Associates, VPs, EDs and MDs (and An2/3s) What are some of the stupidest things you've seen an analyst do? Moments in your career where you had to sit down, reflect, and be baffled by what just happened and how could an analyst even do this.
Any and all helpful or funny stories would be appreciated.
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Every analyst is stupid, that's why they analysts
The smartest people in banking are MD’s and analysts. Take from that what you will
Hide the coffee machine from the idiots in IB
Stay on as associate
as an A2A i feel like the life really isnt that bad..
thats nice to see lol. I feel like everyone always says its hell with some lube instead of raw dogging the analyst
Banged a partner’s daughter.
this is what i aspire to be
This is how careers are made
This isn't stupid, this is genius. He should marry her too for bonus points!
Md commented to add one decimal to each number.
Summer analyst proceeds to manually go into each cell and add "0" to the end of each number(like hardcoded)
Was just baffled.
This is gold
Deleted an entire data room during a live deal. Received emails from counterparties asking where the files went. The mistake was fixed pretty easily but it was panic inducing momentarily.
The analyst who managed to accomplish this feat of stupidity did it at the beginning of his stint but ended up getting a top bucket rating.
An analyst did the same thing with me. I did not think it was possible for more than one person to be this stupid
Sent the list of all counter parties in a process to everyone in the process accidentally.
Not sure they kept their job afterwards…
Know a guy who did this at GS from my class YEARS ago - he got top bucket. Helps when you have family at the bank...
Asked a summer analyst to hit F2 to see a formula, she hits the F key twice
LMAO.
Have a good one. We told an intern to replicate a graph that we found from an online source.
Totally unaware that you can create a graph in PowerPoint, they measured out the bar graph using shapes (Like insert shape!). And then inserted text boxes to add data labels and the line shape for each axis. They measured each bar with a ruler to get the right proportions.
They somehow used the internship at our boutique to get a FT job at a Bulge Bracket. I think she was a decent worker, but jeeeze how do you get through school without making a PowerPoint graph?
vast majority of college students don't make ppt graphs in school. i went to an ivy and certainly didn't
Yup. For any school, really. In what college courses are you ever really required to give a presentation? It's all exams or papers.
just show them man, everyone has to learn
We did. No hate here, just thought it was kind of funny. I've done stupid shit too
I’ll own up to something dumb (yet harmless) I did as an analyst. Had never used the redline feature before, which was how my associate would give comments in word doc deliverables. I’d go through and manually make the changes, occasionally missing one or two, and he’d be like wtf why did you reject my change? I didn’t realize I could just hit “accept all.” Felt incredibly dumb but had never used the feature in undergrad and nobody told me how it worked.
I feel like using the redline feature is something thats never done in undergrad. especially nowadays - everyone is using google docs or something
In my first year I didn’t know how to make a table in PPT. Rather than clicking insert table (didn’t know where it was) or asking an analyst or associate who sat 2 seats away on how to create one, I tried to manually draw lines to mimic / resemble the shape of a table. This was fine but when I sent the deck to the client the table showed up all weirdly shaped on the PDF.
You just made my day - thank you!
Last year had a new analyst take over a client model that we periodically needed to update. The ask among other things was to consolidate the 20 tabs into 5 so most of the work was cut and pasting which should have taken 1-2 hours to do. I got caught up on other deal work and came back to her 2 days later to talk through the changes. See that she’s not even halfway through consolidating the tabs but know she’s been in the model the entire time so I’m confused at the hold up. Then I watch her copying and pasting every line and then manually fixing each formula. She had never heard of Control X + Control V. Happy to report she now knows and can use that excel shortcut.
thats what happens when banks recruit penultimate year history students.. its alright tho, show them how its done
Get drunk and sleep with an MD after team drinks.
cap of year runner-up (honorable mention)
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Got fired as an analyst for accidentally un-muting during a client meeting on zoom for about 10 seconds. Completely interrupted the meeting before I realized and apologized. Shitco client got zero bids in the end.
There has to be more to this story. What did you say when you were off mute...
i was on that call, i remember him saying something like " i wanna get you oiled up", must have been talking to someone on the phone
Called my associate right after I muted myself, and they said they couldn’t really hear anything. I emailed the team and apologized, but MD was furious and refused to let me apologize to him directly. Locked an upper middle bucket rating since the call was after reviews and all that, but got put on a PIP not long afterwards.
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