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You will have a chance. A great realization that one comes to when they graduate, and they've start working in finance is the importance of networking. Building solid relationships helps with this process. Look through the networking guide, and put yourself out there, you'll be surprised with yourself.
Haha oh I network alright. I spam boutiques on the daily. The problem with networking for me is that my resume is very un-impressive. Alot of the times I'll get alums enthusiastically responding and even offering to meet me in person themselves (without me even asking for a meeting , I just ask for information), but then want me to send them my resume, then they stop responding.
Networking only works if your resume is stellar.
In which way is your resume unimpressive? Poor grades? No extracurricular activities? No internships?
Average ECs, poor quality internships, and 3.3 from non-target.
I'm aiming for corpfin right now, and am planning to stay another year in hopes of attaining a legit FP&A (or even better corpdev) internship. Or big 4. I need a legit internship on my resume pretty much. I can pull up to 3.5 by the end of this semester no problem.
My fear is getting into a dead end job out of college, with no chance to ever lateral and getting pidgeonholed. I see kids being administrative assistants out of college here. That sucks. All I desire at the moment is a decent recognizable job that can get me into top 20 MBA (I don't even care for HBS/GSB), be it Big 4 Audit or F1000 FP&A. Otherwise, Ibanking is dead.
OP, has someone you trust and respect looked at your resume? Based on my experience, a 3.3 and "poor quality" internships is not something that would cause someone, nevermind everyone, to run for the hills after previous excitement. That makes me wonder if there is something else on your resume that is causing this reaction.
Building off that, it might not be a bad idea to ask some of the alumni you are reaching out to look over your resume and give you advice on how to improve it based on the goals you are trying reach. Full disclosure, you will get some people annoyed that they think you are giving them more work. However, you will also get people happy to help. If you get really lucky, after giving you advice, your contact will take some ownership of you and your resume and will send it out to their contacts and go to bat for your internally. Sure it may be an ego thing for them to feel like they can play kingmaker, but who cares?
Lastly, if you want to be an investment banker you can be an investment banker, at any age you can physically do the job. At the end of the day the hiring decision is made by humans, and humans do things for their friends and/or people they like. At any given time you are one right connection away from pretty much any job, so keep networking.
A bit of unsolicited advice, keep cold-calling/e-mailing, but also use your personal network. While your uncle is probably not a former BB group head, your personal network is still a tremendous valuable asset. This sometimes gets overlooked on this board, so I wanted to bring it up. Ask friends and family if you could contact/be introduced to anyone they know in finance. Do not be stingy here, reach out and meet with anyone they suggest. Learn whatever you can from them, explain your goals, and ask them if they know anyone else you can talk to (I'm sure you know this.) E.G. your aunt's friend Sally may "only" do commercial lending for a local retail bank, but I'd be willing to bet Sally knows someone in IB, knows someone who does something more inline with your goals, or at least knows someone who knows someone in IB. Assuming all goes well, Sally's endorsement of you to her friends humanizes you and gives you the cache of being associated in Sally. All of that can go a long way in finding a job, but also in life, as you will have extended your personal network to span many areas of finance.
*TL;DR, If you're resume is causing people's tone to change drastically, it's probably a good idea to have someone you trust look over your resume for anything that is scaring people off you may have missed. As well, you sound like you're a networking champ, but using resume advice and your personal network as a tools to make a connection could also be helpful.
Good luck with everything.
Depends on the company? Where I live, the financial institutions (Especially IBD) are obsessed with Academic progress and results. They want people that have been winners since Jr. High-School, and seem to put almost 100% focus on grades and grades alone at the initial screening process. I've met candidates that had stellar grades from Grad School, but fucked up one or two semesters during Undergrad, and got dinged because of that.
Over here it's normal for students (that aim for IBD or MGMT Consulting) to re-take all exams until they've reached 3.5.
So, if your school offers "free" re-take exams (meaning that you don't have to pay full credit for them), I'd advise you to try that.
Other than that, focus on networking. It can REALLY, REALLY help...though some firms are very cautious on helping candidates through networking, as they're concerned with nepotism etc.
Only in some aspects. There's plenty of Army Officers and musicians running around with sub-2.8 GPAs and sub 1200 out of 1600 SAT scores. Michelin chefs I can't comment on because I only know one.
No. That is the perception that this site gives off (because most of the activity is driven by college juniors who are completely clueless) but the actual answer is no.
Can you please explain your rationale?
Just curious, why do you want to go into investment banking?
Because I believe that I would actually enjoy such a job.
Then there's no need to shoot for prestige, right? I'm sure there could be regional boutiques that could be good fits
You always have a chance. Always. As someone here said many years ago, Col. Sanders launched KFC in his 60s or so.
The keys to success are: getting shit done & being nice to people. It's that simple. If you join my firm and make millions for me, I don't care that you messed up Statistics 101 twenty years ago.
The advantage of performing early in live is that this opens a lot of relatively linear tracks to relative levels of success. You need to become more creative and think outside of the box if you suddenly want to be successful mid-life.
This is what I am wondering. My undergrad was (is) not amazing.
Trying to figure out the best way for a redemption.
Just have a plan and take things a day at a time. At 27 and having experienced both my triumphs and failures in my career, It's just now starting to sink in that I still have my whole life ahead of me.
.
Can't answer the OP but I will say I've landed around 5 interviews from BB's to MM's and more than a half dozed PE firms. (for IBD or ER roles) I'm leaving a long/short desk soon with close to a year of experience, all my exams done, and have three solid offers as an ER associate in a credit rating agency, a media firm and a boutique. They aren't IBD but I'm pretty sure I'm ahead of where I would be if I was not hustling. If you aren't applying you've already failed.
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