People who say they're in finance but aren't

Does anyone here get annoyed when someone says they're in finance just because they work at a financial firm but does something completely unrelated to the industry?

I worked with another HR intern during my time at the PE firm. Once my summer internship came to an end, they wanted to extend my internship but I gave up the opportunity to the other girl who didn't even say thanks. Long story short, she now works full time in HR at a HF but claims that she works in finance and that her industry is Investment Management; and above all else "plans" to form her own HF with a friend who works at an IB. Before I found this out, I actually wanted to see if she'd like to hang out with some other intern friends and I but left me on read....

Just bothers me that they feel like they need to say things like that and behave that way.

28 Comments
 

The real question is, what language is it actually written in?

Follow the shit your fellow monkeys say @shitWSOsays Life is hard, it's even harder when you're stupid - John Wayne
 

So this is the type of crap that HR people worry about - no wonder it takes forever for anything to get done as soon as it's passed to y'all.

But to answer your question, yes she does work in finance, does it matter if she's actually in HR? no not really. People really need to stop getting hung up on titles and technicalities.

"A guy gets on the MTA here in L.A. and dies. Think anybody'll notice?" - Vincent
 
Most Helpful

Think of it like this... There are two ways to view Finance... as a sector and as a field. When I say sector, I'm talking about companies in financial services, insurance, investment management, sales and trading, etc. These are companies whose core business is derived by providing financial services, be it traditional IB functions, AM/IM, wealth management, or insurance. When I say finance as a field, I'm talking about any sort of financial analysis predicated on the understanding of how a business works and analysis of the business' financial performance. So, the guy doing CorpFin at an F500 works in finance as a field, while your colleague, the HR rep works in Finance as a sector. If you view it like that, then you can always dig deeper and ask what do you do in finance to determine where they fall.

 

This is spot on. At my business school which is a top 5 school - see what I am doing here lol - a girl at networking events would often tell people that she worked in PE. Technically she was correct as she had been employed at one but wouldn't disclose upright that she'd been doing some back-office stuff here. Of course, that would have taken the wind out of her sail...

 

it's probably so recruiters can find her easier.

”The tranquility that comes when you stop caring what they say. Or think, or do. Only what YOU do. " Marcus Aurelius

 
"lleekyungsie805" Does anyone here get annoyed when someone says they're in finance just because they work at a financial firm but does something completely unrelated to the industry?

Not really, I honestly couldn't care less. It's likely a projection of their insecurities and/or inferiority complex that leads them to want to impress people through such behavior. As I said... Who. Cares.

 

Your comment was alright. But I threw it a silver banana because your user name and avatar are excellent. You got him mid-hand-gesture. "Margin Call" is easily the most underrated finance movie. 10/10.

"Now youse can't leave." -Sonny LoSpecchio
 

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"Now youse can't leave." -Sonny LoSpecchio
 

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