I have been in my current role with a BB BO role for a year and five months and interned junior to senior year. I knew I wanted either ib or research around the time of my internship but did not secure either after having one full time ib analyst interview on campus. In the past few months I have had multiple final round interviews with Guggenheim, BTIG, TD securities, BNP Paribas, Piper jaffray, and KPMG corp fin. BB BO experience is complete garbage, but I have networked my face off, stayed hot on technicals, and just been obsessed with breaking in. I knew breaking in is borderline impossible without ib experience on the res, but I felt like I was on the cusp of breaking in to pretty solid firms. The time period for laterals is pretty much over now. Does anyone have any advice or past experience with breaking in during the summer or fall?
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I've been talking to some people about this. Not BO to FO but a non-IB Lateral. The window for lateraling never really closes. If anything I think a new window is about to open. Fresh 1st years are going to start in July, and inevitably there will be some kids who quit in 6 months. That right there is an opportunity for you
ya that makes sense. just brutal having to stay for another 6 months, kind of being forced to look at non-ib related work that it still requiring a big commitment and intellectually stimulating.
haven't had anymore final rounds since Piper, had to look elsewhere. interviewing for two corp strat roles, one corp dev, and one vc analyst. its a cold world out there.
You are BO, but getting interviews for corporate strategy? that is pretty impressive, would you mind sharing how you got those?
To be quite honest the corp dev and corp strategy interviews i got were straight up resume submission. I had two very compelling internships prior to BO. Getting into BO was just a straight up mistake. Interviewing for investment banking analyst jobs did prepare me alot in terms of understanding ny story, becoming polished, and being able to answer tough questions. I also checked job boards every hour i was awake for about 8months...literally.
curious, why not corp strategy or the other roles you're interviewing for -- people do banking to get out for those roles?
banking still opens more doors than the other roles and also had a genuine interest in banking. staying in banking long term is something I would have considered.
I thought the same until I started in banking very recently -- it's pretty easy to say, until you're actually at work until 2 / 3 am on the regular because some MD wanted more turns on some bs deck. I've noticed where other analysts have exited and honestly, lots exit to things where they could have started straight from college.
Depends heavily on your firm and your current teams management.
What is (was) your back office role? The specifics of that could give some more color on your former situation. I see that the problem has been solved but I'm still curious.
I cant give specifics as I don't want to make myself identifiable. But I will say this was not the typical BO work of settling trades or reconciling numbers constantly. It called for judgement, gave a high level perspective, and exposure to senior management.
All good. Thanks and best of luck at the new gig.
I'm not sure how you can call what sounds like a strategy job at a bank "BO".
Sounds like audit lmao
CONGRATS BROTHER!
I need help! Transitioning from BO to IBD (Originally Posted: 06/28/2018)
Hello everyone,
I just need some advice here. Firstly, I didn't know about finance field or knew that I wanted to get into finance until I entered college and was already two years in. I went to a non-target school and eventually landed an internship. At that time, I thought it was a great beginning to my finance career. I joined BO operations team within one of the top custody banks. Keep in mind, I didn't know anything about IBD or that side of the business. I was more into trading at that time. But I was so elated to have this finance internship, I worked almost 40hrs a week while going to school full time, simply because I wanted to make sure I ended my undergraduate studies with a job offer in hand. I managed to do it. At this time, money was dire and I was not only doing this for myself but also for my family. Long story short, as I've already written quite a bit, I am currently in MO of BO (still BO) doing corporate action, processing events and I can't seem to find a way out. I want to get into IBD. Trading allowed me to learn about finance. I enjoyed learning about fundamental analysis but I want to learn and work with financial models. Currently, I am pursuing CFA simply because I want to go somewhere else and think this could open few doors for me. But managing long hours working and studying is proving to be quite difficult. And I haven't been in the workforce long enough to get into top B schools either. I know in IBD, they do a lot of company valuations, models and that's what I want to do. What do I do? How do I get out of this? At this point, I am willing to bring coffees for people who are willing to give me a shot so that I can simply be around people who work in this field that interests me and I want to learn from them. I will even do an internship to get a foot in the door. Please give me some advice here.
Thank you for taking the time to read all this. Any and all advice, goes without saying, is much appreciated.
Thanks man
sounds like you are a prime candidate for MBA --> IB
middle office of back office? lmao what the fuck does that even mean?
My current title is Middle Office Corporate Action Analyst within my company. But outside of the company, it is still considered Back Office as its operational work. So the title changes from previously mentioned to Operational Specialist, outside the company.
How long are your hours in the back office that finding time to study is difficult? Anyway, from reading your post it sounds like you still have a lot to learn about IB - I would keep reading the content here and elsewhere. Once you have a firm grasp on what the business entails, start reaching out to boutique banks - with enough perseverance I'll bet you can land yourself at a small shop if that's what you're after.
Thank you for answering. The hours really depends. Past few months, I've worked about 60-80 hrs a week - sometimes more. All I do is processing corporate actions - nothing more. It's just starting to weigh in on me that if I stay here longer, this is where I'll end up and that's not what I want at all. And yes, I want to try to go for boutique banks. I've been learning financial modeling from the courses provided here as well as Paul Pignataro's book. Hopefully, all this effort will amount to something. Thanks again for the advice.
I saw the username and was like.. "damn I don't remember posting anything".
Good choice though.
Haha.
BO to IBD resume...Will SB for critique (Originally Posted: 08/05/2011)
http://www.razume.com/documents/21205
I'm on the difficult/impossible route to IB. One year out of undergrad (I went to Wake Forest- no point in keeping it a mystery since I don't know of any other schools with a math bus major) doing a back office finance job (controllership) at a large brokerage company. No previous banking experience. CFA L3 candidate, and yes I realize this doesn't matter much for banking.
I have a few connections at some of the BB's (analysts) so I'll try to have my resume forwarded but I realize landing one of these is probably impractical. My focus is going to be on MM and boutiques in NYC.
Anyways, any constructive criticism is welcomed on the resume or in general. Will reward with SB's.
The format looks good. GPA, SAT scores are on par...Wake Forest is not an impossible non target and you are already in the city so just keep grinding it out with the networking and informational interviews. Are you going for IB or bust? You'd be a great ER candidate if that piques your interest.
I really want to move towards private equity down the road, which is why I think the banking route is preferable. Thanks for the input.
If I were you I would go to the Cornell Club to network. Also, put conversational proficiency in French. If you are not that good then don't put language at all, I guess.
Try to get Masters of Finance. There is a user named ANT, he maybe be able to help you with MFin schools, if you're interested in re-branding yourself with a target.
Literally two days ago I was talking to my roommate about joining the Cornell Club. Do you think it is actually worth it? I don't know many other Wake grads who are actually members so I got the impression I would feel like an outsider. I haven't heard much feedback on networking events and the like.
I'll switch up the language wording. I reached French lit in college but that was my freshmen year and I have barely used it since. Might just drop it since it doesn't help a ton.
I'm a little wary of applying for masters programs, mostly from a financial standpoint. I would like to go back for an MBA down the road. I'll keep my options open and look into it though. Thanks for the advice.
I'm not sure what about his resume makes him a great ER candidate but, overall, it's quite a solid looking resume. It's a tad wordy/cluttered, but it's far better than most posted on here.
Wake Forest isn't a target but it's far from a bad school and floats on the outskirts of semi-target land.
I just saw that he was a level 3 CFA candidate working in the BO. If he applied at my firm, I'd notice that he was at least interested enough in ER to study and pass the first 2 levels to stand out in the crowd.
OP, CFA not really necessary for IB, but you're so close you might as well get it. Just another thing to put in your bio later in life.
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