FUCK YOUR "TARGET"
Sorry for the rant, but just wanted to say that this top school shit has gone way too far. I just had an interview with an SM and got rejected, even though according to my interviewer, I was "the most qualified applicant they have ever seen". My pitch is up 120% from when I submitted my application, and I crushed every behavioral and technical.
They don't hire from my school. Only H/Y/P. I don't even go to a fucking bad school (in most of the "target" conversations on this page), and there's no fucking reason why I should have been rejected. I can't fucking believe that my getting waitlisted from Harvard and Yale instead of being accepted during high school is literally messing up my career.
This target school shit is fucking stupid. If you're smart, you should get an opportunity. What the fuck do you mean you "only hire from Harvard, Yale, and Princeton" if I make you money, what does it even matter????
Sorry for the rant.
Congrats on Kelley - heard their workshop is pretty great!
no tard Kelley IBW kid is going SM
Yes, I would like a large fries with that
Jokes aside, that sucks man I'm sorry. Good luck on the next one.
How far out of college are you?
I'm a sophomore in college
Dm me your pitch.
I know you’re angry, but don’t let it get to you. Had this happen to me while recruiting for a hedge fund after working at GS/MS IB and a MF PE… it was ultimately a bad seat and I’m glad I avoided it.
sounds like an Abdiel type role, also GS/MS IB + MF PE is crazy lol
Lmao forgot about that place. They dont just hire from HYP. They had a recruiting event at my school and a booth at a job fair where non HYP kids were invited
del
Fwiw i was a kid who didn't get into HYP and also a college sophomore currently, still sorta feel bad I didn't achieve a childhood dream haha. I have no connections in finance besides a second cousin that was in IB and am not DEI.
Nonetheless, I grinded at my T10 and I landed a great SM seat that hires interns and have been approached by HYP kids asking about how I landed my role. If a firm limits to HYP (even Tiger, the prestige maxxers don't even do that shit), then it's stupid. There are plenty of people from many schools like Dartmouth Northwestern Duke UChicago that could do a stellar job.
Just stick through it and you'll be fine and reach out to me if you want.
Can I pm
I just dmmed you
can you pm as well :)
just did
Odd that they would say you were the most qualified and then not hire you. But also, when hiring college kids, it's unfortunately one of the only indicators we have about you. Definitely not perfect, but you don't have any real work experience.
Beyond college, it will still have some impact, but it becomes significantly less of a factor, especially at a HF. Im at an SM now and we care a lot less about "pedigree" than when I was at MF PE.
Just hang it there. Ik it's not what you want to hear, but don't be one of those "nontarget" kids who have a chip on their shoulder. It won't do you any good.
You know where to put the fries bro
You're probably feeling a bit emotional, but that's alright. I've lost a seat at an MM HF simply because of box-ticking reasons, as the pod leader and I met up for lunch after I got rejected. I went to a very good school, although not the name brand every here likes to parrot about. If you went to a decent school and you have great intellect/experiences, I have no doubts a great team will bring you on. This whole HYPSM thing is somewhat over-hyped - it's true, it exists, but there is a world where folks from a lot of schools end up in top teams on Wall Street. You can look it up on LinkedIn or even read about it here.
Look at Stan Druckenmiller. Went to a no-name school. Arguably the best hedge fund manager of all time. Keep your chin up, keep working hard, keep moving.
Bowdoin is far from a no-name school…
Lol here comes the LAC supporters. Meh, bowdoin isn't bad, def not a no-name school, but it isn't Harvard lol
only reason I can think on the emphasis on target/non-target, is that when you send the teasers/pitches to clients showing your team, they can put some nice universities at the bottom of ur name to make them look more prepared, which I'll argue that it does make an impression on clients
I don't even go to a non-target - we place tons of kids in top banking/elite buyside every single year. That's why I was so upset. I worked hard in high school and believe that it was a stroke of luck that I got into my school and not into H/Y/P. I doubt any LP would look at my school's name at the bottom of the client letter and not think anything but good things? It's just so odd that it's ONLY H/Y/P (and fwiw I was waitlisted at both Harvard and Yale, so literally some luck of me getting off the waitlist could have changed my early career which sucks because it's not like I wasn't qualified, it's luck).
one helpful trait to develop early on is the ability to stay emotionally detached from certain critical outcomes out of your control and not come across as if you have a chip on your shoulder... especially in this industry at your stage of your career. In the grand scheme of things, this rejection is a small issue to get hung up on. It's understandable to vent after a rejection for a role you really wanted... I've done it too... but an expletive laden post like this suggests that some of these bad tendencies might have shown up in subtle ways during the interview as well... maybe you did come across as having a chip on your shoulder.
did you come across as too rigid when pitching your ideas? are you overly defensive when challenged? how do you react when someone disagrees with your idea? Small behaviors in an interview can reveal a good deal about your personal traits... not suggesting that this was exactly the case here but just something for you to reflect on.
this is still an industry where intellectual horsepower and ability to generate pnl trumps prestige/pedigree... so if you are as good as you say you are, keep networking and applying and you will find the right seat.
