Hi Fellow Monkeys,
I've been thinking about the future of my career, and wanted to get some input from people who may have been in or seen a similar situation to mine. I recently graduated with a degree in Computer Engineering from University of Maryland, and began full time work as a Software Engineer for a very small boutique investment research shop that I had been interning at during undergrad. I've now been there for about a year, was able to absorb a considerable knowledge of capital markets, and just recently accepted a position as a Data Engineer at a pretty well known known hedge fund. My job will be helping clean and process huge alternative data sets to aid data scientists in generating alpha for the PM's. While I enjoy some aspects of coding, I can't really see myself doing it 2-3 years out from now, and am afraid of being pegged as "IT" for life. I'm also concerned about rapidly hitting the glass ceiling if I stay in an engineering position.
My main question is this: Would it be realistic to try and move into a Research Analyst position within the new firm I'll be working at? I enjoyed what I learned about finance from my first job, and think that doing research to come up with investment ideas would be far more interesting than solely focusing on building software infrastructure. My concern is that I don't have the academic background they normally look for when recruiting right out of undergrad (I ended up with a 2.9 GPA, even though most of my poor grades were actually not in engineering courses). I would also consider moving into management, although I don't know very much about that as a career track, or eventually starting a business of my own. Being totally honest, my goal for now is just to make as much money as possible. Would love to hear all of your thoughts.
- Kumquant
What programming languages / technology paradigms are you fluent in?
At my former job I was the only developer, so I've learned the full stack. Off the top of my head though I'm most fluent with Python, JavaScript (jQuery, React, Redux, Node), and SQL. I've done everything for them ranging from sys admin stuff (automated tasks via cron, apache server configuration) to creating economic import / export data models with numpy because excel couldn't handle 176 million rows of information. I also was fortunate to work with TensorFlow a little bit. I think machine learning is super cool, although if I were to really get more into it I'd need more education than the single undergrad course I took on it.
it should be obvious...but to make more money in IT...take more in depth classes on machine learning and neural nets....go more in depth into TensorFlow and deep learning....and then get a job as a data scientist doing machine learning (pays the big bucks these days...300k plus...)
I would try my hand at starting my own business/entrepreneurship as that's where you can by far make the most money but it's very high risk/high reward and it's not a lifestyle that's for everybody. I personally love and have been lucky to do well early on but if your motivation is purely money you won't get very far. I haven't met a single successful entrepreneur (meaning they pocket $1M+ yearly) that was motivated by money. I know one guy that pulls $500k+ yearly motivated by money but that's out of like...30/40 people.
YMMV.
I may have been exaggerating a bit when I said I just want to make a ton of money. I definitely would be in it for more than just that. There's something to be said for building your own company from scratch, and I think that would be a huge point of pride for me as a person who likes creating things. Plus you get to be your own boss!
As someone who started in the fundamental investments side and transitioned into a technology-focused role, I don't regret it. Yes, there is a glass ceiling on what you can make, but it's about the cost-benefit. You take on a fraction of the risk and stress and earn 200k+ in comp anyway.
There are a lot of neurotic kids here on WSO who are so singularly obsessed with some fleeting definition of success that ultimately involves a high paying, but high stress, high hours, and low job security position.
Once you get to around 30 you start to realize "is this it?" and the insignificance of everything becomes more apparent. So my 2 cents, the grass may look greener, but it often isn't.
Alternative data is quite popular with both the fundamental L/S and the quant PMs. And so working in this new HF position can potentially bring you in contact with these folks - and if that's the case, you can learn more about the work they do. Depending on the firm, you might later be able to transition into an analyst role with one of these PMs. In my opinion, transitioning to an analyst role within the firm is better in that you likely have more info about the work you'd be doing and the person you'd be working for.
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