit architecto. Dolorem praesentium nobis reprehenderit quas consequatur quos. Non illo delectus quo et impedit. Totam vero dolores et provident laboriosam vero aut vitae.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...
Commodi recusandae et autem exercitationem modi molestiae. Tenetur ad fuga illum corrupti incidunt eaque. Saepe est non asperiores et dolorum ad. Tempora mollitia natus magnam aut reiciendis. Corrupti et ratione id quod aliquid eligendi.