FT recruiting is on my mind more and more often nowadays. I've come up with the current dilemma... Say you have an offer for a strong MM IB in its regional HQ. Think Milwaukee, Minneapolis, St. Petersburg, Memphis. This offer would be better than another offer that is either a "lesser" bank or a regional office somewhere you'd really like to live like NYC, Chi, or SF.
How would you deal with this dilemma? I'm figuring out that where you live plays a large factor in your happiness. However, I feel like your first job in finance kind of paves the way where you can go. So that should also get a lot of emphasize. Everyone's priorities will be different, but how would you personally go about this?
The simplest approach would be to quantify a city's desirability and pit it up against the career prospect, whichever has the best ratio you go with, realistically though if it was somewhere as bad as Milwaukee I don't think I could ever justify it if the offers in other cities are comparable or at least not terrible, either way that can be a really tough dilemma
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Another question, which I'm sure has been asked before, but ties into this as well... Is working at the HQ for MM banks that important? For example, if you work at a top MM in their SF/CHI/NYC office and they have HQ elsewhere, is that a big deal for career prospects? This is assuming they have good deal flow in the above offices.
tl;dr should you consider HQ vs. regional much in this scenario?
You need to get these offers first. With the way FT has become, it is unlikely that many will ever be in the position where this is a problem. That being said, you just need to figure out what matters to you. Some people have to be in NY, some do not care; some people have to be at a BB, others are happy at an MM; some have to work in a specific group, others are just happy to be in banking; etc.
As far as HQ vs regional office goes, it depends on the bank and group. Some regional groups do not fully execute their deals- they do mostly pitching. Not bank HQs will be the HQ for each group, for example. Say a bank has offices in NY, Chicago, and SF. Their HQ may be in NY, but the healthcare group may have its HQ in Chicago since most of its MDs are there. I would prefer being in the HQ of whichever group I am in simply because that provides better access to MDs and probably more experience.
international student who graduated this may.
i declined Amazon HQ offer and 2nd tier consulting offer in west coast for MBB summer analyst internship at home country. Reasoning was i wanted to spend time with family since I spent past 16 years of my life at boarding schools and college abroad but well..MBB is not letting me do that..
I do not fully understand what the last post has to do with the topic, but I would ask myself how big of a career difference it really is. More likely than not, you are going to switch out of banking eventually and most people may appreciate being in a big market/NY more than they would you being at the HQ (IF they know where your MM has its HQ). Investmentbanking in NY sounds way better to the inexperienced recruiter than investment banking in the middle of nowhere. I am just a kid so take my opinion with a grain of salt, but i would take big 4 consulting in New York over MBB in Cleveland any day. (And your difference sound more like Goldman to Merril Lynch than MBB to Big4).
Delete
I think the role has more impact than the brand name. for example, if you're back office at Capital One in NYC, that's less desirable than wells capital management in Milwaukee. also, Milwaukee is not awful, it's just cold, same goes for the twin cities. even though I'm a southerner, I couldn't do memphis, but that's personal preference.
but yeah, if you haven't gotten offers first, this question is largely irrelevant
+SB
I really wish that people would just understand this. Example: M&A at a "no-name" boutique>>>GS OPS.
Dude, Cap1 NYC anything offers much more preftige than any piker second tier city. It's the Big Apple bro...
Your Memphis comment, and I'm sorry for hijacking this thread but I'm going to do it anyway, interested me. I had a call from a HH a few months ago who described a pretty interesting sounding gig job wise but I turned it down because I have something else going on and, well, Memphis. Interesting job and San Diego gets my interest but not Memphis. I've been there a few times but I've tended to fly in and out and never spent any real time there. Why not Memphis? Just curious.
I'm sure I'd love visiting there on a regular basis but if I'm not going to be close to family I need an ocean, Memphis has neither. Nothing wrong with the city itself outside of geography.
You'll have plenty of time to work out a way to live in your preferred city later in your career. Do what's going to set up your career with the best foundation and upward trajectory. At 22, you won't have the resources (or possibly the time depending on role) to really crush it in NY/SF anyway.
You can also use B-school to relocate, and if your resume is strong you can get a good job in the city you want to move to in the future even without school. Also, don't underestimate life changes; the right guy/girl could alter your geographic plans considerably.
This pretty much nails it. I chose the better job / smaller city rather than my offers in bigger cities and I think it was a great move. Let me tell you that if your goal is to get into NYC IB you are better off in FO in North Dakota than GS BO in NYC. Sure, some people would rather take any job in NYC than live in a different city, but that is pretty shortsighted in my opinion.
Not gonna lie, living in a smaller city has a lot of disadvantages, its nowhere near as fun, you probably have to have a car, dating is much worse, social life is much worse, network is much worse - but you can stick it out for 1-2 years then lateral, you would be shocked how fast the time goes by. Besides, there are things that you will like about any city, even outside of CoL. Those places you have on your list aren't bad at all - St. Petersburg is a nice area, but a little slower, Minneapolis and Milwaukee are great just really cold.
Also, I see it very, very often at my company where people say they are just going to move to XYZ city for a couple years then get out, then end up finding a significant other, getting comfortable, making friends, enjoying their job and end up wanting to stay.
It depends on a lot of subjective factors but the one major plus that comes with being in major city is access to all the networking. When you work in the financial services industry in NYC everyone knows someone who's either in banking, PE, HF etc... In smaller cities it can be harder to build up an strong network, which will be your greatest asset when you get older
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