Throwing a lot of darts at the board

So I don't want to turn this thread into a "give me career advice" type of thread, but I'm trying to figure out something fairly elementary.

The labor market value of people who have no networking and no experience is low. This is a fact that I'm taking into consideration as I am starting to apply for SA 2021 somewhat early. Because of the aforementioned fact, I am looking to apply to more than 30 spots as I am expecting a low hit rate.

I haven't really seen much discussion on the forums about how people "throw a lot of darts at the board", but the reality is that not everyone ends up in the sector they want and as a result they have to start a few layers lower. A reason for this could be the fact that they overestimated their abilities / demand for themselves and applied to fewer spots than appropriate.

Is this a good way of managing the risk coming from not making it deep into rounds for SA? Or am I overdoing it?

2 Comments
 

Diversifying your applications across a few industries is never a bad thing. Especially if you aren’t at a target where you can land interviews at any & every bank you apply to, it is best practice to cast a wide net.

Also, 30 isn’t a large number at all. Try to bump that number up to 100+. If you are only at 30 then it seems like you may just be gunning for the top names, but if you truly did no networking or anything besides applying you don’t have a great chance at the top shops.

 

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