Hi All,
This is my first post. I have been reading up stuff on WallstreetOasis and have learned a lot. Let me start by briefly positing my education and work experience:
Education:
Associates in Accounting with Cumulative GPA of 3.01 (Finished in May 2010)
Work Experience:
2008-2010
Accounting Assistant/Full Charge Bookkeeper at a small private firm in Hanover Park, IL
2010-Current
Accounting Technician at a Transportation & Planning Agency in Napa, CA
Also, I have been trading equities, futures, and currencies for over 6 years with minimum success because I can’t dedicate enough time to it. This is because of full-time work and college.
I researched a lot of about how to get into investment banking and private equity side of finance, and always found myself lacking education/investment experience and also not knowing where to start. I found that best way for me to get in was going through becoming a Personal Banker and getting the series licenses and moving up the ladder.
I currently am making $55k a year with full benefits, but would really like to move to the
east coast as majority of my family lives there. I am having a hard time trying to figure out what jobs I should apply for which will eventually help me get into investment/private equity/ hedge fund.
I would really appreciate some guidance from experts (which is everyone but me, haha) on this forum. Sorry for my crappy wording and I looking forward to the responses. Please feel free to ask me questions as I tend to leave important stuff out.
Thank you so much in advance.
Having only an associates will almost definitely instantly preclude you from work in IB outside of some tiny shop in topeka or something.
Ouch, this make me look like an interviewers dream.
Your degree eliminates you from all of those job functions, just providing a sense of reality I'm not trying to be an asshole.
I completely understand what you guys are saying. I'm not asking to show me how to get a job that requires a bachelors or something. All I'm asking is with the education/experience I have, what step should I take to get my foot in the door. I will be starting my Bachelors in Fall 2012 and just want to know what kind of entry level jobs I should look for while doing my bachelors.
I'm not sure you should be looking for any jobs. if you continue with that GPA, all doors will remain closed.
Step 1: enroll in the best 4-year university you can as a transfer student. There are some decent public schools on the east coast. I'm thinking something like University of Virginia or any equivalent schools. Do your research on which public schools are targets or semi-targets on the east or west coast and try to get into the best one you can. I have no idea what the transfer policies on private schools are, but you probably dont want to pay the extra $.
Step 2: figure out if you're going to be a full-time or part-time student Step 3: transfer your credits and pick a major (major in accounting and minor in finance or vice versa) Step 4: Your GPA resets when you transfer, so try to get as many A's as you can or be part of an honors program Step 5: Join clubs (investments club, finance club, yadda yadda) Step 6: Why not study for the CPA or the CFA level 1 in the meantime Step 7: now you've earned the right to compete on somewhat equal ground... this is where the game BEGINS. Step 8: RE-POST: "Looking to get into IB" - now people can actually give you relevant advice
If you can't do this, you will not be able to compete for the jobs everyone is going for, even in a better economy.
It can be done, though, it just takes desire, commitment, discipline, and follow-through! Plenty of people have done this. You may or may not end up in IB, but at least 1-7 will get you to the point where you can figure that out on your own. Worst case scenario you're still in pretty good shape career-wise, and more doors will open.
Good luck!
2nd what soccerguy said...you need to get a college degree first. Right now you need to focus on learning and getting a better GPA rather than finding jobs.
Indeed what Soccerguy728 said. Especially step 7: it is where the game BEGINS. It is not that step 1 to 6 give you a definite spot in IB. I've a GPA from a non-target of 4.0 and 3.9 (doing 2 masters simultaneously), accepted into excellence honors program, voluntarily work experience, local ''sports champion'' and I am studying for CFA level 1. Apart from that I just signed up with Breaking Into Wall Street (BIWS) for their financial modeling courses and got accepted into a leadership program. When I applied to investment banking divisions, most of them don't want me, even not for a summer internship. To make things worse, I don't even get a first round interview at top tier investment banks. Their reason: we got students from target schools that we prefer to students from non-targets. Just for this sole reason I very much regret of not going to a target school. Especially with this economic climate, where there is much more demand for IB jobs than supply can meet, choosing a target school is the best thing you could do in my opinion.
Look into regional and botique banks. They usually put more emphasis on competence then prestige.
^If you can't get interviews you must not be trying hard enough. I'm from a non-target with worse stats and managed to get a few interviews.
To the OP, as others have said you can't work in high finance without at least a Bachelor's - no amount of networking will change that. Once you start on your Bachelor's get relevant work experience/join clubs THEN worry about IB.
At this point your not competitive but there's no reason you can't change that if you really want it.
Thank you so much for the detail explanation. That is exactly what i was looking for! I am in the middle of figuring out if I should enroll in a top college and move to the east coast and let go of the job that I have or find an entry level banking job (Personal Banker) and enroll in a non-target college and study part-time. Soccerguy and Wer pretty much explained everything I needed to know regarding that. So again, thank you!
^Personal Banking will not lead to Investment Banking. Enroll in a target school and please leave the Personal Banking trash to the proud GED holders and non-target 2.0s of the world.
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