Attempting to share my knowledge and experience lateraling from valuation to IB in an effort to give back to the WSO community. The situation: Non-target, landed a valuation role out of undergrad. Leveraged my valuation experience and was able to network into a MM IB analyst role after a year at the valuation shop. Been in IB for a year and some change. The lateral was not nearly as difficult as other posts on this site make it seem. Ask away any and all interested. Check out these other relevant Q&As: Q&A: Non-Target + 2.7 gpa = EB IB Analyst Q&A: Big Four Valuation Associate - Deciding Whether This Job is Right For you Q&A: 2nd Year MM IB Analyst Mod Note (Andy): This is an older Q&A originally posted on 11/11/15 but the OP let me know he's still able to answer questions today, get your questions in!
No problem.
Prior Firm: Not from a big 4, from a well-known firm that has tons of service lines, including IB. Ultimately didn't want to make an internal transfer given the red tape involved, and wanted to make it into a more well-known firm that had solid deal flow.
Objections / Hesitations: Across the board, a lot of the people interviewing me didn't think that valuation offered enough experience/insight into understanding the various stages of the sell side process. I was confused by this at the time, but I get it now. Do some detailed research on this one. Rosenbaum's book simplifies the sell side process, but it gives you an idea of the general stages. If there is enough interest I would be willing to contribute a full-blown detailed overview of the sell side process in a follow up post just so you all can stick it to the jerk making this claim I'm your interviews.
Also I don't think that people in valuation are given nearly enough credit for the skill set that they acquire on the job (obviously dependent on the firm). I am light years ahead of all of the analysts (and even associates) when it comes to modeling. Valuation is an extremely transferable skill set. Writing always came naturally to me, so I was able to crush any CIM sample assessment in the interview. I was a guru in Excel from my experience, so PowerPoint was all that I needed to get up to speed on (much easier than starting from scratch compared to Excel). Knowing how to use CapitalIQ is a huge differentiator as well.
Recommendation: If you are in Valuation and doing purchase accounting / solvency & fairness opinions... ACTUALLY READ THE CIMs!!!!! I cannot stress this enough. Understanding the structure, meaning, and purpose of the CIM was something that I was able to weave into my experience when talking in interviews. Having access to these is an invaluable resource.
Yes PM me your resume I will review and provide comments.