Most Badass Intern Story?

I love the stories of interns crashing and burning, drinking too much, or doing something stupid as much as anyone else, but are there any tales from the opposite end of the spectrum?

Mod Note (Andy): One of the most viewed posts of 2017.

 

Grimloge:

One of my friends told me a story of this girl who, the day before Brexit (S&T SA), went out to happy hour with her team, got extremely drunk threw up on their HR manager, and a MD had to take her home. Obviously, she forgot to set her alarm and showed up at 11am on the morning of Brexit.

Wait, who had to take her home?

 

When I was an analyst, one of our associates had to fly out of state for a bachelor party or some shit the day before Warriors season tix went on sale, which required purchasers to be on site. His intern went down to the box office on a Friday evening to sit in line and grab the tickets.

Thanks, let me know if you ever need an introduction in the industry.
 

A guy on my internship got kicked off for admitting to his MD that he did coke over the weekend, got sent to the banks health department before letting him go

Another guy on my internship got kicked off for asking another intern out (she told the manager she felt uncomfortable with him "sexually harassing her") and he went down for it, I know the guy and he's an alright person, think he asked her for a drink twice in the space of one week just she a bit out of order, girls have too much power in these circumstances.

Some other guy on my internship went to the networking happy hour and opened a tab telling everyone they can use it, no surprise people went overboard spending a few grand on his tab, no surprise he couldn't afford his rent and turned up at another interns house asking to move in until his next payment came in.

 

Especially if you're asking an intern out - interns don't have access to employment courts and are usually extremely vulnerable in these situations because they are less likely to speak out or complain because they are hoping to get a job after!

 
Controversial

literally everything makes women uncomfortable. fat people make women uncomfortable. frankly, women make themselves uncomfortable. yes, women have way too much power.

Let me hear you say, this shit is bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S!
 
xgozax

literally everything makes women uncomfortable. fat people make women uncomfortable. frankly, women make themselves uncomfortable. yes, women have way too much power.

No way. Really?

 

You're falling for the classic "Survivorship/Reporting-Bias" error of statistical reasoning: You think women have all the power because in the rare situations they do it tends to be widely publicized. However, I can assure you that for every instance where a woman reported a man for a real or perceived mis-behavior and action was taken against the man, there are dozens and dozens of instances where absolutely nothing was done, or the woman's career was put in jeopardy for complaining. You simply don't realize this because by virtue of being a silent phenomena these instances where the man gets off don't "survive" or make it into the sample set that the public widely knows about.

Understanding and anticipating the existence of this statistical phenomena can help you in your career on the street as your interpret data and do backtests, as well as keep you from making rash judgements that will negatively impact your personal life. Take it from a quant. 

nicole
 

not an intern but a trading clerk:

while trading in the pit, one of our clerks went to grab all the traders lunch like most days. he got hit by a taxi on his way back (he was not severely injured but was noticeably limping).

he still delivered each trader their lunch in the pit (note that food was not allowed on the CME floor at the time so he had to sneak it past the security guards). hands down best clerk ever

 

Smoke show of an intern we had, who was batshit crazy (no surprise here), went out on the city every night. After staying out on yachts with 40 year old divorced bankers/lawyers till 6AM every morning doing all sorts of behavior she'd stroll into the office at 9ish. Since the manager was too busy and also happily married (not wanting to play with fire here, after all) she was left to her own devices. To go along with those DSLs and phat booty this girl had balls of steel. She'd sleep in conference rooms and on the couch in the women's bathroom for hours on end to make up for lost sleep - not that she didn't get enough time under the sheets. There were days she didn't show up to work, most mentionably when she went to Italy with one of these said suits. The best part? She bragged about getting away with murder yet bitched about not getting any responsibility.

She came to a happy hour once and within 15mins of my two buddies showing up she flat out propositioned them for a threesome. Some are just born wild.

 

one of the female interns during my sophomore internship teased our VP into verbally and seriously saying that he would sleep with her on the last day of our internship despite having a family and 2 kids. some ppl cant keep their dick in their pants

What concert costs 45 cents? 50 Cent feat. Nickelback.
 

dicks are meant to free-wheel. never forget pants are a societal construct and not what nature intended...

"I'm talking about liquid. Rich enough to have your own jet. Rich enough not to waste time. Fifty, a hundred million dollars, buddy. A player. Or nothing. " -GG
 

ah yes, I am familiar with this specimen and they are the fuel of life my friend. you want to prove you are an alpha? survive a few of these ladies and you have achieved permanent BSD status; there is nothing the markets can throw your way that comes even close to the level of insanity you need to deal with these women! hell, being robbed with a gun pointed at your head will make you yawn once you've battled these mighty hexenbeasts and lived to tell the tale.

