Hi fellow monkeys,
I'm headed for a non-H/S M7 MBA this summer and am trying to get a feel for recruiting, so I'll have a viable battle plan soon. Before reaching out to my school's relevant career groups, I wanted to ask here first.
I understand that generally you would need an IB internship to be considered for a full-time offer. This is supported also by many school's career reports, according to which BBs/EBs do not return on-campus for full-time recruiting. On the other hand, I do see people trade up firms going full-time, so there must be some form of recruiting.
Now, my questions are:
* Would a buy-side internship (AM/HF/PE) shut me out of full-time IB roles at BBs/EBs?
* If not, how would the recruiting process most likely look like - OCR, referrals from summer associates, school network,...?
Before anyone asks why I'd want to do this: I'm aiming for AM/HF roles, but there is a small but real chance that I don't like it; IB is the next best thing. I have seen people do PE summer -> IB full-time at the MBA level, but these could be the exceptions rather than the rules.
Have you done banking before?
If you have not, it will be very difficult to get into banking FT without a summer internship. Most post-MBA associate roles are filled from returning interns and A2As. There is limited OCR for FT and many of those are for people looking to trade for a different firm or geography.
If you are willing to have wide options over geography and type of bank, you could do it, but it isn't easy if you haven't done banking. I am not sure what MBA business schools">M7 means for you, but the success of placement into desirable HF opportunities are not symmetrical between those schools.
Looking at your post history, it seems like you need some serious level setting.
A lot of people that try to do banking out of Wharton and Booth, the top two schools outside of H/S, have really challenges to get into EBs and top BB groups. Those people have backgrounds comparable to yours, some better and some worse, and focused on IB from day one. Look at the stats from both schools. Plenty of people end up at small boutiques or MM firms in 2nd/3rd tier cities like Milwaukee or Charlotte. The majority are not at GS SF TMT, Qatalyst, Evercore, etc.
To think you can target them as a back-up is just not realistic or reasonable without serious connections into the firms and an airtight story.
Should not be a huge issue if you extensively prepare and are very serious about only targeting IBD, and are open to casting a wider net w.r.t. including BB, EB, and MM opportunities. I would try to crack you open with some technicals and even fit questions (people who have spent their career not facing clients can be kind of weird or awkward) but if you survived that you'd be a serious candidate.
You guys remember that kid from CBS who was on here saying he struck out on an IB internship?
This right here is how that happens.
You are setting yourself up for massive failure. IB is not a consolation prize or "next best thing" and you will never make it if that's your mindset. There are too many qualified people that are gunning for the job as their first choice. Just be honest with yourself and go all-out for AM/HF roles and get it. It's a loser's mindset to contingency plan before your first class. You realize you will have to actually pursue the post-MBA job you get as a career once you graduate?
Summer-FT IB Associate recruiting is comprised of about two weeks, with very few open slots being pursued by people of a very specific and relevant background. First of all, most Summer Associates get a return offer, so across all banks there are few remaining roles to fill. Then you have Summer IBD Associates that have a return offer looking to change firms - those people typically fill the gaps at all the EB and BB slots. Then you have MM and boutique bankers looking to trade up. Then you have Summer IBD Associates that did not get a return offer but can plausibly convince another bank that they deserve a second chance.
Finally, way down the line, would anyone consider a candidate from a totally different background (needless to mention would absolutely need to have a return offer). Frankly I haven't seen it happen but not saying it's impossible, but how would that story sound? "I left my career, applied to business school to get into Career X, recruited and did a summer at Career X, but the 10 week experience has caused me to rethink everything and pursue investment banking." It sounds desperate because it is desperate and it just doesn't jive.
Source: I lead Summer Associate recruiting in my group at a BB. Pre-MBA experience is Big 4 TAS Manager.
IB recruiting takes place prior to buyside recruiting
The move is to get an IB internship, then see if you can network your way to buyside during 2nd year.
Right but even then there's no shortage of pre-MBA PE Associates and pre-MBA BB/EB bankers who are competing for your buyside gig in the 2nd year. The IB Summer Associate (with Big 4 background) is in line behind all of those people, including e.g. pre-MBA MBB experience. Again, not impossible, I just wouldn't bet $200k and two years of my life on it.
Buy-side recruiting is an entirely different discussion and one that I don't want to get into. There are many threads on WSO and I'm aware of how competitive it is.
What you're saying is true for PE and I'm not expecting to out-compete the 2+2 guys. To my best knowledge, HF/AM works a little different and an internship would be expected to break in full-time.
I'm not sure why my background would make it harder to tell a compelling story. Big 4 corporate finance -> IB is a route I have seen many times before, especially for international applicants (which I am). Working on bigger deals, being able to finance them, working on different deal types would all be perfectly fine reasons why someone would want to go from a MM M&A shop (which Big 4 typically is) to BB (and EB minus the financing). Would I be held to a higher standard and hit with harder technicals? Maybe, but given my background and experience I'm also in a position to handle that. It's not like I'm going to read Rosenbaum/Pearl for the first time 2 weeks before the interview.
Thank you, Synergy_or_Syzygy, that helps.
