Hi All, I recently started interviewing with some startups. I previously worked in investment banking and private equity. I also went to a top US business school. The problem I am currently facing is that people that don't have a similar background as me at startups often automatically assume that I know everything about modeling and various topics... and say they don't want to train, etc. I do know a lot, but I am not a magician by any means... It also just generally makes me feel anxious because I have imposter syndrome perhaps. The following happened in my last role at a startup - the team had very high expectations for me and staffed me right away on several very complicated modeling assignments / deals. This was overwhelming.... any advice on how to somehow set realistic expectations during the interview process? Anyone face a similar problem? I don't want to set myself to fail. It is a hard line because obviously I want to sell myself for the job, but also honestly do need mentoring and training... especially since I was in business school these past few years and am a bit rusty.
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Honestly man it kind of sounds like you’re asking the wrong questions tbh —
You went to a top business school, did banking, and did PE. It’s not that deep, I’m gonna assume you actually know a fair bit of modeling.
It sounds to me like you have a lot of anxiety. This is valid, lots of us do. Do some therapy to work on this.
Additionally, if you really feel like your modeling is not up to par in some way, work to define that more specifically: WHAT part of modeling is tripping you up? The specific accounting? The structuring? What type of analyses are you having troubling structuring ? The excel ?
At this point in your career man, not to cause you more anxiety, you should have the chops to train yourself. I do also believe that not only should you, but that you DO and can.
The other piece of this is in my experience, startups, especially when they’re not full of ppl not from PE/ IB etc , don’t actually have some grand sets of modeling tasks. Hell, the person in charge of you probably doesn’t know how to use excel (this causes all sorts of other annoying problems but suffice is to say that you CAN do this.)
The last bit of this is you might find other areas of a startup to be more appealing to you— there’s customer operations, sales strategy, etc, that you might like depending on what it is you’re looking for and why you’re leaving IB/ PE
Thank-you for the vote of confidence. :) What type of work have you done for startups? What has your experience been like?
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