Why Do Bankers Always Say "Happy to Chat"
About 90% of the analyst/associate bankers I've spoken to all say "Happy to chat". I've heard it so many times that I'm saying it now.
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Maybe because everyone said it to them when they were in our spot. The cycle continues.
this is the first step to uncovering this is a simulation
“Hey man - thanks for your note, happy to chat. Shoot me a calendar invite along with your resume. Afternoons are generally better”
Just wanted to hijack this to give you guys the inside secret about the calendar invite request. The calendar invite + resume is a surprisingly great way to filter out / assess a few things:
How responsive are they (how quick the email responses are and invite is to come)?
Do they know what a calendar invite is and how to send it?
Did they remember to attach their resume?
Did they make clear in the invite who was to be calling whom, and at what number?
Can they follow simple instructions / will they do an extra task to have this conversation?
Plus it blocks off the time on our calendars without having to do it ourselves. While it doesn't sound like a big deal to do once, it is a big deal when you're doing dozens of informationals with random candidates, in addition to your day job. It's such a nice thing to have someone else take care of it.
P.S. "Happy to chat" and "Hey" etc. are just casual ways of speaking to try and put you at ease. Would not over-analyze it beyond that. In our job, oftentimes our emails have to be perfectly phrased, spell checked etc. and it's nice to be able to write somewhat casually to a student and remember the days before responsibility.
Remind me not to network with you
you must be great at splitting hairs and upholding white supremacy
And this is why finance is where souls go to die. Who gives a shit about - any of those things? They're not material predictors of intellect, potential, or competence on the job. And how do you solve for the kids who haven't been taught those things (e.g., disadvantaged background), or where you're their first reach out, etc.? It's just arbitrary, which I feel is how a lot of IB works.
You don't have to hold their hand, but they're not going to be perfect and you're not actually going to learn anything from any of those points. If you're unwilling to invest some of your time to help the kids learn, why bother? You're just wasting your time and theirs.
because it's simple and it gets the point across, you dolt.
what do you want people to say to you?
"I would be absolutely delighted to have the pleasure of conversing with you for the aforementioned period of time. "
Lol I was going to go the opposite route and say that "give me a call, dickhead" wasn't sending the right signals.
First they came for the em dash, now for the "happy to chat"?
Because they are working 100 hours per week and are lonely. Give a care and Zoom a banker today.
Don't forget to ask them to provide color.
God damn I love it when people give us some more color
To give a slightly more wholesome perspective, I always paid it forward when it came to networking with college folks who had the initiative to message me so yeah, I generally made myself available to chat and made sure I took one or two people under my wing each year since it's the least we can do being lucky enough to be in our positions.
I say it because its a lot nicer and faster to type than saying "I really don't want to, no offense, nor do I really have time, but I remember being in your shoes and how much getting ghosted sucks and how much one person answering can raised my hopes even if it doesn't lead to an offer, and some people helped me out when I was recruiting so I feel like I should pay it forward, so yeah lets work out a time"