Getting a job out of college

sgplayer69:

Hey everyone, I'm new to WSO, have been on here before but finally decided to sign up.

I'm a rising sophomore at NYU Stern (still young but looking to get an early start), around a 3.8 GPA currently. I've been interested in going into finance for a while. From the limited research I've done, it seems as though coming out of college as an analyst is the norm, but is it the "requirement?" As in, is it possible to get hired as an associate or similar alternative right out of college? Right now I'm interning in the Business Development dept. at a law firm, but I'm also working at a Non-profit organization. The organization is basically a small business school/executive training for international students and even some higher level execs. It's a great experience, I've been at the NPO for 4 years now, I started as an intern and have moved up steadily, I recently was promoted to Project Manager.

The reason I ask about certain jobs out of college is that I do have a decent amount of experience for my age (or at least I think). I help manage the staff and other interns at the NPO, and am currently working on corporate sponsorship deals for us. Any help or suggestions would be great!

Thanks, Nick

Don't mention where you work by name on here in public. Big brother is watching.

Mod can you take out the personal info for the sake of big brother because of course Ringo Star over here decided to quote the post and the OP can't do it himself.

Sorry guys, main post is edited.

Not to burst your bubble, but it doesn't matter what you did in college or as a side gig. I am speaking from the buy side, but college does nothing to train you for understanding or performing in markets. It's mostly on-the-job training (and even that can be lacking), which means- bottom rung. You could move up quickly based on performance/contribution, but expect to start at the bottom. For the sell-side (investment banking and such), I can only speak from observation- but it seems like the same is true- they don't hire Associates straight out of undergraduate (only Masters and Ph.Ds holders seem to get hired in this level without prior experience).

And the "Associate" level position is not a management position- you have people under you, but you are largely managed by higher-ups and are a mere pass-through for team instructions- kind of like a Specialist or Corporal in the Army.

The vast majority of finance shops are going to start you as an analyst unless you have an MBA or 2+ years of post-grad work experience in a related field. Maybe a boutique would do things differently, but your current experience is not something that would qualify.

Firstly, a good number of Sternies have some sort of i-banking or investment-related experience by their sophomore year. Your peers are your competitive set at a target school like Stern. Stern kids benefit hugely from the wealth of internship opportunities they have from early on, but it can also put you at a disadvantage because you can fall behind the upper-tier of the pack very quickly. While I am sure your NPO experience is important, meaningful, and full of responsibilities, it probably does not place you among the most competitive members of your class.

Secondly, the most competitive members of your class will get jobs as investment banking analysts at bulge bracket banks or elite boutiques. None will be made associate. There was once a way to skip the analyst level, and that was to submatriculate into a business school after college (for instance, a 4+1 at Cornell). In the boom years, some of these b-school grads with no experience still got associate offers. Today, they get analyst offers at the major banks if they are lucky. Risky, though, since many of them also get stuck because no one wants to hire them as analysts or as associates.

Finally, I think you are misinformed about the benefits of being an associate. I would argue that being an associate (especially non-analyst-promote) is one of the worst jobs in banking. The work is almost if not more menial than analyst work (at least the analyst gets to handle the model, which I think is the most interesting of the menial jobs), the hours similarly bad, and the exit opportunities are nil. To a person, the associates I know are more miserable than the analysts, and jealous of the buyside recruiting analysts get. If someone gave you the option to be an analyst or an associate, I would frankly advise you to take the analyst offer.