Non-Traditional Student - Strong Credentials - Target School?
I'm a non-traditional student with strong credentials at a target school. Here's my story:
Era 1: Audio Engineering
I always loved music, like, obsessed over it. I didn't think much of it, just another genre of music in the library. I'm going to truncate the story here. I spent years as an audio engineer.
Era 2: Breaking Into Private Credit (kind of)
I was introduced to a co-founder of an alternative investments firm focused on originating bridge loans for cash-flowing real estate assets. This firm focused on brokering bank-alternative commercial credit, and they allowed me to manage my own book of business as an independent contractor.
I closed a little over 10 million dollars in commercial loans, primarily asset-backed loans such as accounts receivable financing, senior secured commercial real estate loans, and lines of credit. I realized that I could do more with more resources. However, when I tried to switch shops, I was turned down because I didn't have a formal education or work experience at a recognized firm. I knew that I If I wanted to advance, I would have to re-enter academia. So I left the firm, re-entered community college, killed it, and got into a target school.
Era 4: The Academic Joust, The Pandemic, and The Startup
When the pandemic hit, I was working on a project inspired by the economic downturn. I didn't realize how hard and how much it takes to build what I was suggesting, so, needless to say, I burned out, all while trying to acclimate to a new environment. I did not recover for a long time, and unfortunately, my grade slipped up in school. To get things going again, I decided to shift my focus to programming. I learned enough to be competent with coding and built databases on different cloud systems while participating in PhD research on differential privacy algorithms.
After the research projects, I joined a cool startup comprised of old Wall Street execs focused on ESG, which is HUGE right now. This opportunity gave me the experience of building teams and platforms. At the firm, I am considered a subject matter expert in the space.
Era 5: Moment of Clarity
So, now, here we are. At a target school with strong experience trying to break into private credit/corp finance/strategy at a MF PE/PC firm. I am trying to network as hard as possible with the limited bandwidth I have, but I feel like I need some help. I'm not a "traditional" candidate, so I don't know where I fall on the hiring spectrum. I am "in process" and have submitted my one-way interview at one firm, but I have no idea how to do this or even begin doing this. I am a solid networker, but I don't know whom to reach out to or what to even say to these people.
Any advice would be appreciated, and I'm happy to answer any questions you may have about my journey.
I didn't get all the way through your story (you may want to condense to 2-3 paragraphs for more responses, this is honestly really hard to read) but the important questions here are 1. what is your current GPA, by grades slipping "a bit" do you mean a 3.3 or a 3.7 and 2. what is your exact graduation semester (May 2023 is a lot difference advice than May 2024)
By BB PE/PC do you mean a megafund? BB means Bulge Bracket and refers to the investment banks (GS, JPM, etc) - stupid small thing, but just in case you are saying this in any networking emails, it's an auto ding to call a private equity firm a BB.
I don't think you have an easy path to MF PE or MM/UMM PE, mostly because of how complicated this story is, potentially GPA (below 3.6 is a challenge) and your timing - most people aiming for PE start the process before their sophomore year, and the whole recruiting process often wraps up before the end of sophomore spring. I also think your previous experience is intriguing but is very complicated and people may question your trainability/willingness to be an Excel computer monkey with so much prior experience. You could certainly land a smaller credit job and either lateral up or use an MBA to climb up the ladder to a larger firm.
I would also recommend highly redacting your resume and posting here to get some feedback on how you are wording these previous experiences. Having an MD title at your own shop doesn't mean anything unfortunately in the high finance world... and could very well be a negative, IMO I might consider juniorizing that title down a bit because it makes your story really quite complicated to be applying for analyst positions when your profile is already a very winding road. The startup (is this the same company?) is also a pretty complex story. You have to network and get people to vouch for you, your resume will raise a ton of question marks if you just cold apply.
As for networking, you should look up some guides on here but the premise is to reach out to people and get them on the phone for 15 minutes to talk about their career and the firm. You can't straight up ask them for recruiting help but you definitely can ask about recruiting timelines (most MF PE will say their junior recruiting is done, I'd focus on smaller credit shops)
Hey, thanks for the feedback.
In order:
1. Truncated the narrative down significantly, but kept it longer than you suggested to keep the story clear.
2. I went from a 3.7 to a 2.7 but have a plan in place to get to a 3.3 by the end of this year.
3. I can graduate after summer semester 2023, or I can extend my time to hop on the next hiring cycle. I am trying to crush 16-18 credits a semester right now, but slowing down feels like right thing to do so I have more time to network, job hunt, etc.
4. I means MF PE/PC, I've edited my post to reflect this. Thank you for clarifying.
5. I realized after the fact that there is a TON of material on WSO on networking and the intangibles. I will review.
6. Good call on juniorizing the role. I'll attach a resume shortly. I wanted to get this response out, apologies for the delay.
Your main issue is that your entire history to date sounds like you’re just blowing smoke and haven’t done anything relevant to your goal so you’re inflating a bunch of non-relevant experiences. You should really just be straight forward about what it is that you did and why it led you to wanting to do XYZ, and start out by targeting internships at boutiques. You need real experience - points below may be a little harsh but I’m not really about sugar coating advice, if you really want this then just put your head down and grind and you’ll get something.
Thank you for your feedback. All of your assessments are correct. I've removed all the airy stuff and got very specific in my resume. I've posted my resume for critique here, my hope is that gives you a clearer visual on my professional experiences and skills.
To answer your questions; in order:
Hope this is sufficient, thanks again for your reply.
You're still doing it - cut it out with the fluff and blatant BS, if you are serious about this move. People see right through this. What you held was an internship, not an "internship" and nothing more needs to be said; how long was the position for? Were you earning a salary? No? Then just knock it off and call it an internship. As for experience / reasoning, you're being incredibly confusing. For one, nobody is going to understand what you mean by you picked up coding to "get experience as an Operator" and the technical experience you'd build in the short time you pursued this is likely not ever going to be used in industry. Again, there's nothing there that connects the experience to your goals, and you trying to do so with literally everything on your story / background is reading like trying to fit a square in a round hole - it's just awkward.
Again, you need to stop with the fluff, or people are not going to want to work with you. I'm serious about this - it's a huge personality flaw if you want outright honesty. "Integral member of the founding team" - dude, you're an intern. Do you hold equity? No? You're so valuable to this company yet they aren't giving you equity or a formal offer to join the company after graduation? And you're clearly not even engaged enough with the company / work they do to pursue the work full time post-graduation. You're pitching this experience like you're Mark Zuckerberg who just created Facebook in his dorm but are shopping around for PE offers in the 9th inning. Also, it sounds like if you can't explain what this company does without all the buzzwords and in what's now been two responses, you should really figure out a new approach. You can't realistically give credible background on anything if you're just describing it as a "fintech ESG platform" and have to pitch the founders as "seasoned Wall Street executives"; again dude, this all means nothing. You need to either directly say what you are doing / why / how it actually correlates to what you want or leave it off.
Sorry for being harsh, but you're not really getting it and if you actually want a chance here you need to take the above advice seriously.
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