Asking for Leave of Absence for SA stint

You should take the summer analyst position during the day and work your other job during the night. A good buddy of mine did this last year when he was working as a club promoter a STK and got a summer analyst position at Bear Stearns.

How about you do the analyst internship for a year and apply for an MSF program?

An MSF will rebrand you and give you another shot with campus recruiting. Just my 2 cents.

bear stearns?

best case scenario is that your current firm allows you to take time off to do the SA stint, but highly unlikely. Unless you are really tight with them and they know your banking ambitions, it will be a tough sell, and I wouldn't lie about family/backpacking or anything because its a small world, and people can quickly find out what you're doing.

It's not an easy job market, so I would think hard if the decision comes to leave ur job or not. I mean banking options are also few and far in between post grad, when you have no exp already. I would talk it over with some folks, including the senior partner who recruited you. I don't know what your current job is, but if you really want to get into banking, then I say take the internship, regardless.

@Determined - what? I work for a financial services firm in Philly right now. The internship is in Boston. Aside from the travel involved, my current firm doesn't have a "night shift."

@Fez - the SA internship is for 3 months. If they extend it, great I will stay on, but it is strictly for the summer. I have no real desire to pursue an MSF 2 years out of undergrad. If I go back to school, it's for an MBA in 4-6 years. I suppose I could consider an MSF after the internship, although I have heard bad things about people entering MSF programs with 1-2 years experience then being labeled "too experienced" for IB Analyst positions.

@dayaam - thanks for the words. I have made it clear to my boss that I am looking for more responsibility and applying out of the department the first chance I get. He doesn't know I am looking outside the company though. Are sabbaticals really that hard to get approved? I will have roughly 20 months time in job when June comes up, so that's a pretty proven track record. I feel like if I say it's for a summer internship they will auto-deny it and possible even lay me off.

if you can afford it, ask the internship to not pay you. taxes would be how you get found out. alternatively, quit your current job if you think can either get it back or go work for a competitor (if this is pwm or something not out of the realm of possibility). get your bschool recs now though (speed study the gmat and apply just so they have the app on file)

Pretty risky bet. Full time job vs internship that may or may not lead to a full time job either directly or indirectly.

I'd say no way you get a sabbatical. When companies have those they are for people with many years of experience and given as a way to retain talent. Highly doubtful that a kid with 20 months of experience out of college gets one.

Its so crazy it might not even be worth asking for. Personally, I'd decide what I was going to do; stay the course or the internship. If you decide internship ask for the sabbatical for icing on the cake but I feel like once you ask for that there isn't really any turning back as you will have hurt your personal brand within your company.

Thats my two cents.

I am now starting to consider fez's idea of an MSF. If I am going to lose my job over this, it may make sense. Villanova MSF has great alumni contacts in the NYC area and they usually send about half of their class into IBD analyst (and some associate) roles with a few going into trading, advisory and Fortune 500.

I think passing Level II of the CFA, doing a Summer Analyst stint and then jumping right into a 1-year quality MSF program would make me an attractive candidate moving forwards for MM or possibly even lower tier BB's? Plus having access to OCR which I totally effed up in undergrad would be huge.

Thoughts?

A MSF could help, I'm don't know any specifics, but might be a little late in the application cycle though.

But for IBD a CFA is worthless - you can do a search on this. A CFA is for trading, investment management, hedge funds, etc. but in many regards irrelevant for IBD and PE. So I'd think about that before you embark on that journey of studying and really figure out what your long term goals are.

ke18sb:

A MSF could help, I'm don't know any specifics, but might be a little late in the application cycle though. But for IBD a CFA is worthless - you can do a search on this. A CFA is for trading, investment management, hedge funds, etc. but in many regards irrelevant for IBD and PE. So I'd think about that before you embark on that journey of studying and really figure out what your long term goals are.

The CFA may be worthless for IBD, but it is something I am doing to hedge my bets. It is a designation I can study for on my own time and don't have to be sponsored for, and if things don't work out with banking, I can always move over to ER or AM if I have the CFA. That said, I was told by the partner that offered me the Summer Analyst position that the only reason he gave me the initial interview was because I passed Level I and called him on the phone personally. He obviously saw the value in it and so do I, so I'll continue studying for it.

duffmt6:

First of all, congrats on the SA opportunity. I think the above is your best option. Try to leverage the internship into a full time opportunity elsewhere, and if that fails go with the MSF. I know we have discussed by PM that I am in a similar situation. I can tell you that I would accept the SA offer in a second if it is at even a semi reputable bank. Good luck with whatever you choose.

I would not do the SA. The shop is too small to be reputable and helpful to your resume.

Just be straight up with your current firm. If they feel you're worth keeping around then they'll work something out. Otherwise (and most likely) you're going to have to quit.