Posted this in another thread, but I thought others could benefit from a broader topic standpoint. I am a hiring manager for our analyst pool and run a FI product trading book.
Here is my advice to you.
Trading is still a massively old school game. If you want to succeed half of the battle is living out this concept with every cell of your being. I cannot emphasize this enough. It is not up to your manager to gauge if you are succeeding. It is up to the entire desk. You have to build a reputation and the best way to do that is to keep your mouth shut and free up trading hours for the entire desk while working IB hours as needed.
Be assertive. Take on as many projects as you can handle to provide value. I care about few things more than my P&L. Every second that I have to focus on something besides trading is costing the firm, and me, money. You're going to have the lowest hourly rate to the firm on the desk - understand this and find ways to free up time for everyone senior to you so they can produce. Be assertive.
Ask questions - traders are always busy and I will gladly tell you if it isn't the right time. I won't go out of my way to carry you across developmental stepping stones though - I want you to prove to me that if I'm amortizing P&L on you it's +EV for the desk.
Write everything down. If I have to teach you something twice I'm going to spend less effort teaching you. If I don't and you take my prior advice I will give you everything I have towards your development, because strong support networks are the lifeblood of a strong desk. Of course, you will encounter pricks that don't understand this - you must still support them. Many will test you solely on your ability to know your role. Even the best analysts will get buried and feel worthless. This is part of the evolution, LEARN FROM IT.
Persevere or die. If you make it, always pay it forward. Despite how many will act, nobody can make it without good mentors. Being a prick will land you on the buy-side.
Of course, the obligatory excel advice already given is relevant. You have to be as efficient as you can possibly be to thrive on a desk in any role. You also must buy a hard copy of Fabozzi and treat it as your bible. Read every single word and write down everything you don't understand and research it or ask your mentor(s). Keep it on your desk and research any topic that comes up for your peers. You will learn most aspects of your product in the trenches, but having a grasp of Fabozzi will significantly flatten your learning curve and ability to grasp complex concepts. Be assertive.
Nothing (even P&L) is more important than networking. Use your on-boarding program to connect with everyone you can across the org at every level and especially on other trading desks. If you can get on other associates etc calendars without pissing off yours it will massively pay off 10 years down the road. You want everyone to know who you are, but not necessarily for any reason if that makes sense.
Best of luck. Nobody on your desk wants anything other than for you to succeed, because then we all get better. My DMs are always open.
Thank you for the great write up. Sounds like a dying industry!
Ouch 😭
Great job choosing arguably the worst subsector in finance as a career path
Clocking out @ 5 everyday on a prop/uw desk is still a pretty good gig. But we send our failed analysts who can’t hack it in trading to research. Maybe you should take some advice...
This guy gives valuable, thoughtful advice and people on this forum still manage to be jerks. No wonder not many people actually in the industry post here. And news flash: some people are interested in stuff like central bank policy etc and not working until midnight everyday on random Powerpoints for the sake of "prestige" and risk aversion.
hey im not interested in trading but wanted to thank you regardless. ppl like yourself make this forum what it is and some of the commenters above would likely do well to remember that. though perhaps they take issue with the tone in which you tried to convey your msg.
regardless, very interesting read and i must ask, do you think it is possible for someone who is currently very slow at their work and/or feels naturally slower than the rest to improve? would that book you recommended help?
1st year Trader on a desk, every word you said is 100% true.
What's with all the IB cucks here dropping their venom out of despair after their boss ruined their night.
Your wife's boyfriend would NOT be proud of this behaviour.
This is fantastic and 100% correct advice. I have no idea why some people are taking issue with the OP.
For those of you who aren't in trading yet, I think there are a few things to keep in mind:
1. During market hours, traders are either extremely busy with stuff or not doing much and waiting to have stuff to do. It's binary, so if you want to approach them to talk about stuff make sure you understand which of those two they are going through in the moment.
2. The most important skills an analyst can have are to be diligent and to be self-sufficient. If you can google the answer to something, or look it up yourself, just do it. You don't need to know everything technical, but if you demonstrate that you're smart enough to think for yourself and willing to work and learn you're outperforming most of your class (sad, but true).
3. Trading has significantly better hours than banking, but only count on that when you're on a book with P&L. When you're an analyst, you'll still probably need to do the SOD and EOD stuff and be clocking 60+ hour weeks regularly. You'll see all the senior guys leave the floor by like 4-5, but you still need to do a bit of work to catch up to them. Your day during the actual trading day is slower unless someone needs you to do some admin/ops adjacent thing, so it's a great time to learn about the market and talk to people when the opportunity arises.
4. Trading is an apprenticeship model, so the best way to become a valuable asset is to talk to people constant and assert that you're not some robot who can just follow directions, but rather are someone who can think for themselves and have a well-argued thesis for what's going on and how to best express that. This gets constantly refined over time, but the best entry is to pay attention and minimize dumb mistakes.
5. There is nothing technically difficult about trading, and the vast majority of how you will be judged in on your potential. Most banks budget losing money on their analysts, but they keep them around because it's still a good long-term investment for the firm. You don't need to have a book ASAP or need to know everything to be successful. Trading is all about refining a flexible skillset - so think in more general terms when thinking about your own development.
I wish there were more threads like this when I was an analyst; would have saved me a ton of time and frustration.