Hi, I have a question which is puzzling me and for which you might have an answer. I am an undergraduate student from a top french business school graduating in december this year. I have a gpa of 4.0 / 4.0 and intend to do a masters in finance in london from september onwards next year. I have two previous off cycle internships, the first one at a mid-range french bank in FI sales-trading (in paris), and the second one at a BB in DCM (in london). After those two internships I realised I preferred to go towards IBD M&A and have applied for off cycles in IBD at all the BB's and EB's, both in London and in Paris (MS, JP, GS, BAML, CS, Citi, Lazard, Rothschild, etc.).
Problem is, I have either been refused by all of them right after hirevue or am "under consideration" / "business review" since early to mid November - so most probably refused as well. I dont understand why as last year, before completing my off cycle at the BB when my CV was "weaker", I had been invited to a handful of AC's and made it to the last rounds of many banks. My CV is technically stronger this year yet the results I am getting are worst. Could somebody tell me what I am doing wrong if anything ?
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Off-cycle internships have fewer spots and you are also competing with a lot of other coming Msc students from all over Europe. Breaking into off-cycle without networking is tough from my experience.
Which Msc are you getting in London? The LSE program is only 10 months and should allow you to recruit for next summer and then joining full-time.
Thanks for your reply. But what I dont get is how last year I was much more successful with off-cycle recruiting, making it to AC's and last rounds, and this year I am faced with an almost complete drought.
Aiming for LBS, LSE and Imperial in London. And yeah thats the plan, but I would really like to gain experience in m&a between January and the start of my masters so as to increase my chances of getting an FT after the Msc.
Hard to say why that is exactly. Could just be bad luck. All schools have wide alumni networks and ties to IB - reach out to alumni from your country and try to get contacts from there - they are usually more open to helping people from "home". I think it will be hard to gain any experience prior to starting now, but you could reach out to local boutiques without standardized programs.
Why not HEC for masters? I would see it as being stronger than Imperial and on par with LSE and LBS.
Take my post with a pinch of salt as I'm just speculating. Having gone through two recruiting cycles in London, one thing I noticed is that this year I didn't get an AC/phone interview where I did them the year before, so I suppose a sort of "blacklist" might exist.
It's just insanely competitive and it's a mixture of CV/networking/luck.
I had the same feeling but I didn't know if that was just me being paranoid. Good to know I'm not the only one !
Off-Cycles are pretty competitive, more than summers. In any case you can land them without any network if you have the own skills or experiences, the important thing is to show off and to prove that you have what they are looking for from the 1st interview
I would gladly show off and prove that I have what they are looking for if they gave me the chance at a 1st interview. I guess for the banks that did invite me to hirevue interviews I should have tried to be even more convincing, but for the others I don't know what to say.
I do feel that Hirevues are a complete nosense, in my bank they barely review the videos, if they like the CV they just watch 30 secs and call him for an interview.
The problem is that there is a huge bias to some universities when it comes to CV Screening, if you add some nationality and diversity quotas things go worse
By the way, would you mind to disclose which university? It couod help me to give a better insight, and did you receive any return offer from your off cycles? Did you state that on your CV?
If you do state it.
University - ESSEC (doing the bachelor there, not the Grande Ecole, but that was never a problem for UK applications in the past)
No return offer from the BB off cycle
French teams - read french people reviewing your CV at banks expect you to have a masters. Its as simple as that. So here’s your explanation
But then again last year I made it to the AC's of 3 different BB's and that wasn't a problem then. A part of me agrees with you which is why I am going for an Mfin in september, but that still fails to completely explain why, if last year it wasn't an issue, it is this year
Not at my bank, and could tell you that most french people dont rely on having a masters. It's true that having a masters gives you a leg up, as its something really common, and for us its a proof that you want to work in finance. But its true that here if you dont come from a target uni you have like almost no option to land a good gig
From my point of view, there are different options: - Quotas: French quotas were full - They saw you moving too much: From S&T to DCM to M&A (not a common path and seems like you are moving from one side to another) - You didnt convert any of the 2 off cycles, which can be seen as a red flag
Then you have to also add to the mixture that banks are reducing their intern classes this season (or it seems so, according to HR)
ESSEC BBA is not a target at all... basically you pay to get a diploma unlike rigorous PGE...
Would rather do bachelor in Dauphine than ESSEC BBA
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