GS Entrepreneurs

Not a good idea....

If programming interests you, do it. If it doesnt and you're just learning it to get a job that pays nice, don't. You'll suck at the job, get fired and look really stupid.

I think you need to ask yourself if you are be interested in Comp Sci before pursuing it. Don't take it merely because bankers have spoken about their regrets during theiir undergrad. Ultimately, it boils down if you will make use of the comp sci major or not.

Programming does genuinely interest me, however that interest could be due to the nature of projects that I was working on. Back in high school, I used to write some programs for fun for purposes that were practical to me, and I had a great time doing it. However, I do get the sense that most people majoring in CS have an affinity for programming that is not bounded by the project they are working on - they simply love solving problems. For example, if I received a job offer doing some programming work for an oil company, I would have little to no interest at all in pursuing that venture, regardless of the salary (to an extent, of course). If I were developing Android applications, on the other hand, I would enjoy this immensely more than that. And I'm also pretty sure that coming out of a school that is pretty weak in CS is not going to afford me to great CS jobs on the level of Google/Microsoft coming straight from undergrad.

I would still likely pursue banking, but my plan has and always will be to get out of finance after my Analyst / Associate stint. I do not plan on pursuing it further, at the moment. CS seemed like it gave me a fair shot at banking, and an easy way to jump ship once I got burned out for a nice, easy, no-dress-code career which offers similar compensation at the earlier levels. From there, maybe I could pursue my own path and create something of my own, mixing CS and Econ, etc. The only downside is I'm essentially giving up what I've worked for all this time (only if FT recruiting is a wash, as some say it is). At the moment, I have a PWM internship, an investment banking internship, and a few others to fill the resume with to make me an interesting candidate for the interviews.

Lately, however, I've become a little apathetic towards the industry as a whole and started seriously considering if this is what I really want. When it comes down to it, if I got the job, I would probably pursue it, but I'm not very determined to even move past the analyst stage at this point. The idea of working for two years and barely seeing friends/family and making very little money after taxes and expenses doesn't seem very appealing right now. Just thought I had a shot at both, somehow, and thought you guys could show me how, if this wasn't the right way already.

Thanks!

That should be Plan B. Plan A is to get a summer internship.

Programming is something that you have to keep practicing. It's like a language - you can't just take 2 classes and expect to be an expert. You have to do coding on your own (e.g. making your own games, websites...etc).

So if you think that one summer is going to turn you into Larry Page - think again. It won't work. Better get an internship instead.

I would maybe take a CS/Math class or two as an elective and see how you like it. Math is very different than what most people think it is and the only real way to find out is to take it. Try either abstract algebra or analysis (linear algebra is pretty easy compared to most math classes) and see how you like it. Proof based math is a whole new beast. Also, depending on the program, CS can be VERY theory based and if you expect to just sit down and start plugging out code in every class that could be a major shock too. I wouldn't make any rash decisions without dipping my toe in first.

Take it from someone who's in the industry, what you study at University doesn't make a difference in your job. Study what you enjoy.

This is where the dilemma starts. I'm in a pretty good position to get a summer internship, should I study hard and nail the interview questions, as well as keep a high GPA. The only problem is that I basically have no room to fit in a Plan B option if I pursue my Plan A. Just wanted to see if anyone could recommend a healthy medium or let me know if my option to spend this summer studying CS and obtaining a software internship (likely easy to nail in NYC and already know some places in mind), and trying for IB at FT recruiting was a viable option or foolish. Not many people get the chance to have a decent shot at IB, and I didn't want to give that up.

You need to know everything from abstract classes to string immutability to memo table strategies to get hired as a developer at a bank. At a tech firm, it's going to be even tougher. And the MIT/Stanford/Cornell/CMU/Public Ivies EE and CS majors tend to take a dim view of the (other) ivies. ESPECIALLY business and finance majors.

So you're already coming in with two or three strikes against you.

1.) Better know your stuff. Everything from pointers and references, to cross-platform execution on the JVM, to load factors in hash maps, to dykstra's algorithm, to ford-fulkerson, to divide and conquer sorting, to class templating, to the data structures (hash maps, linkedlists, arrays.) You will have to explain model view controller, singletons, and other design patterns. You're going to have to write out and apply this code on a whiteboard while your interviewer is watching you. And finally, this is simply for a desk developer interview at a bank. A Google or Amazon interview will be 5x tougher.

2.) If you're going to get paid like a professional to crank out code, it had better be high-quality stuff that they won't have to rewrite later. It will not just need to work but also execute efficiently and be easily maintainable. None of this college kid O(n^3) stuff when the code can easily execute in O(n^2). That's worth $5/hour in India.

3.) Don't be an asshole. Or at least have a high competence to arrogance ratio. And trust me, you won't have much competence. Arrogant incompetence is TOXIC in a tech culture and us techies- though often socially awkward- have a laser-like focus on picking out assholes. Their techie-sense will already be on edge due to the fact that you are an Ivy league econ/finance major and already suspect you think you're better than them.

I say all this as an asshole New York desk developer, myself. I wouldn't let me into my tech firm. I'm too much of an asshole and I've lost my sense of fair from years of walking past homeless people in NYC.

4.) Play some D&D with the engineers this fall and get involved in a programming project. Learn the culture and learn to respect it. Trading/Banking is nice in that it allows a lot of people to just walk in and quickly puts them in their place. Most cultures, including tech, don't allow that. They require you to know your place before you even get in, and they are too polite to tell you when you missed the offer because you didn't know your place. Kind people won't tell you that you got turned down for the job because they didn't like you.

It sounds funny, but techies like social people- they just have their own definition of social. Instead of football, it's dungeons and dragons. Instead of decisiveness and leadership, it's humility and a sense of fairness. It's the ability to withhold judgment and laugh with people when they show up to class or work with their shirt on backwards- because you probably made that mistake last week "Hey Fred- I think you might have missed a few spots when you shaved this morning. OMG you pulled an IlliniProgrammer!". I'm not really a part of that culture anymore, but it's a great way to run a company.

So again, plan A is to get a six figure job where you don't need to spend three years learning this stuff just to earn a junior developer's starting salary ($60-90K) with the hope of capping out at $250K in fifteen years as a senior architect.

Yep, agree with IP, you're out of your league for now. If you're determined to do it you'll have to do a year or 2 of post-bac and then get in a CS masters program most likely to even get your resume seen,

Thanks for the reply. Just to clarify, it isn't doable in four semesters - I'd need to take a solid 2-4 courses over the summers to graduate on time. Maybe I'll look into transfers, who knows. The main concern I had was feeling like I was lost if I didn't like banking. Software seems to be the hot job right now and I used to fool around with it in high school - making programs that I loved in a community that worked together with each other. I felt like if I didn't enjoy banking, or decide my senior year that I want to actually..have a life outside of a cubicle, or maybe no cubicle at all, that software development could provide those sorts of opportunities - with a ton of developers making a killing by living at home. Just thought the Econ degree pigeonholed me into corporate life for the rest of my life which everyone seems to hate and certainly isn't as interested as making apps for Android. I guess it was my way of jumping ship from living inside a cubicle for the rest of my life and that looked very appealing to me...