Just to clarify though (not only in response to your post, but also to others): * I'm not planning to go through IB recruiting half-assed or in parallel to recruiting for other roles. * Yes, most buy-side recruiting generally takes place after IB recruiting. That's not an issue, because, as I said, I'm not planning on doing both. * Finally, I'm also not planning on doing a summer in marketing or similarly unrelated fields, but on the buy-side; so while it's not banking, it is not a "totally different background".
The scenario that I'm thinking about is, if I recruited for AM/HF for my internship (implying that I would not go through IB recruiting for the summer) and decided I didn't like it, would I be able to recruit for IB full-time (implying that I put my focus there in the second year)?
The answer seems to be no and that is helpful. It is my understanding that for top asset managers (PIMCO/Fidelity et. al.), an internship would also be de facto mandatory. Hence, what I'm trying to figure out is if there is a summer -> FT route that gives me a little more flexibility. So for me, the take away is that I can't try out one path and switch back to the other in case I don't like it. Obviously that's not the answer I wanted to hear, but I now have another 6 months left to reach out to people and figure out what I really want to do.
A few thoughts, and I'm just trying to be constructive:
AM and HF are not the traditional "buyside" for groups in IB (PE is), but may be more accepted in capital markets type roles (ECM, DCM, LevFin). It's just not relevant for 80%+ of the MBA Associate type jobs in IB. Maybe a tiny chance higher if you're in a credit investing fund and recruiting for LevFin or Financial Sponsors and can convince a bank that what they do is more interesting than that (yeah, good luck).
If you don't recruit for IB for the summer, nobody at the bank will know who you are, so you'll be at the bottom of their list if you make it at all. IB MBA recruiting can involve literally 100+ informational interviews at around a dozen per bank. On the back end we have a master spreadsheet with every candidate we met and people's notes they took about them. You'll basically be cold emailing banks with an unrelated summer internship.
There is no "second year" IB recruiting unless for boutiques, there is only the summer / end of summer of the first year. Recruiting is essentially done before the second year classes actually start. This is true for EB/BB/MM but boutiques and Big 4 will stretch their recruiting out further to get more candidates.
Because of the above timing, if you really want to switch companies your second year (even within IB assuming summering at a different bank), you have to start recruiting and reaching out immediately during your summer, ideally to people you have met before during the recruiting process.
There isn't a summer internship choice that keeps doors open for you in the second year. Both AM and IB are equally persnickety about recruiting candidates who are focused on their field. You might also seriously consider quitting your current job early and trying to do a pre-MBA internship. It will be super obvious what track you're on because AM MBA candidates are in the hyper-competitive investment funds, doing credit and stock pitch competitions, etc. and the banking candidates are in the banking clubs, doing banking related competitions, etc.
The above considerations might, might be relaxed a little bit if you are female / URM. If banks have a slot open they will be far more open to filling a diversity quota with someone who has a high finance background. In my Associate class we had a Harvard JD/MBA URM transfer in full time who had such a background. Still, very difficult and you have the unknown commodity issue. Not a URM? Back of the line.
This isn't targeted at you, but in case others are reading this thread, the biggest thing people don't seem to grasp is how important the "story" part is. By far the most sneaky difficult and most important question asked in your interview. The issue you will honestly run into is that you truthfully - stepping aside from how you could spin it - you truthfully don't want to pursue IBD as a long term career. Senior bankers are going to see through your story unless you have prepared a very careful rationale for the switch and have primed the pump by networking extensively from Day 1.
Wow, that's a wall of text. Happy to clarify further or go into other aspects of the process. I want you (and everyone else here on this site) to succeed and go into any situation with two eyes open.
Wherever USNews ranks your school doesn't matter, what matters is the relationships your school has. Recruiting at schools is run by alumni at that bank and the amount they hire is more or less dictated by the total influence that alumni team holds. This is the big difference you see: while yes all the BB may recruit at say, Darden. GS will only take maybe 1 or 2. At Booth/CBS they will take around 15. Yes, I understand that class size is different but more open spots does make a difference. Furthermore, small boutiques (e.g. Raine Group) will all recruit at Wharton and probably Booth/CBS, but less so at schools with less established finance pipelines.
Yes and no. Schools tend to send the same amount every year but these numbers are in no way "fixed". It comes down to the alumni MD at that bank who leads the recruiting team. This also contributes to the crazy "offer without an offer" song and dance where banks will ask you where they rank or whether you would accept an offer - the alumni team doesn't want to waste an offer on someone who doesn't accept. (I personally screwed this up pretty badly, and while I still got my dream internship, I was definitely dinged out a few times because of how i handled that conversation).
Not so much visa challenges as not being able to do well in informationals. Most of who gets a 1st round (besides GS, they interview a TON of first round then cut like crazy) depends on who has built the best rapport with the alumni bankers and whose name they recognize. International students tend to not do as well with the networking and schmoozing , in general.
Use LinkedIn to find people with as close background to yours as possible and see where they landed and how many got what YOU want. Chances are, a significant proportion might have landed back into Big 4 CF or EBs or non-BBs. This is just the brute reality. HSW/MBA business schools">M7 MBA recruiting is EXTREMELY competitive (speaking from personal experience). Your background does NOT guarantee that you'll get what you want, so I'd advise you to have a reality check first.
