Trending Content
| +46 | Interviews Are So Fake | 28 | 9h | |
| +33 | 2024 UK Election - Tories finished? | 21 | 13h | |
| +29 | Being Christian in investment banking | 14 | 1d | |
| +26 | Non-Competes Banned | 26 | 3h | |
| How do I become Sigma | 15 | 5h | ||
| +19 | Moelis has the cutest Analysts? | 4 | 1d | |
| +19 | ADHD ! | 4 | 10h | |
| +18 | Best NYC neighborhood for single 30M | 12 | 3d | |
| +16 | Underage intern, drinking? | 7 | 1d | |
| +13 | Secretive vs Universal Prestige? | 7 | 1d |
Career Resources
I don't know anyone personally. Though, I'm sure it is not all that uncommon for people to end up in a less 'prestigious' place later on in their careers. Maybe they got pushed out. Or maybe they got tired of the grind and just decided they want to spend more time with their families even though it might mean a lower paycheck and a 'lesser' job. After all, how many megafund partners can there be, or rain making MD's at a BB?
This is perhaps a bit earlier in the BB-PE-MBA trajectory than what you are after. I studied together with a guy in university, who appeared to be super determined to become a big swinging dick in IB. He always talked about how much he wanted it and had known that this was his calling since he was 13 years old, how he was connected to various MDs through his family/network and basically tried to mimic the stereotypical hardo persona.
He had some solid previous experience from a local boutique, and then managed to land an internship in IB at GS/MS/JPM during our studies. Everything basically seemed to be on track for him and we all thought he had a great career lined up. However, the internship really changed him and when he came back he seemed to have been thoroughly shaken by the experience. The hardo attitude was seriously toned down and when he spoke of his internship it was more about depressing stories, e.g. how a director would scream another poor intern in the face over a typo / missing comma in a pitch.
After we graduated he went back to the local boutique for a year or so and then exited to some no-name private banking role. The internship completely broke him and his ambitions, which was really weird considering that he already had a good understanding of what the job entailed and what to expect from the internship. I honestly believe that he didn't want it bad enough in the end and that he was more obsessed with the glorified image of being a banker. I genuinely just hope that he is happier with his choice today than if he had stuck around in IB and hated it all in the end.
Similar story here. I was interested in trading from a young age. But the internship last year was depressing. Zero years of growth since the financial crisis (until this year) do that to any team. Now I'm in consulting.
Yeah, no growth / back to back cuts for a long period (with no end in sight) makes for a depressing atmosphere. Especially when everyone keeps reminiscing about the good old times that you missed out on.
I mean, to understand the culture and what it's actually like day in day out, you need to spend the time there. You can have as many conversation with people about it, read as many books as you want, but until you're sitting at that desk for 16 hours or whatever it's all meaningless.
Completely agree. There's no substitute for experiencing it yourself, which is why internships are a great way to figure out if it's the right career path for you.
There's no shame in changing your mind, if you find out that you just want something else.
Yes. Tons of the senior bankers at no-name boutiques are there because they washed up there.
Well plenty of senior bankers are also at boutiques because they'll get paid a lot more, for the most part.
Not everyone is willing to do the corporate grind forever. I think everyone eventually has their Office Space moment.
People want different things in life. Priorities change. You can't judge someone's career trajectory by looking at their linked in page.
What ever happened to wanting to be your own boss/have your own business? Many people in WSO judge success by the name of someone's employer...
In the end, we're all in this rat race until we're not.
I once met a guy who made millions per year off of making and selling vending machines. He knew the trade like the back of his hand. He doesn’t have a LinkedIn, but if he did it would be really underwhelming to say the least.
Does he care? I doubt it. He bought an ~$8MM house in Orange County, CA recently.
A mouse was put at the top of a jar filled with grains.
With so much food around him, the mouse was happy eating the grains. He became complacent as he did not have to run around to find food.
As he enjoyed the grains, he reached the bottom of the jar.
Trapped at the bottom, he was unable to get out and his survival depended on someone putting grains in the jar.
Most people on WSO can relate to the mouse in this story...
The requirements to start in a top tier seat are vastly different than what it takes to end there. I remember being in analyst training (warning: anecdotal evidence ahead) and the people who were the superstars were the ones who could bang out a DCF model the fastest, or who could update pitchbooks, etc etc. You are, as this site constantly reminds you, a monkey. But those same folks were also not very sociable, didn't have much in the way of outside interests, and ended up putting longer hours in at the office than they needed to because they had nothing better to do.
If that is all you're good at, of course you'll have a mediocre career. Being a heavy hitter requires intelligence and extremely hard work, sure, but it also requires charisma and the ability to code switch when talking to clients. Some people never learn that their inability to talk to people and their lack of interest or education in anything not directly related to their jobs are extremely correlated.
Ability to code switch is so underrated, especially in real estate (I only say this because it's what I'm most familiar with, I'm sure the situation arises elsewhere, too). I've seen finance guys have zero idea how to make small talk with the construction guys or the design team has no concept of money (a good architect understands the finances of a job) meetings just end up being stiff and everyone is simply toeing the line. If you can get people who can have good conversation and know how to talk to each other in each others languages, you can accomplish so much more.
Life is very fluid... some people get rich early on, some people get rich later in life, some people inherit, some don't get rich at all. Just do what makes you happy. Its impossible to plan life.
I know somebody that quit his job in consulting to buy a piece of property near a tourist destination and build a rental unit on it. People thought he was a bum. A few years later, he now has twenty units on the same piece of property, and his revenue is over $300K. He's now looking to build a tavern or pub on the piece of property, for all the tourists that come in, and I think he'll be successful at it. Some people might look at his career as mediocre, but his work life balance is amazing and he's doing what he loves.
-
A family friend graduated from Cambridge with a top 2:1, if not 1st, in mathematics.
He worked in IB for a few years. Couldn't hack it.
He then started teaching but what was weird was that it was at a secondary state school (public high school) not even university level or private school, in Tower Hamlets which is a real ghetto. Couldn't hack that either.
Now in his late 30s, for the past decade he organises day trip Meet-ups and teaching English as a second language for a living.To this day he still boasts about how he read mathematics at Cambridge and his intellectual superiority.
I feel like there are a sizeable number of Oxbridge graduates who get a rude thump into the ugly reality of the real world and are unable to cope. Have another family friend who got a solid position in aviation finance, aided by family connections, but left soon after to become an interior designer or lifestyle guru out or something.
Dolores provident error qui quas est. Voluptas tenetur dolores praesentium eveniet voluptatem eos sit.
Praesentium ex est necessitatibus quis ut iure. Magni temporibus quia aliquam excepturi ullam et. Enim minima nostrum vitae.
Et corrupti ea non porro reiciendis quia. Qui sint dicta similique recusandae.
Sint saepe inventore voluptatem modi ratione id similique. Consequuntur in ab assumenda eos. Quos libero possimus minus odio natus ad distinctio. Numquam sit voluptates est quas.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...