"I'm talking about liquid. Rich enough to have your own jet. Rich enough not to waste time. Fifty, a hundred million dollars, buddy. A player. Or nothing. " -GG
 

When I sat on the lev fin desk, had an intern from a top tier school who was kinda quiet and kept to himself mostly. Work ethic was insane. Never left his desk unless the banker he was supporting told him to grab coffee or some other task that required leaving his desk. Typically stayed way past reasonable intern times. Occasionally was seen shaving/changing ties in the bathroom. A telltale for overnights.

Welp... one month in, HR calls up the MD and says there are 'discrepancies' with his background....

1). Housing: He claimed to live at (side note: I had no idea HR went this deep) a residence and apparently did not live at said residence. HR was positive. OK....a little weird

2). College: Basically didn't show up for his last semester of Freshman year. Obviously bombed all exams/possible dropout

When confronted he said HR was wrong and he could prove it, but he just had to grab the sublease and college transcript from his phone. Cue him standing up, walking out of the office, and 'dead sprinting out of there'--as our MD put it. Desk Admin said he didn't stop when she went, 'is something wrong?'.

I never heard of the kid again. HR and the firm apparently did something, and it was rumor mill city in the intern class.

Not so bad-ass, but--for a banking office--made for a pretty funny story.

 
Best Response

When I was an intern once, had an MD go to Chicago to close on a deal that was heating up. Guy was very much so "new money" and didn't act like the conservative traditional banker. I think he was from Brooklyn and went to one of the city colleges and just grinded to the top, respect. Anyways while he was in Chicago he hectically called our office and said he forgot his "lucky watch" and "special suit" in his house. Watch cost something like $50,000 and the suit at least $10,000+. Well he made one of the interns go to his house, pick up the suit and and watch and then personally fly over to Chicago to deliver it to him. I volunteered because I thought it was exciting and because I fucking hated the internship and being in the office.

The associate laughed at me and said good luck and gave me the MD's phone number. I called him letting him know I would be the one in charge of this task. He said "Ok, go to my office and pick up my credit card in the top desk drawer." I picked it up, and ordered a taxi to his apartment. I get to his apartment and no one is fucking home. I call him to tell him all the doors are locked and so he says to go down to the lobby and they'll open the door for me. I comply and security obviously doesn't believe that some 20 year old kid has the permission to go into this guy's house. They say they cant take authorization over the phone and that it has the be done in person with the resident's ID the night before. I try calling the wife, but she was at Soulcycle for the next hour and wasn't answering the phone. Mind you, this is in July, and I'm in my full suit sweating profusely. The MD begins to scream at me and tells me to "figure it out" and gives me all his people's phone numbers. I have nannies, maids, and his kid's phones and I have no idea who the fuck to call.

I get another taxi and go to his children's school. At the time I was twenty years old, kind of over weight, beaten down by my internship, in a cheap suit, and was in desperate need of a good shave and haircut. I'll go ahead and say I probably looked like a fucking creep. Oh yeah, I was also sweating profusely too. But ok, I go to the elementary school and try to match up with the guy's second and third grade kids who were in class at the time. Security tracks me down in the hallway and asks if they can fucking help me. At this time I have no energy to explain to them this retarded story and so I just call the MD and put the security on the phone, then security says that I have to ask the principal and not him for permission to find his kids and ask for the key. I hang up, go to the principal's office and then call the MD again. He has the nerve to tell me to stop calling him "until you make some real progress." The guy talks to the principal and so the principal agrees to walk me over to my boss's kid's classrooms. Well what do you know, fucking Piper and Sally both forgot to take their keys to school that day so none of the booger eating, moth breathing idiot children have their keys for their house. I call the MD to let him know this, and somehow it's my fault that his kid's still have the attention span of a dog and couldn't remember to bring their keys. I try calling the nanny, but of course it's 9AM and she doesn't have to deal this fucking family until 3PM so she doesn't answer.

He tells me he's not happy with my performance but gives me one more person to call. Well what do you, my fucking girl Wang Li, the maid answered her phone, and told me to meet her in SoHo where she was cleaning another client's house but had the key. I meet up with her, pick up the key, and then go to the guy's house and pick up his stuff. I call him again and he tells me "if you're not in my house right now, you're going to be in trouble." Luckily I was in the apartment but told me "which suit and what watch do you want." I can't tell the difference between an expensive suit and a regular suit, and do he says this is something else we will have to talk about. I facetime and I show him the suits and watches and he tells me which one to pick. Then I finally rush to JFK and order the next flight to Chicago to deliver him the suit.

