How is work divided between associate vs analyst at your bank? What is the norm?
Do your associates make slides or do models or do they only open pdfs and mark them up?
At my group, some associates will help out analysts in excel/ppt when busy but others will refuse to do so entirely. Certain associates also expect their analysts to come up with pages themselves to show initiatives. Is this normal?
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Generally I would expect first year associate to be more hands on vs. 3rd year to be more PDF friendly. But obviously it varies
I was an associate promote so had a very different relationship with my analysts. I hated slides and liked to maintain my own models so that's how I split the work. And the good analysts basically only got to the model if they already did the slides / so basically I did nothing
A lot of the MBA associates struggled with the models/excel in general so they stayed high level
When i used to work in IBD as an associate, we always appreciated analysts who step up and show initiatives in coming up with analysis/commentary that is useful. With that being said, I take that as going above and beyond and do not expect that from my analysts on a day-to-day basis (esp. when busy). After all, if analysts are doing the associates job then why do we even have associates. I've certainly had mixed feelings when i saw MBA associates sometimes abuse extra-keen analysts to do their work...
Associate - 0% Analyst - 100%
Some associates are glorified assistants that get paid more than the real workers. They don't last, but it's tough in the short-term.
Well my group than has a 100% of "Glorified Assistants". They don't do anything. I don't think they even know how to open excel or where is the shared drive.
This was my experience....When I was a first-year associate, I divided up the work with the analysts because that felt like the fair thing to do. I was a former analyst and hated when my associates would dump work on me and go home. So when I became an associate, I did not want to be one of those "lazy" associates that I hated when I was an analyst. Plus, I figured that if I helped out (division of labor was usually 70/30 with modeling work going to the analyst), the analyst and I would be able to get our work done faster as a team.
Of course, because of this, the analysts all thought I was a great associate. I also thought my VPs and Directors would applaud me for being a team player for helping out the analyst. Nope! I couldn't have been more wrong. In my annual review at the end of my first year, everything was positive except for one major thing. I got blasted for being too in the weeds (i.e., doing work that analysts should be doing). In fact, my manager told me off the record that he knew that I being a "good guy" but if I continued to do that, people above me would have a hard time seeing me as anything more than a "fourth-year" analyst whereas, to get promoted to VP, people needed to see me as an officer.
From that point on, I never again divided up work with analysts. I "dumped" all analyst level work on the analysts and instead spent that time on "bigger picture" VP level work. Not surprisingly, in my subsequent reviews, I was applauded for my big picture thinking and officer potential, not to mention my ability to leverage junior resources. It was truly retarded. But I learned something very important -- the definition of a "good" associate to an analyst is very different than the definition of a "good" associate to more senior people in the firm.
In my experience, most associates in my group go through a similar phase like I did. Most first-year associates tend to help out the analysts and divide up work with them because they either want to be a team player or they want to learn how do it themselves or they do not feel they have the authority to fully direct the analyst. However, by the time they become second years, they tend to step away from the analyst work and try to focus on bigger picture stuff so that they can start transitioning into an officer role (plus, honestly, VP level stuff is much more fun).
Thank for bringing this up. I think that is what most analysts and associates don't understand. When you become a senior associate or VP, you get dragged into winning mandates from clients, building relationship with buy-side, managing other professional parties, and involving in corporate strategy (big picture items). If you spent all of your time helping out your analysts or associates with decks and models, the senior people will not see that you can be the rainmaker - as in someone who can win mandates for the bank. In the end, it is getting clients to pay us is what keep us at our jobs esp at senior levels.
Great comment; as an analyst I often end up being the only guy that knows anything about the company we're pitching...
SB'd for the great comment. I never thought about it that way but in my current role, have been increasingly delegating tasks to juniors and have been applauded for that.
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