You obviously sound qualified, and yes its unfortunate. Are you going to keep dwelling or take action
Do you mind sharing which fund so I know what to avoid
Bro non-target life is the best. When I was at ASU, we would tan all day out by the pool and party all night with the sorority chicks.
"I was "the most qualified applicant they have ever seen"."
You also think the stripper really liked you?
Not sure if this helps you actually feel better, but I think something to recognize is that if a place actually works like that, then the business can't sustain itself over any long enough period of time for you to want to work there and build your career there. Capitalism sorts out winners and losers. If the culture is that far off from making smart decisions, it will be a loser. Markets are ruthless. There are a few funds that are straight up country clubs. LPs are there because the founder is some rich kid and he hired a bunch of people he knows personally. Great if you can land that but not worth getting mad if you don't. Otherwise, you want to be in a culture that rewards real work and develops you, it's better for you in the long run.
Are you trolling? Did I finally get got? Your post doesnt make much sense...
Someone has to say it, if you crushed the interview half as much as you indicated, this SM would have fought for you to at least get a proper process going. When real talent is identified in the HF market, even at the junior level, it is usually taken seriously.
I know this for a fact because when these guys who look make a name for themselves at 20 want to start their own funds, they are taken seriously. An old professor would talk about it, meeting students who were 18-21 who said "I am going to start my own fund immediately after school", and he would say "will you take me on as an investor". So it strands to reason if you were perceived by a SM as a true savant, they would look to retain you, regardless of alma mater? No?
Additionally, how does one get an interview with a firm only to be told they dont hire from the interviewee's UG? Are you referring to a coffee chat as an interview only to then state that you weren't eligible for a formal interview?
Finally, never, ever, and I mean this truly, have I heard an interviewer tell someone they were "the most impressive candidate I've ever seen" after getting rejected. Or even after getting the offer, candidly. You don't want to tip your cap that this individual is immediately perceived as a sizeable leg up against the rest. That simply how the feedback isn't displayed. I am basing this off the feedback from my entire network as well, FYI.
What does "SM" stand for? ... I don't know too much about the hedge fund space
Sadist-masochist
"I wouldn't be this successful today if I didn't land that one job out of college" said no one ever.
What about the people that never got that one job and never became successful?
It's a good question but ultimately I think the answer is they don't really exist, at least not in a causative way (i.e. of course there are unsuccessful people who never got that one job, but that's not the reason they're unsuccessful).
If getting that one job was key to success, you'd see the evidence on both sides of it. You'd see some successful people crediting most of their success to landing that crucial first job, and you'd see some unsuccessful people crediting their non-success to that particular failure point.
What you see in reality is only the second case. You see unsuccessful people blaming their non-success on one thing or another, and often times their chosen scapegoat is that they didn't get that early gig that puts them on the path.
The question of course is whether that's the true cause. And I think if it was, you'd see the contrapositive also: the successful person who says they owe it all (or most of it) to landing that gig. Hope that makes some sense.
Hmm I don't really know if that's true. Don't get me wrong, 1st job is NOT destiny at all
But I can confidently say that I would not be here today at my age with the same level of success if I didn't end up at the top LO AM that I did right after graduation. You could make the argument that 1) it would have taken longer but I'd still get here or 2) I would've been more scrappy in getting here (which maybe would increase my resiliency in the future too which is critical to success)
Haha I started off trying to counter your argument, but I can see the merits of yours now too. All to say, life happens for a reason and each path has the power to form you in very positive, if different ways
There are always exceptions but in general, especially in a very developed talent-sorting system like our finance industry, its hard for talented people to end up unsuccessful and vice versa. Possible but hard.
Seems like you’re still in school.
I’m hiring for a role much more senior to you (looking to add one more to my team with 10+ years of experience). There are five candidates who have a spot and all have an incredible, real track record of generating P&L. Not a case study but years of P&L for all of them, all quite similar.
So ultimately, who I hire isn’t going to be about talent — I think all are top 90-95% talent in my sector. It’s going to be who I like.
You might be a great, smart guy, but unless you are literally investing prodigy, at best as a kid in school you are a 40-50th percentile junior analyst. Basically, you’re useless out of school. The average guy who did banking or PE for two years and joins my fund is almost certainly superior to you, especially if they did come from a top group. But even someone new from banking would be mostly useless as they have zero public mkt experience.at best, they’d be 30-40th percentile senior analyst in terms of their year 1 capability.
