How many years are spent at the Associate level?

Hey Monkeys,

How many years are typically spent at the Associate level before promotion to VP? It seems like it differs from firm to firm and competency of the individual, but is it safe to say as follows:

Analyst: 2-3 years Associate: 2-3 years

Thus, are there many 28 year old IB VPs out there?

12 Comments
 
Best Response

Its generally 3.5 years. When you graduate B-School or are direct promoted to analyst it is usually with a July start so the calendar looks like:

July 1 - Dec 31: Associate 0 Jan 1 - Dec 31: Associate 1 Jan 1 - Dec 31: Associate 2 Jan 1 - Dec 31: Associate 3 Jan 1 - forward: VP 1

At the analyst level some banks are doing 2-2.5 year promotes (I believe at Citi analysts are promoted to Associate after 2.5 years and then spend a whole year as an Associate 0, hence 2.5 years as an analyst and theoretically 4 as an Associate).

Thus putting this together, assuming you graduate college as a 22 year old, the fastest you could be a VP is probably 28-29 on a normal track.

 

What a contrast from the biotech industry, it takes five to ten years just to make it to manager.

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positions in other industries though mean different things. VP at a Fortune 500 company is usually a much bigger deal than being a VP in a bank, for whatever reason the naming conventions are a bit different between industries.

 

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