Thanks. I realize that there's no guarantee, that's why I'm trying to walk into the program and recruiting season well-prepared.
I have been grinding LinkedIn quite a lot, but the problem (similar to career reports/statistics) is that you only see the actual outcomes and not the intentions. If someone goes, say, EB -> MBA business schools">M7 -> EB, for all I know that could be a sponsored student or someone who didn't get an A2A promotion without an MBA but otherwise live and breathe banking. It could also be someone who didn't make it to the buy-side, MBB or whatever their plans were. People have good stories for why things played out the way they did and enjoy talking about it; they don't enjoy talking about their failures to a stranger though.
Long story short, there's always going to be a success bias on LinkedIn, but I agree it's very helpful to assess how common certain paths are.
I agree with this, but the numbers will give you an indication as to how likely you would get what you want.
Also, keep in mind that the careers office at your MBA business schools">M7 might tell you “what you want to hear”, i.e. you have a competitive profile, go for it. The truth is, that it is in their interest along with banks to have a competitive/packed/hyped recruitment process so that banking remains a highly coveted post-MBA industry due to exclusivity among its other attractive aspects. This sounds cynical of me to say this and unethical on their part (it isn’t, that’s life bro), but it’s the truth. At the end of the day, you’re a product that the school is marketing.
My $0.02 is keep a cool head, know as objectively/factually as possible what you’re up against / what your odds are. This will spare you the trouble of lamenting over what in God’s name went wrong, if something does. It likely might, as banking is by NO MEANS the “next best thing”. It is THE thing along with other coveted, competitive and, believe it or not cutthroat, things such as buyside, MBB and cushy tech/F100 LDPs. Again, this is something that you probably don’t want / like to hear, but it’s a reality pill that I’m inviting you to at least consider.
What about if you come from a more traditional background i.e. EB —> MF —> MBA business schools">M7
Is associate recruiting still super competative or can it be viewed as more of a fallback?
Also anyone hear of someone going PE Associate for 2-3 years back to IB as a VP? Is it possible to skip the associate role in IB?
From my anecdotal experience (tens of classmates from multiple cohorts, tens of 2nd/3rd connections on LinkedIn who I’ve researched/mined for datapoints), it’s impossible. All post-MBAs start as Associates. You could fast track to VP in a year if you’re as good as your experience says you are and if stars align, i.e. there is a justifiable need to promote you.
As I mentioned to the OP, recruitment for post-MBA banking should NOT be considered a fall back option. Again, from my own experience I had a few close classmates with MM PE experience struggle to even get internships because bankers and HR could smell that this is plan B for them. You have to have extremely tight game and go into it not only with banking or bust in mind but also in how you project it.
If you think you can fake it, you’re deluding yourself. As someone who’s supposedly worked in EB and MF PE, I would expect you to know that.
Just to put this out there, not trying to be a smartass. I think you’ll appreciate my honesty when you realise that I wasn’t far off from the truth and at least you had these posts of mine somewhere in the back of your head.
Yes, and put yourselves in our shoes. Let's be 100% real. Banking kind of... well, sucks sometimes. Banks want to recruit people who are hungry, for whom banking is a real upside compared to their prior career, and who can weather the storm.
Let's play a game. Let's say I'm interviewing someone who has a sick background, let's say Moelis to Blackstone to Chicago Booth. During his first year summer he interned at Uber or something. Now this guy comes to me and tells me a story about how he wants to do banking. Wouldn't you be suspicious? I'm not trying to solve for "recruit the smartest candidates" I'm trying to solve for "who will contribute the most for the longest at my bank?"
Assuming I hire this guy, once he's on a shitty deal or staying up until 4 AM working on a pitch book, won't he be like, "Yeah now I remember why I left banking" and look to leave after his signing bonus vests? Now my group is down an Associate when I could have hired Joe Schmoe the Big 4 Audit to Tuck to IBD Associate guy who would fucking run through a wall for me.
I can provide some color on this.
I graduated in the past few years from a top 5. Now I'm an associate and I help with MBA recruiting.
Even at my school, only 80% of people got IB jobs. Most of the ones who end up with nothing is because they were: a) awkward, b) big ego and IB was their plan B (some of them ended up with nothing), c) combination of the above and bad luck (internationals that got sick and missed a flight, just string of bad luck)
Getting a banking job is actually "easy" because it's a process -- if you follow the instructions of your banking club and you are a somewhat smart (not brilliant) person you are going to get a job. What do I mean by this? Network, don't be an ass to your classmates (pretty noticeable from outside corp circles), dress decently, don't talk about DCF in an informal interview, HAVE A BULLETPROOF STORY and study your technicals.
Now you see who fails?
Banking is not a top choice at top B schools; Tech and Consulting are gaining a lot of top candidates but it is still extremely competitive so please don't believe that just by having a top MBA on your resume any bank is going to beg you to come work for them (there are ~1,000 candidates that could do your job with good credentials).