May 2025 undergraduate grads… how are you doing navigating this competitive job market and industry?

I am having a really tough time navigating the market. Trying to use all of my universities alumni networks possible through LinkedIn and such to get an “in” to the industry. I may be overlooking this but after being “unemployed” for 6 months after graduating I think I might have to call it quits for the positions I was aiming for in this industry.

My background: I worked at a student run venture capital fund that acted like a traditional VC where the students were the ones doing the due diligence, founder interactions, memos, presentations, and investing. Real money on the line. I did that for a year, learned a lot and loved the experience.
My major was business management (concentration in entrepreneurship). I really want to break into the investment field and continue this type of work but it seems like I can’t even get an interview. I’ve applied to tons of “investment analyst” positions at different funds with different focuses such as renewable energy, real estate, or whatever else because I seem to meet the qualifications it says on the job posting. I also try to network with people at the companies whether they’re alumni from my university or not. I’ve gotten some referrals but I’m just beat from this job market. I don’t know if I’m actually qualified or not. I also don’t know many other finance people or how they’re doing so I hope to learn more from this post, but from my perspective I’m really struggling and might pivot to do something entirely different unfortunately. And I have no idea what I could do with my background other than investment analyst. I’d really appreciate any insight from whatever experience level. Thank you. I appreciate you reading post.

5 Comments
 
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Hey man, I’m going to honest at this point you should pivot to everything else in the market outside of finance. There are way too many people in the space—and every semi competent college graduate is aiming for these roles.

Branch out across verticals and be prepared to take something you never thought you would, paying standards lower—look outside NYC (if you haven’t).

Sorry to tell you this, brutal market: everyone is being overly preemptive about AI, pricing in the depressed incentive around entry level training, taking stock in perceived political uncertainty, and accounting in the devaluation of the college degree. The entire model of college to job is being upended in real time, those on the other side of the fence with specialized expertise will be priced expensively (lucky them).

 

May 25 grad here. Recruited for 6 months and just accepted an offer at a FoF. Don’t give up hope put your head down and keep applying and networking every single day. It’s a shit market but don’t let that stop you from giving it your all.

 

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