Sitting on 2 offers, IBD vs Valuation (complicated aspects) what do you guys think?
HI all. I'll make this extremely summarized and succinct. Basically, I am a Junior at a semi-target and I have 2 offers for summer analyst. I would appreciate your input.
Offer 1: Company X IBD in city X (great bank)
Offer 2: Company Y Valuation in city Y (think big 4, duff&phelps, etc)
Info: I really really really do not want to nor have any desire to live in city X(houston). I seriously want to live in city Y(nyc)
My goal would be to start in company Y/city Y and lateral into IBD in city Y. What do you guys think? Could I ask HR from company X if I can instead do the internship in city Y or would that be terrible idea?
This is very summarized so I hope I gave enough info. Obviously salaries are drastically different etc.
Thank you so much if you comment with any advice. I have like 7 days to accept either offer
Easier to lateral cities while working in a very competitive industry (IBD) than break into IBD while you're on the outside. So I would take the IBD offer, perform well during the internship, and towards the end sit down with a VP or MD that you have a good rapport with and explain that you're interested in working in city Y and ask if they can help you transfer there for FT. Alternatively, you can peform well during the IBD internship and recruit for FT positions in city Y at other banks.
Thank you. Do you have any thoughts on lateraling from valuation to IB? (it's been talked about on this website already but not very in-depth). Lastly any input on straight up asking the IBD offer if I can do the summer internship in their office in the better city?
Don't know much on lateraling from valuation to IB. Regarding your second question, you can definitely ask, but you should do it as soon as possible, since firms hire interns with certain numbers for each location in mind.
Okay, any suggestions on how? If not no big deal. Should I ask the VP/MD I interviewed with on superday or just ask the HR guy? Do I write a letter/email/call? I feel that it's a stupid idea but maybe not
Take the IB SA offer in Houston. If you want IB, you should take IB, simple as that. Lateralling from valuations is not a sure thing. It’d be easier to change cities for IB than to change roles or “upgrade”.
Take IB SA, kill it, and make sure you get the offer. During the summer at Bank X, you can (1) get a sense of which bankers in the Houston office would be willing to connect you with NY bankers at bank X. Or maybe if there are any that have done stints in NY, grab coffee with them, get them to chat a bit about their experience- can probably weave in something like “I love Houston but feel I would really benefit from exposure NY before coming home” or that kind of thing. And (2) find bankers in the directory in NY to talk to and see if they’re open to calls/networking.
Let’s say you get the offer for IBD at Bank X in Houston and you get the sense the bank isn’t open to giving you an offer in NY, you can always network with other banks for FT recruiting for ny positions. Again, much easier to do this with relevant IBD experience than in valuations.
Lastly on your question on whether it’d be ok to talk to HR or the MDs that gave you the offer in valuations at Bank Y into switching to IBD SA... please put yourself in the MD’s shoes. He/she goes through the trouble of interviewing you for valuations role and you must have told them how much you want to be in valuations (when they asked “why us”? And “why valuations”?). And they decide to give you the offer out of a large pool of candidates ... only for you to be like “hmm, what I really want is IBD in NY at your bank, think you can connect me to those guys?” How do you think it would go down? They’ll either be insulted because some punk kid who hasn’t developed enough work exp or credibility yet is looking down on their work, or they’ll be pissed because you wasted their time and you’re using them as a backdoor to IBD. The only time it would be ok to talk to the valuations MD about IBD is (I) AFTER you’ve finished the internship at Bank Y, (II) you killed it and likely got the offer and (III) you’ve developed good rapport with them and they're willing to go to bat for you because they like you / see themselves as a mentor in your career.
If you want to work in IBD, take the internship in IBD.
Have a friend who worked IBD as a SA (don't know how he performed) but he managed to relocate his FT all the way to a major city in the west (coming from the east)
That sounds like a risky assumption to make, I feel that I would start out with that goal but it wouldn't happen and I'd be stuck in hou
The general perception that I know HR and employees in less popular cities believe is that they want people who are interested in living in those less popular cities and not doing what many employees try to do, which is stay a year or two in that city and then request to move to a more popular city (most commonly NYC). OP, if you don't go to a school in Texas, I am pretty sure you were asked "Why Houston?" during the interview process. This is why they ask that question.
I know a good amount of people who have successfully moved from generally less popular cities like Dallas and Houston to NYC though.
I personally think you should take the IB offer in Houston and then hopefully once you're on good terms with HR and other people in the office, around late July, you could politely ask about any possible openings in a city like NYC. In the end, you should at least give Houston a try. You never know. You may love it there (though the humidity in the summer wouldn't help your perception).
Thank you for this analysis. I appreciate it a lot, the thing is I grew up in Houston and go to school in Tx. I’ve been all over Houston for years and feel I would be unhappy there. But I know it’s crazy to turn down ib. What do you think about this? I really have been spending way too much time going over scenarios but I guess it is a big decision
Definitely a big decision, but another thing you could think about is that if your family home is nearby the Houston bank, you would be able to save loads of money living with your parents (free rent, food, etc.). Obviously, many people wouldn't want to do that for non-monetary reasons, but it's still something to consider.
I feel like you will also be much more comfortable with the city in general though I can see how it might be boring because there's nothing new for you to do there if you've lived there.
I agree with pretty much everyone else that you should take the IB offer. Like I said before, I know a few people who ended up lateraling to the NYC office from the Dallas and Houston offices after a year or two.
Lol would love to have this issue! IBD > Valuations bro. I've seen some people on here talk about how difficult the transition from valuations to IBD can be. You can recruit for FT in other offices with an IBD SA anyways.. you'll get much more hits than a valuation internship i would like to bleieve
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