So how, then, do people hire for juniors, whether out of school or as first public mkts job? Simple — we view competence and passion for the mkt/seat as a bear minimum / table stakes. Beyond that your pitch even if it was sandisk last year, would not be the thing driving an offer vs no offer decision. Rather, we’d look 100% at fit / likability / ease of working.
Now look, fit/likability is highly subjective. If you share a background with guys at the fund, you will get a boost. That’s just how it is, almost tribal nature. Same thing with being in same eating club/fraternity/etc.
See how many ppl in this biz are on the boards of the targets, how many have donated buildings, endowed professorships paid for athletic programs & facilities. People love their schools. They will go to bat for their fellow alumni assuming all else equal — which it very often is at junior levels and almost certainly is if hiring out of school.
Tldr would find firm where you know guys from sports team you played on in college, fraternity,etc. you will have the upper hand then
Hey, so sorry to hear - I went to Cornell, which IS an Ivy League, and I had a similar situation happen to me. Like bruh, Seth Klarman and Leonard Green and Sandy Weill and Chuck Feeney and Frank Bruno and Michael Gatto went to Cornell, and these elitist snobs think they can ding me because I did not attend a HYP Ivy? Give me a break.
My brother at Georgetown also faced a similar situation. Like bruh, Joe Baratta and Egon Durban and Roger Altman and Antonio Gracias and Tony Ressler and Michael Psaros went to Georgetown, and these elitist snobs think they can do my brother dirty like they did me?
But in all honesty, echoing everything everyone said above, use this as motivation to push harder.
All the above mentioned legends did very well for themselves despite not attending HYP.
Ultimately, my brother and I both did very well for ourselves on the 2+2 and M7 MBA paths, and we both agree that this situation motivated us to work hard to achieve the careers we did.
Looking back, I would not have it any other way.
Now, I'm waiting on people on this forum to congratulate my family on Cornell and Georgetown.
Frankly if that‘s how they end up deciding, they should filter you out earlier - otherwise they are wasting time.
But to be honest, it might also be an excuse given to you when there was no personal fit or someone else was even better. For example a lot more difficult to tell someone that they are awkward than to refer to their school.
I resonate with a lot of what has been said in this thread. However, from working on the client side in my earlier years, I can attest that a large part of it has to do with business development and origination. Some shops find it much easier to sell their proposition if they articulate that they only hire the brightest individuals i.e. - “Our investment team is comprised of HYP alumni with an average of x years’ experience…” something along those lines. I saw it almost every day on the client side. That holds a lot of weight, especially when performance is flat or there isn’t much differentiation vs competitors.
TL;DR - Some shops find it much easier to sell their capabilities if the investment teams appear smart on paper.
This is the main reason. Doesn't matter in periods of outperformance, but this REALLY matters in periods of underperformance in assuring clients. In LO AM, the combo of Top 20 school + CFA is powerful marketing to clients
Hey man, keep trying. I have no top schools but i managed to work in tier1 US banks (best ones).. nearly 20y now. I think Europe/UK is more relaxed in that respect.
2 phrases I live and die by
If you got the interview, trust me you were in the running. Seems like you're doing fine and just need to continue networking and getting more interviews. I bet your case study was shit btw, haven seen hundreds of these from overzealous 20 year olds in ugrad.
On another note, whenever people ask me why WSO became more angry and incel and MAGA, i point to threads like this.
angry people like charlie kirk usually had this type of moment of anger and hatred via an Annapolis rejection define the next decade of their worldview. just keep doing your best and not go down the path of blaming immigrants and DEI for your hedge fund interview outcomes.
Damn that sucks bro
Feel for you, but if you want to make it in this industry it’s going to take being able to take rejection / failure like this all the time. I interviewed all over the place only to find that a completely random fund (where I’m at today) was the right one for me despite fighting it my whole time as a junior analyst. People care about prestige in this industry and if you can’t accept that and be willing to bet on yourself, it’s going to be a tough ride.
On a brighter note, im firmly a believer things happen for a reason - you don’t know what bullets you’re dodging now, especially as an undergrad who hasn’t been in the industry and seen people less talented than you succeed all over the place. Stay in your lane - if you’re as talented as you think, keep betting on yourself and use every slight as a motivation to improve every day. The best create their own luck and their own right tail outcomes where others don’t see it.
If you’re truly the most qualified candidate they’ve ever seen, they wouldn’t drop you over your non-target school, and if policy were to never hire from that school they wouldn’t waste time interviewing you…
Maybe it was clear that you’d overreact and they found some way to let you down gently
But who cares, if you’re the most qualified ever fuck them and nail the next one
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