International student going through hell,
Hey all,
I had an account up on here but haven't signed in for a while and my e-mail address got cancelled. Anyways, I need some advice, I'm actually pretty stuck. Here's what has happened. I'm an international student, graduated from PSU with a degree in Management & Finance, wanted to work on wall street, loved the work culture because I could work all day which is really what I wanted to do. Anyways, graduated with a 3.68 average (yes I know not the highest, I didn't exactly have my shit together). Spent a summer interning at Morgan Stanley in Asset Management, I figured it was one way of atleast breaking in, got in there through a ton of networking, finally met a guy, real gem of a guy who helped me get in. This was summer of 09. Same guy helped me by calling his mates and connecting me, had good friends at JPM, BlackRock.
Anyways, yes I know this is a long story and I apologize, just let me vent here. So I applied to several firms in my last year, landed interviews at GS, BlackRock, a couple of shit show companies in PA. I didnt' make it past the first round in all my interviews which was pretty fucking sad, i know. I figured ok, maybe, just maybe I may have botched one interview, but I had 5 interviews, so atleast 1 of them must've gone well and I wasn't scared at all going in, knew some of my stuff and was pretty confident. Than I'm thinking ok, maybe its because of my international student status, all of these fucking companies just arent interested in sponsoring me, again probably because I was not good enough. Has anyone had this sort of dilemma with Visa sponsorships? Anyways, so during that whole fuck session, I did all the networking I could, but I kept on hitting the same internaitonal student no sponsorship brick wall. During that time, I applied to NYU for a masters in Graphic Communications, my family is in the printing and real estate business in east africa, and I figured that degree would be fairly helpful. After a year, it is pretty helpful but I think I would rather spend my time working, because the value of me being in the business is more than me not being there and coming back with another degree. I honestly do not know what the fuck to do and i'm just slowly loosing control of myself here. I always figured that coming in this banking arena with nothing but dedication and focus was enough but maybe i'm lacking a shit more.
Sorry for venting, if anyone has some suggestions of international student probs or successes, let me know,
thank you,
ak3205
As an international student, there is definitely a disadvantage to compete jobs with local students. However, I think there are plenty of stories I've heard about getting into the BBs as an international student. I know many Koreans, Chinese, Brazilians and Indians are working on the wall street. I guess it is because they represent those emerging markets. For example, let's say China and Brazil. Everybody knows there are great opportunities there. So those BBs always try to recruit people with related background. I don't know which country you come from. But I suggest you should take advantage of your country's background, like natural resources? Mines?
Hope it helps.
I'd focus on BBs. They normally recruit the best and brightest and don't really care about H1B sponsorship since diversity is generally a strategic imperative for most BBs. I wouldn't waste my time on MM/ Boutiques. Good luck bro
^ agree. focus on the BBs and bain/bcg/mck and you won't have to deal with the h1b issue.
It's tough, my frd is going through the same thing so I def hear you. try this website,
http://www.myvisajobs.com/
its designed for job hunters with visa issues, I know someone who got a job at Merrill thru that site, it's an option you can consider
I think you were just under-prepared. Large firms like the ones you mentioned will readily sponsor visas for a foreigner, before they offer a domestic the same opportunity - provided you are the best candidate.
I just graduated from a school where there was a very heavy international presence ( >50%). All of them always whined about how unfair the system was, and how they were screwed out of getting jobs in major banks. Fact of the matter was, they just sucked. They just couldn't admit it to themselves because they were raised as princes and princesses in china or india, and just assumed that their shit didn't stink. Obviously its must be the system's fault.
Funnily, the one's that actually were smart(and foreign) landed jobs in big4, GS, MS, etc. Never heard them complaining about the system.
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