When I land to Chicago and and meet up with him, I don't even get a thank you or a job well done. All he says is "Alright now go back to New York and re join your fellow interns who are currently working hard in the office." Oh and he also says "Don't forget to save all the receipts that you got today or else you're going to have to pay me back."

Really wish I had just stayed at the office that day instead.

We're not lawyers. We're investment bankers. We didn't go to Harvard. We Went to Wharton!
 

"fucking Piper and Sally both forgot to take their keys to school that day so none of the booger eating, moth breathing idiot children have their keys for their house." Yesss

 

Reminds of a time when I was interning and some senior bankers decided it would be a funny idea to get a fish tank, adding a new fish for each closed deal

They asked for an intern to go to the pet store and buy a fish tank, a few starter fish, and setup the tank, absolute nightmare. I did not volunteer... Never volunteer...

Long story short, the guy who gets picked to do it ends up being called fish boy for the rest of the internship. When we came back for FT, the fish tank was gone. A director playing with a deal toy accidentally slid it into the tank, breaking it in the middle of the bullpen.

 
GridironCEO

When I was an intern once, had an MD go to Chicago to close on a deal that was heating up. Guy was very much so "new money" and didn't act like the conservative traditional banker. I think he was from Brooklyn and went to one of the city colleges and just grinded to the top, respect. Anyways while he was in Chicago he hectically called our office and said he forgot his "lucky watch" and "special suit" in his house. Watch cost something like $50,000 and the suit at least $10,000+. Well he made one of the interns go to his house, pick up the suit and and watch and then personally fly over to Chicago to deliver it to him. I volunteered because I thought it was exciting and because I fucking hated the internship and being in the office.

The associate laughed at me and said good luck and gave me the MD's phone number. I called him letting him know I would be the one in charge of this task. He said "Ok, go to my office and pick up my credit card in the top desk drawer." I picked it up, and ordered a taxi to his apartment. I get to his apartment and no one is fucking home. I call him to tell him all the doors are locked and so he says to go down to the lobby and they'll open the door for me. I comply and security obviously doesn't believe that some 20 year old kid has the permission to go into this guy's house. They say they cant take authorization over the phone and that it has the be done in person with the resident's ID the night before. I try calling the wife, but she was at Soulcycle for the next hour and wasn't answering the phone. Mind you, this is in July, and I'm in my full suit sweating profusely. The MD begins to scream at me and tells me to "figure it out" and gives me all his people's phone numbers. I have nannies, maids, and his kid's phones and I have no idea who the fuck to call.

I get another taxi and go to his children's school. At the time I was twenty years old, kind of over weight, beaten down by my internship, in a cheap suit, and was in desperate need of a good shave and haircut. I'll go ahead and say I probably looked like a fucking creep. Oh yeah, I was also sweating profusely too. But ok, I go to the elementary school and try to match up with the guy's second and third grade kids who were in class at the time. Security tracks me down in the hallway and asks if they can fucking help me. At this time I have no energy to explain to them this retarded story and so I just call the MD and put the security on the phone, then security says that I have to ask the principal and not him for permission to find his kids and ask for the key. I hang up, go to the principal's office and then call the MD again. He has the nerve to tell me to stop calling him "until you make some real progress." The guy talks to the principal and so the principal agrees to walk me over to my boss's kid's classrooms. Well what do you know, fucking Piper and Sally both forgot to take their keys to school that day so none of the booger eating, moth breathing idiot children have their keys for their house. I call the MD to let him know this, and somehow it's my fault that his kid's still have the attention span of a dog and couldn't remember to bring their keys. I try calling the nanny, but of course it's 9AM and she doesn't have to deal this fucking family until 3PM so she doesn't answer.

He tells me he's not happy with my performance but gives me one more person to call. Well what do you, my fucking girl Wang Li, the maid answered her phone, and told me to meet her in SoHo where she was cleaning another client's house but had the key. I meet up with her, pick up the key, and then go to the guy's house and pick up his stuff. I call him again and he tells me "if you're not in my house right now, you're going to be in trouble." Luckily I was in the apartment but told me "which suit and what watch do you want." I can't tell the difference between an expensive suit and a regular suit, and do he says this is something else we will have to talk about. I facetime and I show him the suits and watches and he tells me which one to pick. Then I finally rush to JFK and order the next flight to Chicago to deliver him the suit.

