My Coffee Chat Questions Suck
Hi all,
I've recently been doing a lot of coffee chats with various people in commercial real estate, including financial analysts on top broker teams, developers working with big private families, and asset managers with institutional funds. One thing seems to stay in common: the questions start to feel repetitive, and it becomes challenging to have a meaningful conversation with someone.
For reference, I am going into my third year at a reputable school in Canada and am trying to solidify a strong internship for next summer. I have already done three internships, all related to the industry.
Do you have any tips on how to ask better questions or prepare more effectively for these chats?
Do the questions feel repetitive to the person you’re asking them to, as evidenced by their lack of engagement in responding, or do they just feel repetitive to you because you’re constantly asking them?
Are you tailoring a portion of your questionnaire to their specific background and firm, making at least some of the questions unique regardless?
Are you asking easy follow up questions based on their responses, taking the conversation in unplanned directions?
Pretty much this.
Do your research and ask about the firm, recent projects they've worked on or deals they've closed, what their role was in that project, what was the story on the deal and why did they like it, etc. etc.
Coffee chats are easy to make the people you're meeting with walk away from impressed with you if you go in with genuine curiosity. You should WANT to know about them, their firm, their role, their deals, not just be checking boxes in hopes of getting a job. Go in with the mentality that you want to learn from them.
Most of us in this industry love to talk and share war stories.
I defiantly tailor questions to company/ position. I have been chatting more people who are early in there career which could also be a big factor. Chats have been really hit or miss like have had some really great ones and just overall bland ones. Really trying to take my chats to the next level with the questions I ask, do you have any other tips for chatting people earlier in their career?
For sure. RE is somethin I have been passionate about for quite some time now. I genuinely enjoy reading about the market and keeping up to date with everything. I feel like my questions are tailored, but just haven't had the most personable/ memorable chats.
I should be more clear, I've had some great chats, but am struggling chatting with the more institutional companies and the younger people there, which is what I am leaning towards for a job coming out of university So I feel like its important to improve my chats on the institutional side more so.
Probably less defiance.
Seriously though man real estate isn’t overwhelming interesting. We aren’t dealing with the future of the species here or deep philosophy. Make a connection with the other person, engage in the conversation, and then realize they may be boring as hell or just doing this to be nice and move on.
Focus on getting a job, not the chats themselves.
Generally when this happens, I try to find something that they work or worked on specifically and drilling into details on that (i.e. a recent deal that closed and had a press release). If you can’t find that maybe talk about a deal you saw in their market that they may find interesting (or maybe even looked at). It will
give you insight into their day to day and probably feel more organic for both you and the other party.
I appreciate this comment, will definitely start incorporating this.
Some might not like this approach, but my coffee chats have become significantly more organic and memorable after changing my approach. I started out asking the same typical interview-esque and market questions to the people i’d coffee chat with and to be honest I would get bored and often they would too. Never felt like I had a meaningful conversation.
What I changed was started trying to make coffee chats more personable/casual. Finding shared hobbies, interests, etc has had me have much more meaningful chats. While I think asking market questions is great, I tried to avoid only asking this kind of questions, as sometimes they feel preprogrammed/prepped rather than organic.
I really think asking for advice(RE related ofc) is helpful too. Not only can you get some great insights, but you get to talk about things that you’re involved in and show you're driven and truly interested in the industry. Ex: I'm working on this case comp/project for my club. Here are my xyz ideas. What do you think and what would you change etc? --> Stuff life this shows you're driven and involved in RE
Great advice, definitely need to implement more casual banter to the conversation.
Hey man, keep it casual. They get easier as you go. Don’t make it interview-esque, get to know them as a person and ask open ended questions 👌
Ignore the above responses that are basically "tell me about your favorite deal/product/valuation ratio." Those are the same cookie-cutter questions that every sweaty college student asks... FT employee answers it for the 100th time and 9/10 times said college student will not understand the jargon he talks about:
Analyst: "We leveraged DEF Corp's existing platform to execute accretive M&A" "EBITDA margins expanded by over 300 basis points in the first year"
College Kid: "Wow! 300 basis points! That's awesome, Analyst, I totally get the context to this!" (In reality kid doesn't know wtf is going on)
"Go in with genuine curiosity"........ my ASS!
"I genuinely enjoy reading about the market and keeping up to date with everything," LOLLL
I KNOW YOUR CALLING ME CAUSE YOU WANT A JOB THAT PAYS 6 FIGURES.
AND if you understand the stupid deals and jargon I'm telling you, I'm gonna assume ur a HARDO. AND I DONT WANT TO WORK WITH HARDOS.
Now that that is outta the way, I think you're getting what 90% of people want out of these phone calls. GET TO KNOW YOU! We want to know if you're chill, can get along, and of course show a little bit of interest in the field. But you're gonna talk to people like you're trying to make friends.
We hire people who are competent, but there are too many out there. I'll like someone if I can work with them for long hours. I think of someone memorable, interesting, cool, etc. That's the impression I'm getting here, and I could care less if the only thing you're putting in the table is your interest in finance. I'm already surrounded by colleagues who work in it, don't want a chat that sounds like another earnings call. Too many bots in this industry anyways. Read books on social and human psychology. Let me know if yuo need any more inspiration. your welcome
Thanks Intern in IB M&A. Gonna give an IB answer even though this is a real estate question.
Look, you're not wrong, but I'd be really impressed if someone understands even half or 75% of the jargon. Doesn't mean you can lack social skills and attempt to impress me by your knowledge.
Someone who understands industry jargon AND is sociable is truly impressive, but I think you're over-discounting people who understand the jargon. That shows genuine interest/drive
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