Non-Target School Hopefuls Unite!

Some steps I've taken thus far have been subscribing to the WSJ, researching concepts within the IB community and reaching out to alumni and professors who could offer advice and networking opportunities. I'm sure there are many other strategies I have overlooked, and hopefully this forum will become a veritable almanac of strategy and advice. Thanks guys, and best of luck.

Network your ass off, use every connection you have, and make yourself as marketable as possible.

i second tiger90's point. make your goals known and if you show the effort and get the results your professors will generally swing in your favor when your grade is on the cusp of the next grade up.

also, reach out to alumni using linkedin and then figure out their email structure if its not on the profile. from there, reach out to them, and ask for a chance to learn what they do thru fone call or coffee.

woops, replied to wrong post

Good luck, I came from a non target big 10 school and landed elite boutique!

Yeah, asking professors and alumni seem like great ideas! Im a Sophomore doing Finance at a non-target, interning in BB Ops this summer, hoping to do a part-time internship at a during my fall semester this year to help my resume for the next recruiting cycle. Also running my own M&A news site and writing some articles for WSO this summer.

Most of my IB-related experience is online but Im just trying to add everything in I can..

All great advice, thanks everyone. This is all very applicable to any non-targeter's experience, especially with regard to the contrast between your work ethic and others'. Personally, I surround myself with friends in the top of their chosen field, whether it be pre-med, pre-law, or anywhere in between. The intense, almost competitive group dynamic seems to be both a great motivator, as well as good practice for IB environments. With regard to the dreaded group project, I feel it can be a boon for our interview ammunition later on. I know many interviewers like to ask about your past leadership experience, and there is no better place for honing this than wrangling a bunch of slack-offs to rally behind the same project.

Ultimately, I've found the support group for individuals such as ourselves to be wonderful. Both at my university as well as on sites such as this, there is no shortage of people willing to offer advice and assistance. Although we may be competing for the same positions one day, I'm glad we our brothers in arms as of now, and I wish everyone luck wherever their search takes them.

I will continue to update this forum as I gain new insights, I hope y'all choose to do the same.

You need to be flexible and patient with your path to IB. That being said, make every decision and evaluate every choice with your ultimate goal of breaking into IB in mind. The path won't always be clear or straight for that matter, but if you're always working towards 'breaking in' then you'll do just fine.

Has anybody had luck with cold calling? Which groups do you find are the most beneficial to cold call/email (Banks, junior staff, senior staff, etc)? Thus far I've called up a few old professors and they have been great with regard to showing interest in my pursuit as well as opening up their personal contact lists for my benefit. I would highly suggest this practice, you never know who has a son or close friend in a BB firm.

Here's my biggest mistake: I tried too hard to impress. It's easy for non-targets to get too focused and try hard to impress.

I spent everday planning out how to get into IB. I ended up getting around 5-6 internships in everything from IB, PE, Research, Trading. I followed the market, read up on so many technicals I knew more than some 1st year analysts starting out. I even worked at a firm where some BB bankers approached ME to talk about the firm.

Despite all of that I'm currently a junior, with no SA though. What happend was that I ended up coming off to nerdy, too eager to impress. That's not good for IB culture.

I transferred from a community college to a non-target in a large non-NYC metro area. I had no desire or knowledge of how to get into IB. I joined a student investment club, found a group of people who were motivated by the same goal, and most importantly WSO. What is laid out on those two sites is basically a path on how to get a job. All you need to do is get lucky, follow the steps, and work hard. In a few months I’ll be starting a full time position.

Network all the time. In class I would write out cold-emails and send them every day. I must have sent out over 2000 emails in my time at school. You’re going to get some great connections and be so practiced on your story they and behavioural interview questions are going to easy. Call every bank, advisory firm, or consulting firm in your metro to attempt to get some fall/spring internships. cold email/calling is best done with people that you have a connection with. If you’re going to a large school a number of graduates will have going on to get MBA at a target and be working on the street. They will almost always take your call and return it compared to the target kids and talk with you.

Don’t focus on being from a non-target. When you’re cold calling, networking, and hustling for a job you’re doing everything that target kids are doing. Show that you’re able to do the work, understand the requirements of the culture, and have the passion. If you can use your story to show that every semester and summer has been building to being an analyst you’re making a powerful argument.

Remember, luck has a great deal to do with the process.

Yeah don't spend too much time focusing on those around you, and focus on things that you have control over.

Stay hopeful, be persistent, enjoy and welcome every failures you encounter. Don't be afraid to go the extra mile everytime you have the opportuinity to.

Sometimes you feel isolated in your experiences working toward your dream, but remember that we are here and are all working toward our dream. :)

Thanks for the post and stay motivated!

This whole thinking that getting into a BB/MM is some idealistic accomplishment is kind of annoying. As has been shown many times before the path to banking from a nontarget is very clear and not some magestic accomplishment as is touted on this board. Sure its more difficult than if the banks recruit on campus, but if you put in the work and have a base level of ability you should be able to break in as long as you aren't a complete weirdo.

1. Get internships early and often. PWM freshman summer-> corp fin/boutique ib sophomore summer-> BB/MM IB Junior
2. Network with every alumni you can find and anyone remotely connected to you
3. Visit NYC/Chicago to meet with bankers
4. Keep a solid gpa, 3.5+ is a line that makes it much easier for an alum to push for you, 3.7+ would be ideal
5. Get the WSO guide and know technicals and behaviorals questions cold
6. Construct a coherent story for why investment banking and practice it
7. Be socially adept, be able to small talk, hold a conversation. Best advice would be when networking and interviewing the more you can talk about things outside of school/finance the better. Connecting on a personal level is what really makes someone want to push for you.