When I land to Chicago and and meet up with him, I don't even get a thank you or a job well done. All he says is "Alright now go back to New York and re join your fellow interns who are currently working hard in the office." Oh and he also says "Don't forget to save all the receipts that you got today or else you're going to have to pay me back."

Really wish I had just stayed at the office that day instead.

WoW effect!

 

"New money" MD, deal heating up, he's forgot his lucky gear.... odds didn't look good on this one pal.

The guy was in a "the deal is the only thing that matters" state. The hero act had a low success rate but well played for finishing the mission.

Hope something good managed to come out of this in the end.

Absolute truths don't exist... celebrated opinions do.
 

New hire on his first day, emailed the entire team and manager that he was going to miss work because he was helping his friend move a couch.

The email was sent at 3:45am...

Needless to say, he has all the time in the world to "move couches" now.

"A man can convince anyone he's somebody else, but never himself."
 

Wait do you guys work together?

<span itemprop=name>eliteculture</span>:

few of my intern class got so drunk one night at the apartment where bank housed them, they carried a couch in the lobby area all the way up to the roof and just threw that couch off the roof....the management company told the HR and they got fired.

Make Idaho a Semi-Target Again 2016 Not an alumnus of Idaho
 

One story is there was a guy once call in to work saying he couldn’t come in because the elevator didnt work in his apartment building, he was dead serious.

He called the police and told them it was broken and to come fix the emergency.

Everyone was dying laughing because of this, he wasn’t fired

He later got arrested for doing cocaine

 
BillMurray

One story is there was a guy once call in to work saying he couldn’t come in because the elevator didnt work in his apartment building, he was dead serious.

He called the police and told them it was broken and to come fix the emergency.

Everyone was dying laughing because of this, he wasn’t fired

He later got arrested for doing cocaine

Unexpected ending. Brilliant.

 

Story happened during my internship in M&A. A team (thankfully not mine) was pitching a company in LatAm. The operation being pitched was quite complex, combining a reverse takeover, buyback considerations and LevFin elements. Now you might know that the currency in Argentina is the Argentine Peso. The intern googled wrong and wrote the first slide using the symbol for the Philippine Peso. The whole team followed suit, copy/pasting the symbol from slide to slide. Nobody saw it, not even the MD, who wasn't a specialist of Latin America and was just here to pitch a subsidiary of a company he had a good relationship with in Europe. Ended up pitching with a book full of Philippine Peso symbols. The prospective client interrupted him at the first slide, basically asking him "wtff?". The story got back to his client in Europe, and, incidentally or not, he didn't win the next RFP with this client. Needless to say, the intern was blacklisted from the bank and every bank the MD had any relationship with.

 

Of course it was a terrible mistake from the intern, but mistakes happen, especially as an intern with no experience. I would rather blame the MD for not seeing it. I mean it´s basically the work from an associate to check such things and mistakes from analysts, not even mentioning interns. It is more embarrassing for the MD, who earns 1 Mio $ and has 15+ work experience to not know the right currency symbol than for a fucking intern.

Don´t say this in a banking interview: Which superhero would you be and why? I want to be like Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor - me.
 
<span itemprop=name>jordan25</span>:

Of course it was a terrible mistake from the intern, but mistakes happen, especially as an intern with no experience. I would rather blame the MD for not seeing it. I mean it's basically the work from an associate to check such things and mistakes from analysts, not even mentioning interns. It is more embarrassing for the MD, who earns 1 Mio $ and has 15+ work experience to not know the right currency symbol than for a fucking intern.

Well he ain't gonna fire himself now is he

 

When I was an intern, I worked with this analyst who hated me. He was also in charge of submitting proxy forms (a job he hated) and had a stack of them on his desk. The night before my last day, I chose a few from some of the firm's larger holdings, ran off about 100 copies and taped them all to his desk, computer, and chair with little messages asking him to fill them out. I also hid the pile of forms so he thought I had used those. I let him rip them down and fill out a couple before finally filling him in.

Small thing but it got a laugh from the office....

 

Our group took the intern class out for drinks the night before the summer class volunteering photo op for the bank to prove it does nice things. Anyway, not one, but two interns missed the bus and had to explain to HR why they were absent for a mandatory event. Oops.

 

Had some pretty wild stories myself but dont wanna blow my cover. Anyways the interns before me managed to make over 80k in one summer because of a major screw up with payroll or something.

What concert costs 45 cents? 50 Cent feat. Nickelback.
 

Not that outrageous but buddy of mine during his SA stint a few years ago packed a flask and usually helped himself to a few drinks each late night. Still not sure how he didn't screw up or succumb into actual alcoholism.

