Why do people in banking change firms so much?

I was wondering why people in IB change firms so much. For example you may see an analyst summer somewhere change to another firm and then change again a few years later.

Why is this? Do headhunters reach out and offer better gigs at the different firms? Curious if anyone has insight.

15 Comments
 

In my experience, I wouldn't say it's from headhunters aggressively recruiting away candidates. It typically goes something like this:

  1. Person interns/first years at a bank
  2. They may or may not like it, but they have a better, more "prestigious" bank in mind that they want to transfer to
  3. They reach out and leverage that experience in order to get that new job

It's just a function of IB types valuing social and economic mobility and wanting to improve their circumstances. I haven't really found it the # of transfers per year to be much higher than other industries -- people everywhere are always looking for greener grass

 

With friends who have done that it's usually because either they think that the hours or work experience will be better over there or it will set them up better for the type of exit opportunity they are looking to have.

 

Hmm seems like my response got removed by accident. For friends who've done that it's either

  1. Because they think they'll have better exit ops in a different group/at a different bank that's more relevant to what they want to do

OR

  1. They expect the hours or culture to be less intense/more enjoyable

Compensation is going to be pretty much the same across all analyst/associate roles at different banks of similar tier.

 

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