Does it even make sense to do banking for 2 years then NOT do PE?

I'm starting to think that PE might not be the move, it seems like people are working a lot more hours and getting paid a lot less as competition has increased over the years. I'm thinking about doing banking for 2 years just to do Corp Dev/Strategy, but is this even worth it? Why would you work the 2 years in banking just to work a job that you could have worked out of undergrad? Do you actually get paid more/enter in at a higher position? Or are you better off just pursuing something in tech or consulting at that point? Thanks in advance.

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Not saying you should or shouldn't but a few benefits include:

1) higher pay first two years out of school, 2) your ppt and excel skills will be better than most of the people you'll be benchmarked against in the next job, 3) you have more optionality (i.e. can move from IB to many more different job types than straight corp dev) and 4) there is a reputation component / stamp of approval that's small but still helpful when looking out to the next jobs.

Whether those are worth giving up two years of your life is up to you... 

 
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Other thing I'll add to this is that promotions in Corp Dev / Strat have a degree of randomness attached to them. Those groups are small and you won't necessarily move up because you've been there for 2-3 years like IB / consulting, there needs to be a vacancy and/or broader business need. So decent chance (but not a guarantee) that you'd enter at a higher level post 2 years of IB than you would if you'd started in the space after undergrad. 

That said, while I do think IB is better optionality for other careers in finance, starting at a "normal" company is potentially better for other roles in that field if you aren't sold on finance. It's an easier story to go from Adobe Corp Dev => Adobe Product Management than it is to go from IB Analyst => Adobe Product Management. 

 

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