 

During my SA stint I kept a bottle of Soju inside an empty protein jar in the bottom cabinet and would mix it with a cup of OJ and some ice i got from break room.

What concert costs 45 cents? 50 Cent feat. Nickelback.
 

One of our male interns managed to sleep with two different analysts (one of whom was in the same group as him) in a span of three weeks. He got the return offer.

My favorite intern back in the day shows up and on his second week on the job, was clearly smarter than most of the first year analysts. I took him under my wing and on week #4 of his internship I was slammed so I gave him some M&A modeling to do on a live deal (risky move as I didn't even ask staffer for permission). The kid fucking knocked it out of the park and came back with a finished product 12 hours later (outputs neatly formatted with only a few minor alignment and color scheme issues). The model itself was 95% correct, and his work was so well organized it only took me an hour to check everything. He even had a separate tab in the Excel file where he pasted screenshots of the specific notes from the filings he was referencing. Needless to say the kid got the offer (I didn't even have to put in a good word, everyone noticed he was a rock star) and he also got promoted to associate after 2 years as an analyst (which was very rare at my BB). Last I heard he is still in banking and loves every minute of it.

 

how the fuck did he sleep with two analysts was he good looking?

also kudos to your rock star banker -- can you expand on what parts of the m&a model he did?

What concert costs 45 cents? 50 Cent feat. Nickelback.
 

I do mind you asking... what does it matter what race they were?

And the rockstar kid basically built a 3 statement model from scratch for both companies, with everything from S&U and pro forma cap tables down to accretion/dilution, AVP, copntribution analysis, etc. We ended up significantly expanding on this model as the deal progressed but he built the basis for it.

 

holy shit this actually happened to me this year lol the club was next to my office building, I slept on the floor till about 6am, then continued sleeping in my chair, had my socks and shoes off, was wearing a singlet underneath, with my trousers on. i woke up and saw that half the office was in (but not my team), then slowly put my shirt on (it was draped over my chair) and just sat working (this was about 8am) and the partner in my firm walks past and asks if i pulled an all nighter - i said i came in early to study, was shit scared that I would have gotten found out and fired or something but no one really gave a shit

 

Ok this is a story I heard from one of the analysts I interned for, and it was confirmed by multiple sources. So there was this kid that interned at a BB who was a really bright kid, but apparently went WAY overboard for everything he was staffed on (Even by banking standards). He would finish a deck at 12PM and then stay til 5 AM just reading it over a bunch of times and fixing small things that are so unnecessary its ridiculous.

So he was on an A&D deal and it was late and there was one small change left to make (adding a few logos, etc.). Literally a 5 minute change.... TOPS. He insisted that the analyst left and he would take care of the extra changes, and the guy left.

Fast forward to the next morning, the analyst saw that the intern had sent out the draft to the MD three hours later than he had left, but at this point that wasn't too unusual since by then he was familiar the kid's antics. This deck was presented to the CEO / CFO etc. of the company at the bank, so the powerpoint was shown live on the projector behind the MD while he went over the slides. Apparently, when the MD came to a certain slide, all the sudden a logo just FLEW out from the corner of the page, zipped around it wildly and bounced off the sides of the slide, and then the page went into a swirl and transitioned to the next page. The intern had been there so late that he must have had a mental breakdown and accidentally added animation.. apparently the execs all had a good laugh and everything ended up working out.

The kid was yelled at but he ended up killing it towards the end of his internship (when he found the right balance of hard work and remaining sane) and got a return offer.

 

Technically not an internship story because I never got the offer, but here goes...

So, I'm a rising senior at a non-target and desperately need a summer internship. After a bunch of cold calling and emailing, I finally get an interview at a small PE shop an hour from where I'm going to school. I do some research into the firm and am impressed. It's small, but the head guy went to HBS, consistently ranks on those "people under 40" lists, is a featured speaker on CNBC, has a solid fund raised, etc.

My first-round interview is in-person with the COO of the PE shop. I show up 20 minutes early and am trying to find the place. Oh, it's located in a freaking strip mall. I really should have left at this point, but again, I was a desperate non-target kid. I figured I'd just call the place and pretend to be a client trying to find the office. The funny thing is, the guy who picks up the phone has no clue where the office is either. He just goes, "Give me a minute while I pull up Google Maps to see where the place is." Turns out the place was outsourcing their reception to India. WTF.

Anyway, I finally find the place. I open the front door and see no receptionist, no front desk, no lights on, nothing. There are two offices and a lobby, and it looks like no one even works here. There is nothing in this place except two bare desks, a chair, and some strange statue. Out of the second office comes a porky Indian guy. He introduces himself as the COO and invites me into his unlit, unfurnished office for my interview. I really should have just left.

