Help with career decision - Unable to land anything

Any chance of FT offer @ the end? Either way, I say go for it. Ops jobs are a dime a dozen and IB experience is GOLD.

I don't think they'd be looking to add me FT. He said they would maybe hire me again next summer for another internship but paid, which doesn't really help.

Do you think I'll be able to use this IB experience to land interviews at better firms on this upcoming cycle? Or do you think because the firm is so small it won't be taken seriously by bigger banks?

If you can get experience with good deal flow in 2 months go for it!

You should ask the people working there or find out if there's good deal flow, figure out how many deals are currently in the pipeline.. If you can work on a few pitches and maybe even be staffed on a live deal then that would be really good transaction experience on your résumé and would set you up well for FT recruiting.

Also, research and find out how easy it is to lateral from ops to IBD in your bank. PM me if you have further questions

Well in an email to the partner inquiring further about the position I asked if I would be working on live deals and he said yes otherwise they wouldn't be looking to hire me.

How can I go about finding out more? I'm meeting with I believe 3 out of the 4 partners next week.

Is it improper to ask about deals in the pipeline? (That little voice in the back of my head is saying yes but I figured I'd ask)

Oh so you're still interviewing at this place? Why don't you interview first and just ask about the dealflow last year, or what's the favorite deal they are working on now.

It can give you a good guess of 1) how many deals they executed last year 2) how many deals they are currently working on right now. And then from this you can ask a follow up say how would you split your time between working on live deals vs early stage pitches vs admin work.

I've asked people how many deals are currently in the pipeline and those that are live.. Although they are not entirely honest it can give you a good estimate

Surprised by the answers in here.

You are considering leaving a fulltime paid position for a 2 months unpaid with no chance for anything except the next summer? That is a terrible idea... if it was 6 months I would not hesistate to say do it, but 2 months is nothing and there is no guarantee you get a FT job after anywhere let alone IB.

Depending on your relationship with your current boss, ask him if they could put you on some sort of leave for the 2 months so you can return after.

While my position is technically full time, it's only a long term temporary contract for 6 months of work.

Being that I just started last week, I don't think I could ask for a 2 month leave.

Iamamonkeybanker: when you say ask about the split between live/pitch/admin did you mean ask what their split is like or ask what my split would be like?

Ask what your split is like.. You have to sort of dance around these questions to kind of figure out the dealflow. Boutiques tend to have really volatile dealflow and they like to overstate their work so becareful.

It really is a risk/reward. If you were already graduated I wud say stick with your job. If you are still a junior I wud say it's up to u but I wud probably take the risk of doing the unpaid (if it is a decent firm) to try FT recruiting.

Thanks for the advice on that.

Just to clear things up- I have graduated already.

I'm slightly leaning towards taking the internship because I want to do IB and this is my first shot to get some experience.

I know I'm going to still have to claw my way to a good IB position afterwards but at least I'd have some experience to speak of. As of now I don't think my resume would even get a second glance

If that's the risk you're willing to take good luck and work hard. Opportunities will come by

I hate those scumbags... they just want you to do work for them... I think 2 months of IB will help you to get interviews for full time IB jobs somewhere else, but it's a risk...

I wouldn't worry about the name of the company as long as they have a nice deal flow. Usually the small companies have a very monotonic deal flow and it get boring after some time... but if you get to work on real deals, that's a big plus...

I would try to find out if they want you to help them with deals or with some generic garbage that nobody wants to do...

Another trick you can do is say you're looking into other boutiques of similar calibre and say that they have decent deal flow and that since there won't be a full time offer the amount of live transactions that you get to work on this summer is a crucial part of your decision and that would make them talk about their deal flow in more detail.

Thanks for all the great advice guys.

I'm just goin to prepare for these interviews all weekend and find out as much as I can about their deal flow and what's in the pipeline.

I figure if I get this experience, at the very least I can find another operations job or something better afterwards to make so money while I'm doing FT recruiting