If you were to go to a BB as an associate from a top MBA and do a few years there, but decide the MD track is not for you, where are your exit opps?
From what I hear, its a bit different moving out of banking as a post MBA associate then a banking analyst, but wanted to hear some input from those of you who have had experience with this situation, or have directly seen someone go through the same.
I am not directing this question towards anything specific like PE, but just in general, where do banking associates usually go, and what types of organizations try to recruit associates.
In my experience, departing associates most often become associates at other banks/boutiques. The first real exit is at VP (generally to industry...corp. development, things with strategy in the title, etc). Some associates make this leap early but tends to come at VP (again, in my experience).
I've seen:
-Corp Dev / Strategy -Product Management -Start Ups -Hedge Funds -Microfinance
Only know two IBD associates that left. One went to a small research shop in his sector and the other did a hail mary to F500 corporate finance after being unemployed for 1.5 years and sailing around the world or whatever it is she did. Hope that helps?
I've been wondering the same thing since I'll be using the MBA to change careers into finance. I'll only have a summer internship to decide if I think banking really is right for me or not.
Are you insane? Do you have no friends? Do you hate free time? Do you enjoy repetitive, stupid activities? Do you do any endurance sport (marathon etc...)
If the answer to all of these is yes, banking is the perfect fit!
Before I started my MBA, I quit my BB job early and took five months off while living in the city and doing a bit of traveling. By the end of it I was getting quite bored of my free time and wanted to get back into the corporate swing of things.
Also as far as "repetitive and stupid" activities, I used to be in operations and never really minded the work we do there even though to some it could also come off as "repetitive and stupid", I can't imagine that a few years in IBD can be worse than that from an intellectual perspective when working on deals and learning the ins and outs of a business (feel free to correct me if your experience tells you otherwise). My roommate in NYC worked in the industrials group of my firm and he loved the work.
As far as the long hours go, I've been deployed in the military where 100 hour weeks are normal, and there was zero, if not negative, intellectual stimulation there. So from that perspective, I don't think IB work can throw anything at me that I wouldn't be comfortable with as far as burn-out or not having a life outside of work.
I guess to each his/her own. Like I said in the original post, I am not set on IBD but its definitely something I want to look into due to the skills to be gained, contacts to be made, and exit opps to be presented.
corporate finance, corp dev. Have also seen consulting.
banking could actually be quite a good fit for you, i am obv. not serious about the insane/no friends part, but the endurance bit is something thats def. not true for most successful bankers. best of luck
Don't the hours get better for associates/VPs? I thought 100 hour weeks was only what the analysts did?
as a post mba assoc with no prior banking experience you will get raped for atleast a year because you have no idea what you are doing (similarly to analysts getting raped the hardest in their first year), it gets a bit better as you move onwards, especially if your not a deal.
During deals even vps are frequently in on weekends and stay in the office until 10-12pm (again depends on the client, phase of the deal etc...)
I would expect to get raped, just to catch up to everyone. I'm sure it would take at least a year if not longer to catch up to an associate who went through the analyst program, which would be my goal.
Question: are associates less prone to leave banking because they WANT to stay in banking, or is it because of the lack of opportunities in PE, corp dev, startups, etc??
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Never been an associate but I knew 4 of the summer associates in my group really well (all of whom got offers), and two are coming back. We had this discussion once and two of them who had done their research said that the most consistent post-banking careers had been consulting (change of lifestyle when they were more serious about starting a family), F500, and hedge funds (although the HF thing I think was a little unique to my group).
How were they planning to move into consulting? At what level?
I don't understand why you would go to consulting from banking. You can do consulting straight out of MBA if that is what you would like to do. As far as a lifestyle change when starting family, that sounds crazy to me because at least a banker is in the same city in case an emergency arises, whereas a consultant is traveling the majority of the week, so I really don't see the connection. Maybe IB to AM for lifestyle change sure, but consulting does not make sense in this case.
I don't think IB to HF is common for anything above analyst (or even there, really). Sure there are people who know people etc but that is exception, not rule. Hell I have a pretty good contact base in the hedge fund community from my previous life but I still don't see that being an option for me if and when I am done with banking. Nor do I really want it to be, frankly.
Corp dev/biz dev, etc is essentially in-house investment banking. If you are a large multi-national company, you don't need to hire bankers do every $500mm/1b deal you might want to do. Likewise if you're medium size buying a $50mm company or whatever. That's what corp dev does. Some firms house that in treasury, some have a corp dev arm...it can vary.
What you are talking about (product p&l responsibility) is just straight up post-mba general management.
Bottom line though, and I say this as a post-mba associate, don't get into the banking post-mba for the perceived exit ops. They arent there like they are for analysts (except to other banks...plenty of those ops). And you're doing yourself a disservice, MBA is your last real chance to pivot (short of starting your own thing)...don't spend that chance on something you think you will want to leave in 2 years.
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