The interview goes well, but I cannot help but pick up on how the COO keeps telling me how this PE shop is one of a kind because even interns are allowed to invest their money (keep this in the back of your mind). During the interview, I gave the COO my availability for the next week, which did not include Monday.

A few hours after the interview, the COO emails me for a final-round interview that Monday. I respond that I cannot come in on Monday and kindly remind him that I had already stated that. He responds by telling me that I'm clearly not interested, have no drive, have no work ethic, and have no business interning at such a fine PE shop. In a strange plot twist, a few weeks later, the founder of the PE shop (the guy I wrote about earlier) emails asking if I was still interested. I politely decline.

A few months pass and a buddy of mine who works in the local FBI field office's white collar crime division texts me to ask if I ever took that internship. I told him that I never got an offer and ask why. Turns out the PE shop's founder was running a Ponzi scheme, except he was pretty bad at it. Instead of using new investments to pay out old investors, he simply refused to pay out anything and used the money to buy houses and cars. The guy is sitting in jail now.

 

LOL for a minute I thought you were describing the offices of the Investors Center and were about to interview with Jordan Belfort, but sounds like even those dudes had more pizzazz then these people.

"I'm talking about liquid. Rich enough to have your own jet. Rich enough not to waste time. Fifty, a hundred million dollars, buddy. A player. Or nothing. " -GG
 

was she married? was she hot? details bro...

"I'm talking about liquid. Rich enough to have your own jet. Rich enough not to waste time. Fifty, a hundred million dollars, buddy. A player. Or nothing. " -GG
 

this is not about interns but still a funny story. Years back I am working as an analyst and towards the end of the two years our whole class was in the process of being evaluated for promotions. Our VP was a younger guy who was the nephew of the CEO. They guy was useless at everything, except at happy hours, he excelled at that. pretty much every Friday night he would take us all out open a tab and let loose the dogs of war. As we get close to the two year mark, people are nervous as not everyone will make the cut. Two of the women in our group, one french one Venezuelan, both very hot, were average performers and no one thought they would make it. The weekend before the VP was due to hand in his final recommendations he took us out as per usual. I left around 2AM and the party was significantly simmering down at this point. When I left the VP was still there and so were 4 other people including the two hotties. The following morning we all had to show up to one of those feed the homeless events (yes on a Saturday, but we all got paid so I didn't care). We show up and the coordinator is taking attendance and three people are missing: the VP and the two aforementioned women. 20 minutes later all 3 arrived in his car, with the women wearing the same clothes as the night before. They later admitted to me that they had a threesome but not before he promised them the promotions. Needless to say on Monday it was announced that they were on the promotion list. I hear the guy is still there now and runs some BS department made just for him while the two ladies have moved on and married since.

"I'm talking about liquid. Rich enough to have your own jet. Rich enough not to waste time. Fifty, a hundred million dollars, buddy. A player. Or nothing. " -GG
 

In my first PWM office, there was a former intern who showed up his first day and was asked to file. Filed for 2 hours and then went to HR to complain about dust allergies. HR told his manager he couldn't file anymore.

Next day the kid showed up, wrote his name on an index card and put it on an empty office. Opened the WSJ, put his feet on the desk and stayed that way for the day. Spent the rest of the internship doing the same thing.

3 years later I interviewed him for a full time position. I had to keep myself from laughing the whole time. Sad thing was, the kids interview was spot on. If he hadn't blown the internship he definitely would have gotten a job.

 

A few years back, I was interning at a boutique tech bank. The CEO liked to bark out his emails to his Admin sitting at the desk right outside his office. The Admin would typically leave by 5, but the CEO still needed someone to "tee up emails" for him. I was that lucky intern. When you sit at the Admin's desk you have FULL access to his email and he receives some pretty wild emails from his "buddies". One Thursday night around 7 PM, I'm sitting at the desk and an email pops up with the title "URGENT! I NEED IT NOW!". Usually, I minimize his inbox to give him some type of privacy/avoid these awkward moments, but this time I saw the full email.

"Hey ____, you know how you said you owe me one? Well, I need it NOW. I don't care how it gets here, but it needs to get here in the next 30 minutes before I leave for the weekend. I'm serious, ____. Get it done."

The CEO is a Napoleonic, psychopath that would NEVER allow anyone to talk to him that way .... or so I thought. I kept my head down and waited.... and waited...... and waited until he slowly got up from his desk and walked over to me with two objects, a small wooden box and a key.

