How to prep for banking
Bit of background, I am an 18 year old from England who is currently on a year out before starting university in September. I have a very basic understanding of corporate finance, aided by a 3 month internship during my gap year and am interested in investment banking (m&a).
my questions to this forum are: What would you be doing now if you were in my shoes?
and in particular: what would you be doing now to learn more about the skills needed for banking if you were in my shoes?
I am aware of the recruitment process, spring week>summer internship etc... and am pushing to get as much work experience possible over the next two years.
Tried to keep this short & sweet, any help would be greatly appreciated!
18 on a gap yr thinking about banking? If I were in your shoes I’d prep to get some bitches first
Don’t need to do that... !
not really much you can do at this stage I've been told (in your position minus the GAP year). Just make sure you're going to a target and are prepared enough in the course to hit the ground running for a first or high 2:1. For spring weeks its more about going to a target university, formatting the CV correctly and then (can't stress this enough) acing the interviews.
Thanks! Good to hear someone else is in a similar position
It’s a tricky one, feel like i’m at the stage where I really want to push to get ahead, just not sure how (apart from work experience), which you would think is simply the best way forward! + networking
Thinking of other ways apart from those two really
learning modelling at this stage would be a massive hardo (and also unnecessary since spring week applications don't test technical knowledge) move. Honestly the best thing you can do is actually learn what an investment bank does, what the different divisions do and where you think you might like to end up, having greater commercial awareness in the space is what will make you stand out in the interviews, not being able to model. Assuming you're looking at FO positions; where do you want to end up? IBD? Sales? Trading? Do you know the differences between them? etc these are the sorta questions you should know if you want to go into the industry and then obviously know about sellside v buyside. I'm assuming like me, and most other people who go into IB, you don't want to stay there for longer than 2 years so maybe learn more about institutions anlaysts normally lateral into.
Jobtestprep for springs. Mash this out.
Make sure your CV is looking clean - look for things to pad it somewhat.
Prepare interview answers - down to a T.
Research different institutions.
Springs are going to be what you should be hyper-focused on.
Edit: when you arrive at uni, join societies and try and get a first-year role. Many societies have first-year 'representative' roles.
That’s great, thank you so much!
In regards to skills, would you suggest anything to learn more about what’s needed on the job?
Thinking of trying more modelling myself, have a few operating models I can use to test out some valuations
5poundnote
this advice is great but not completely optimal, getting first year roles varies uni to uni in when they can actually apply for them and get them and so for many unis the optimal app time for rolling springs will pass. But definitely do that for summers and non-rolling ones
Just speaking from my experience. Sure enough these roles won't be available at all unis (or in time for applications) - at mine they were.
This advice isn't concrete.
Enjoy your current freedom and think of other career paths too incase you don’t enjoy your spring weeks/internships
Basically taking out of this that I need to learn the answers to the interview questions, gain better commercial awareness and start going through all the tests, sound about right?
Won't lie to you spring week applications are a bit of a crapshoot and there's a certain cutoff in terms of how much preparation will actually result in a tangible increase in chances. Right now its way too early to be going through psychometric test preparation (aside from Morgan Stanley, they don't play a huge role in applications and are generally pass/fail) - do it closer to the time you apply, maybe a few weeks before so at some point in Sept-Nov. You can't learn the answers to interview questions but they do provide some general do's and don'ts. I'd again maybe look at these closer to the time you apply. Commercial awareness you definitely can do at this stage as it literally involves reading the Financial Times every now and then and going through this careers map: https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/careers/map/
Generally, having a clear map and idea of what to do is crucial at this stage, the execution comes later. There is no point practising insanely at this stage for a pass/fail test (honestly I believe the preparation for these is more to get used to timings and the layout rather than learning stuff). You generally prepare to warm up and get used to them, warming up months before you're going to do them isn't a great use of your time, same with the interviews to be honest although preparing for them is free so if you want to have a look at a few questions go ahead. This might well be the last extended holiday you get so make the most of it, your friends who went to uni should be returning home around now too so go to music festivals, go out and enjoy.
Btw all this advice is on the assumption you're going to a target/reputable semi-target. If not you should probably let us know lol.
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