Want to be more than an Excel Monkey
I'm a senior in college and grateful to be hitting an awesome IB desk hopefully by August. Courtesy of my school's program - it's courses, the co-curriculars, etc etc - I know my way fairly well around a spreadsheet and can "model" whatever needs modeling to support my views/thesis (of course, there's tons yet to learn with Excel, but I'm hoping a lot of that can be picked up as I go about my Analyst years).
My concern is that I have a very juvenile thought process when taking a position on company/the market/macro-events. I want to develop my intuition/views/theses regarding an issue to be more robust, more bulletproof, more thoughtful. I just don't want to be an Excel Monkey, and stay just that.
Have the senior guys encountered that this just comes naturally? Is it something you pick up on the job? What can I do between now and August to build some of that skillset up? Not entirely stressing about it either, but it's good to have something in the back of mind. Really appreciate it, thanks!
As an aside, I'll be doing tech banking out west, so maybe something relevant to that would be helpful.
bump!
Not sure if these directly help but I think keeping up with the news + reading books will help in the long-term.
1) When you read the news (Economist/WSJ/Bloomberg) don't just read the main headline. Many times I see people pull up WSJ click 2-3 main articles and stop reading. But really, go through the news 15-20 minutes of your day find articles that aren't just "news" articles that give you more insight of the world.
While you read these articles don't just mindlessly read the article, think about how it can relate to you, your friends/family, and your community. Do some critical thinking, after reading an article try to think about it in different angles for a minute or two. Doing this daily will help you 1) not only train yourself into actually processing information without blindly accepting it and 2) will help you naturally get a fuller view of the "world".
2) Read books and not just finance and investing books but look at book lists that Bill Gates recommend. Go back and read the classics of Tolstoy, Camus, Stephen King, Hemingway, and etc. Also read current books such as Thinking, Fast and Slow, Predictably Irrational, and etc. Having a good set of experience through books will only deepen your knowledge more. As crushing as banking is try to read 10-15 minutes a day. If you get into a habit of it, you'll be finishing a book every couple month and thats knowledge, making you more "thoughtful".
While reading articles + books might not be exactly impactful immediately overtime they will open up your view of the world and really impact your thought process. Might not be answering your question 100% but really this is something that will help in the long run and people will notice it.
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