Received an offer at a BB in the M&A group as a 3rd year Associate and want to know what I'm getting into and what I should be able to do? My prior experience is at a small boutique, more real estate focused and only working on sell-sides for private (not public) companies.
Am I going to need to heavily ramp up or is this going to be a huge issue?
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Are you currently a VP? If they're bringing you in at A3, they likely view you as a VP or imminently VP ready, although you could do a 4th year at associate if they feel you need to ramp up more.
Your seniority means you need to be looking at things big picture (how does this slide fit with our overall messaging? Where does company X view itself in the market and what is the next step for them?). Pay attention to how your seniors deliver materials in meetings.
At the same time, you will be Associate 1 level at some things such as the modeling/diligence intricacies that come in large public M&A and firm-specific ways of doing things. Treat your analysts as teachers for the first 6 months - your job is still to check their work, but after a year at the firm they know more about the MD's preferences and BB's standard formatting than you. Once you hit VP you will have more projects to cover and less time to figure out how to help your team model a specific transaction, so use your associate year to learn as much analyst stuff as you can.
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