Freshman Internship Questions

Hey guys. I have a few questions about freshman internships, and I guess the recruiting process in general. For background, I'm going to a target this fall and I'm starting an internship at a startup (not a finance position). 

I was wondering how common it is to start off in freshman year with more general/unrelated business internships (business dev, marketing, etc) and then take on more finance-related internships. I've been under the impression that this was a relatively common path, but I'd love to hear some input.

I've also noticed that when underclassmen do get finance experience, it's usually with smaller banks/shops. Are these internships sought out through cold-emailing/calling, or the standard application process. If I would like an internship like this over the next summer, when should I start looking? 

I'm not overly anxious about the recruiting process, nor am I dead-set on IB, but I would like some clarity on a few things. Thanks so much for the help.

 

As a freshman I don’t think anyone expects you to have an IB SA role right off the bat (then again I’m also still in school, hope a full-time or HR member can provide better insight) but it certainly helps. Having any kind of work experience is good (as opposed to sitting on your ass the whole summer). Work experience is still experience - at the very least it teaches responsibility and soft skills. It’s more important to build a story - eg. What did you learn from your role, why you want to go into IB. As for sophomore summer some BBs do have sophomore diversity roles. Local boutiques I would imagine have a very unstructured timeline if any - just reach out and see what happens.

 

Thanks for the reply, especially the details about boutique internships. Once the semester is underway I’ll definitely start building some contacts and connections. So in general do you think it’s feasible that I can gain some more relevant finance experience over freshman summer? I guess I’m just a bit confused over the recruiting timeline; if it is as accelerated as I understand, I’d like some more focused experience before sophomore year.

Thanks for your help and insight man, much appreciated.

 

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