"Listen to me very carefully, intern (we had the same first name, but he kept forgetting that). I need you to deliver this box and key to my friend, OK? If you get this to him, you'll be head and shoulders above the other interns in my eyes. To be honest, that's all that really matters."

I told him of course I will do anything for him and I take the items without question. He told me the address and I hop on the next train to cross a certain river. After ten minutes, I realize I am on the campus of a very well known business school. I run into a large building and I tell the security guard watching Netflix why I was there. He jumps up and escorts me to the highest floor and drops me off in front of a large office door. Oh, its the Dean of the entire business school's office. Awesome. I knock on the door and wait for something to happen.

____ opened the door and calmly told me, "Son, office hours are on Monday's from...". "Sir, uhhhh I have your box and key." "HE SENT YOU! WHAT THE HELL WAS HE THINKING! DID YOU LOOK IN IT?!" I told him "No"; I would never do anything like that. He brought me into his office and sat me down. He took the box and key and eyed me suspiciously. "Son, I appreciate you coming all this way. I hope this can stay between the three of us. Is there anything I can do for you?" "Well, uhhhh maybe I'd like to go to business school someday...?" "OF COURSE, let me give you my card and my personal cell phone number." I took the card and schlepped my ass back to the office. The CEO didn't yell at me when I returned so I guess I succeeded.

I have NO idea what was in that box or what that key opened. Drugs? A house key? I had heard about the CEO's mysterious Miami house, but I had no clue. I didn't tell any of the other interns or analysts. I was still shaking by the time I left the office and got home. I told a few friends, but tried to forget the experience. The CEO never brought it up again. I ended up pursuing real estate and left banking for good. I haven't seen the CEO since.

Fast forward to a few weeks ago, I'm at a speaker event and guess who is sitting up on stage? Yes, the Dean. I wait until the event ends and I slowly make my way over to him. Eventually, he sees my face (an insignificant nobody in this room) coming toward him and he looks like he had just seen a ghost. He abruptly ends his conversation with the person next to him and speed walks out of the event.

I still have the card the Dean gave me and I'm hoping someday I'll be able to use it. So I got that going for me, which is nice.

You eat what you kill.
 

My firm sends all of their interns down to Disney at the end of the internship. A couple of years ago a number of drunk interns decided it would be a good idea to take a piano from the hotel bar and throw it into a lake

 

be honest now, you were one of them weren't you?

"I'm talking about liquid. Rich enough to have your own jet. Rich enough not to waste time. Fifty, a hundred million dollars, buddy. A player. Or nothing. " -GG
 

It was a hot day and one of our MDs had to get to a fundraiser for some position in the city government. He was late, so he drove the car to his event and then made me drive it back due to the lack of valet and parking options.

... it was a Lamborghini.

Knowing that I would die his indentured servant before paying back any damages, I drove about 5-10 mph in light traffic all the way back to our office garage. I ended up accidentally parking in another MDs spot, thankfully they never mentioned it when they came back from lunch.

 

This happened to me during a sophomore summer internship at an EB in London.

Thursday nights were a big thing in the office. It was expected that everyone in the front office go out, with some support staff/back office people occasionally invited along. All in all, about 30 people would leave the office around 8:00pm and head down to a local pub to 'pregame' before heading out to the clubs - basically like a glorified happy hour before a night that would frequently get out of hand.

The thing was, the pub we would go to had an interesting policy. Because we were such regular/good customers, we had a literal firm 'tab' - a fancy piece of plastic/metal that you could show to the bartender and order anything with.

My first week at the firm I go out with the guys to this pub, as is the norm. We all hang out and drink for a while - about 2 hours or so - and I'm trying to split my time getting to know my team better and to network around the bank a bit with people I haven't met yet before the group splits off and either goes clubbing or goes home. Thus far, I didn't really know where the drinks were coming from - analysts and associates were just bringing them out to where we were from the bar pretty much constantly. Then, as some of the middle-level guys who didnt like to party that hard started heading out, an associate from another team comes over, introduces himself to me, hands me the tab, and tells me to put whatever I want on it.

Not wanting to screw anything up, I go over, order myself a pint of Peroni - about £5 - go back to my team, and ask them who I should hand the tab off to. They all start hysterically laughing at me. People are starting to leave, and the policy at the bar - which no one had explained to me - is that whoever is left holding the fancy piece of plastic/metal when the last people leave for the club pays the whole tab. Mind you, this is a tab for 30 bankers, drinking mostly fancy cocktails, at a fancy pub, for 2 hours. Probably an average of 5 or 6 drinks per person, at an average of at least £15 a drink back when the pound was north of $1.50. I dont have nearly enough money in my bank account to pay this off, or nearly enough room on any of my cards.