Done. I would say the most difficult thing is lucking into finding this forum so you know what you have to do to break in. Actually doing it is simply a function of your: Ability x Effort >= Minimum Work to break in. If you have less ability than someone (lower gpa, test scores, etc) than you have to put in a considerable amount more effort.

Freshman at a non-target here. Are there any good alternatives to a PWM internship for freshman year? Like maybe a sales internship, corp finance, or ops internship?

Im at a non target in Canada so I dont know how helpful my advice will be but I will throw it out there regardless. The things that have worked for me so far are: 1. Making it known that you want to be an IB and regularly chatting with the specific adviser in that field 2. Networking a political maneuvering so that you sit with and chat with every one you want to at events (if you have a finance or trading club get to know the VPs and president) 3. Get involved and plan well in advance for case comps and opportunities 4. Get some one knowledgeable in the industry to go through your job documents 5. Keep on WSO. I am still 2 years from graduation but these have certainly helped me so far.

Also great thread! Im enjoying all the tips!

I'm getting really depressed. I have a 4.0 but just can't get any offers. I probably applied for around 250 positions with little to no response. cold called or emailed around 70. I go to a podunk school in the middle of nowhere with no alumni connections on wall street. Pretty frustrating.

I went to non-target myself, would be willing to help fellow Monkeys from non-targets.

"1. “Take my advice, bastard. Never forget what you are. The rest of the world will not. Wear it like armor, and it can never be used to harm you.”

Think your life is tough if you’re from a non-target school and you have low grades and no finance work experience?

It might be tough to get into investment banking, but your life is a walk in the park next to bastards in the Middle Ages: no matter how hard they worked, they could never even own land or advance into the upper class.

And getting into investment banking? Forget about it – even working at a commercial bank would have been a stretch.

But just like the quote above says, don’t let any of these difficulties stop you: rather than letting your unknown school get you down, use it as your strongest selling point when networking and in interviews.

Show it off as you go to other schools’ information sessions and point out how much extra effort you’re putting in to break in, and what you’ve had to do to get there.

Sure, some bankers still won’t “get it,” but it works more often than you’d expect."

I'm in same boat. West Coast Non Target Undergrad + Non Target Masters. Networking my ass off for the past 5 months, landed an interview at GS and at another Top 5 that I'm currently in interviews with. Leveraged my industry background and had my pitch down. Had some pretty good mentors along the way that have helped me refine my resume, refine my story, and drill down where they thought my skillset would best fit.

PRACTICE your story, why banking, why XX firm, etc. Hoping to land an offer and sneak into either a 3rd year analyst or 1st year associate role. Wouldn't have gotten the interview without networking, which led me directly to a Co-Head and then to his MD. Completely skipped HR, and junior level interviews. Co-Head liked my story, thought I had a diverse skillset, and vetted me to his MD. MD of course, gave me 10 minutes, asked me to tell him about myself, ended up having some common threads, and turned an interview into a conversation. MD said he needs more manpower, and that it was all about headcount, which is the Co-heads decision (score). Cross fingers.

Good luck.

I've heard leadership experience is a must, and is usually brought up in at least one interview. Because of this, I decided to start an investment club at my university. I figure it will provide the leadership experience, as well as more exposure to the industry. Anyone else think this is a good idea?

Also - I would add that you should really take every opportunity to sign up for Wall Street training courses. Having that on your resume shows that you're ready to work and can add value on day one. WSO has a bunch of partners that offer discounts on those services. I've heard great things about Wall Street Prep.

As an observation, there is a lot of great advice on here that really benefits everybody to do, target or non-target.

Breaking in to IB as we've noticed is rather formulaic [school, major(s), GPA, ECs, internships, etc.]; however, I just want to stamp out any romanticizing of a 'non targets' or even a 'targets' journey to IB. Meaning it's not this transcendent path where you go from lowly serf undergrad and hustle and work hard to be knighted an IB analyst.

Just because you check the box in every place or are only missing one or two components to the 'formula' doesn't mean it's going to work out for you. Your high GPA, triple-major, solid ECs, and notable internships EARN you NOTHING come recruiting, especially if you are a non-target. I mean I'm not discouraging an all out effort, I think it's required even to give you some semblance of a chance to break in, but what I'm saying is that you could do everything right and still be told NO.

I think this is the most important piece of advice that I was never given, but learned and want to share with you guys: don't underestimate the psychological aspect of recruiting; were're all tough guys/gals, but to be told no x2, x3, x4 and 'ding', 'ding', 'ding' is a tough experience. It's easy to shut down when you're in the trenches in October and November, but you need to keep pushing even if you've only go one interview left and you think its a shitty boutique it takes one offer to break in. Get that 'fuckin offer and start 'strategizing' how you're going to stand out and lateral out of there. Mental toughness has been talked about on this board, but it's different than being a SEAL or Marine where you're out there roughing it with 100 lbs packs, weapons, and executing missions [I know personally]. This is a much more intimate and challenging type of mental toughness to exert.

Hope that helps or at least doesn't depress you.