Impact of referral in London

Hey folks,

Was wondering how much a referral in London can boost your chances of securing an interview? By referral, I mean you use the employee's name in the 'source' section of the application form after selecting the 'employee referral section', and nothing else. Also curious to know how much of an impact it has it if comes from campus ambassadors VS junior bankers VS senior bankers. Thanks! 

29 Comments
 
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I would say it makes not much impact in order to get interviews... but it does in order to be able to have some good answers for the interviews

There are some particular banks where networking with the RIGHT person does help, as they may be able to pull for you, but HR dominates recruiting at most banks in London, which makes it hard/useless 

 

For example at my US BB the industry staffers do have the power to move people to interview or at least to get their CVs screened with more attention (HR will look at it twice) and during the ACs there will be a notification of who made a referral to them, so everyone is aware. Analysts can also direct their referrals to the staffers and does also work the same way (I have seen this coming from top analysts or respected people). Anyways people usually dont expose to this, and its normal to just send a referral to HR, which is a waste of time as it really doesnt work

Again when I speak about banks, there are some in which HR keeps most of the power with the 1st CV screening (like JP), whereas there are some other banks where they throw on some analysts / associates a pill of CVs which get screened out (HRs screening is very very basic, hence there is option to get pulled your CV if it meets those basic requirements)

 

you need to find those people who are on recruiting panels. At my BB there are 9 people on the recruiting team and they handle all the interviews. Even better if the guy heading the recruiting panel is from your university. 

 

I agree on this JPM is completely anti-referral and networking with HR, should be the way to go there, if that is even a thing.  GS HR is very powerful as well but referral is possible.  If you are looking for place for referrals, I would say good chance at UBS, BofA, MS, CS I have experience of all those 6 banks first hand.

 

I'd say no since you apply on their own website and not through DP's one. Can personally confirm PJT is in house.

 

Referrals through internal systems are useless, I know many friends referred by directors and with good profiles who never got an interview (top schools, high gpa). On the other hand I know people with average profiles that got into IB simply finding the right person. At the end of the day is all about how much your contact pushes you through.

 

I am quite surprised when I read people saying referrals are useless in London...

From my personnal experience I spoke extensively with an analyst at a networking event for MS, who told me to tell him when I would have applied for the Spring week. I did so and got an interview like two weeks later. I am from a semi-target.

Also heard about people getting successful referrals at JPM 

 

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