One of the guys on my team is sympathetic to the situation and tells me to go talk to an SMD who is still around - and mentions that he has picked up the tab a number of times before to go easy on the junior guys.

So I go over to the SMD, and strike up a conversation. After a few minutes of schmoozing, I pull out the tab, and ask him if he has any advice as to what I should do with it. He takes the tab from my hand, looks at me, and says "Ah, this thing. You REALLY don't want to be caught with this thing." And then tucks it into my suit's breast pocket and walks away.

At this point I'm freaking out. The only people left in the bar from my bank are a few analysts from my team, a couple of associates from another team, and this SMD who has just hung me out to dry. So I do the only thing I can think of. I walk up to one of the associates, who is standing near a table, and strike up a conversation. As soon as he looked away for a split second, I snuck the tab out of my pocket, placed it on the table, and made a beeline for the bathroom. Within seconds of making it into a bathroom stall I hear the door violently slam open, and hop on top of the toilet seat so my feet cant be seen/the stall looks empty. The associate starts opening all of the stalls until he gets to mine, which is obviously locked, and starts banging on the door, yelling how he knows I'm in there. I call an uber on my phone, and once the car is outside the pub and the associate has stopped banging, unlock the stall, and beeline out past the associate straight into the uber.

The associate ended up paying the tab. I paid for all of my own Thursday night pre-drinks the rest of the summer to avoid ever having to be in that position again.

 

Wow, how did a policy like that even stayed in action. I don't believe anyone would volunteer for it. Or was i always the unlucky intern who drew the short straw

 

Recovering VP-level banker (power boutique) - I once had an intern who I not only trusted more than most of my analysts, he also supplied the office with dip to keep the troops happy, grinds to the keep the other troops happy, and knew a number of card tricks.

I thought he was so great I convinced him to seek employment at greener pastures (bigger banks) because I thought he was destined for bigger and better things. It was hard for me to do because good help is hard to find and I would have loved to have him as an analyst after graduation, but he had the potential to do great things.

Lawyer turned VC, turned banker, turned VC and never leaving again.
 

Opposite, we had an intern that left within hours of being on the desk. BB, IB, spent first week with the Bloomberg / Factset / basics training, (don't know if they got one week or two of training) but day ONE of actual work, said quietly, I don't think this is for me, packed up and left, apparently, didn't even talk to HR or staffers on the way out.

 

Intern who was some sort of Math Wizard .... created a model which he then proceeded to present to one of the MDs proving the diminishing returns of working past 6pm ever ... and that this is why he refused to do so ... needless to say he did not get a return offer

 

Watched an intern decide he was going to be super alpha, started assigning other interns work to do. One of the interns gave him (what he thought was) inferior quality work, so he blew up on her, at the desk, something to the effect of: don't you even think about doing shit work like this if you want to have a real career at this bank. VP took him into a side chat shortly thereafter to have a discussion about appropriate behaviour.

 

Met Janet Yellen at the Federal Reserve cafeteria while waiting to meet a research assistant, and learned that she doesn't keep kosher and likes salami sandwiches. Stanley Fischer, who stood beside her, was baffled.

Quant (ˈkwänt) n: An expert, someone who knows more and more about less and less until they know everything about nothing.
 

Not the wildest story, but it's the best I've got so far...

Myself and a few buddies were interning at a boutique (not EB, but genuine 10 person office) firm in the summer. The Partner of the firm is alumni at our school (remember this for later). Anyway we had a wild Sunday night but left our access cards at home and couldn't get back upstairs to our dorm. My dickhead mate, after hooking up with a questionable woman ten years older than him, starts dragging couches out from the common room and stacking them on top of one another so he can reach his balcony (as he never locked his window) to gain access. This all unfolded at like 4:30 when the sky becomes noticeably lighter.

It turns out, the Partner of our firm goes for early morning runs around the campus... When we rolled in at 9:00 sharp, he said something along the lines of "Some dickheads were stealing couches and trying to break into X dorm this morning". My mate stands there with his jaw on the floor and looks at me. I choked up and said "Really? How weird...". He grunts "Yeah, thought it was odd" before shaking his head and walking off.

To this day, my mate and I aren't sure if he actually recognised it as being us. He's the type of guy who would have a good laugh about it anyway.

Ignore my Title and Industry - I can't seem to change it under 'Edit Profile' lol
 

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