Pivoting Into The Big Leagues - Is It Possible?
For a traditional candidate (the right school, right degree, right internships), the road to BB or EB offers is tried and tested, it's no mystery. Unfortunately, we don't all make prudent decisions as teenagers and young, dumb university kids.
For a non-traditional candidate, the steps to success can be varied and non-standardized.
For example, someone without any financial modeling experience probably needs a stepping-stone (intermediary) role where they build the skills that qualify them for IB.
In my case, I did not study finance or accounting and I attended somewhat of a super non-target. I began my career in product marketing. Moved to real estate finance. Leveraged the real estate deals on my resume to land an offer at a nameless mid-market investment bank. Essentially the most unorthodox career narrative, but slowly inching in the right direction.
This leads me to wonder if the next big pivot is possible. In my mind, that is eventually getting a seat at a top shop that works on the best M&A deals.
Does anyone have any non-traditional stories of using stepping-stone roles to ultimately get to an EB or BB? Ideally, if you missed the boat coming out of school and did not get in through an MBA. Are there any guys out there who were just scrappy and tenacious and pounded the pavement networking and grinded their way in? Or is this a pipedream?
It’s tough, and you don’t have a clear path to a better firm even if you’re at a small mm focused shop now.
Just focus on improving what you can day by day on your knowledge of deals and finance.
Find some courses to help you get better at technical stuff like financial modeling and excel.
Get some interview prep courses to help you learn what to look for in deals, practice every day for half an hour on interview questions and responses. Practice with friends if any work in the field or sign up for interview prep.
Learn everything you can about your deals. Numbers, rationale, details about buyers sellers etc. Talk to more experienced folk who can clarify stuff, and if you have good relationships with people then they’d be more willing to sit down and explain stuff so you’d understand, otherwise it could take much longer to learn on your own, or you may find yourself stuck / uncertain on some topics, based on what I’ve noticed.
It takes a really long time and a lot of prep to get to the next place coming from a regional mm shop, some people can move in a good market with lots of prep, but you have to be willing to put in a lot of time and effort and be ready to sell on why they should hire you instead of the guys from better known shops.
It took me 6 months of continuous prep to give an idea, I spent hours every day after work, others may have taken longer. Was able to get to a solid mm group after, maybe not the big leagues you’re looking for, but a place with good culture and dealflow at least
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