What to do Pre-MBA to prepare for IB recruiting
I will be attending a top 15 program come August 2019. I am looking to get a Summer Associate role at an Investment Bank. The school I will be attending historically places very well for Investment Banking.
Is there any advice on what I should do before my MBA studies to better prepare me for the rigorious IB recruiting process. I come from an engineering background, so I have minimal finance/accounting experience.
I'm in a very similar situation. Would be curious to hear responses to this.
Do what you can to fast-track yourself through finance/accounting, so during Fall when you’re recruiting, you’re taking more intermediate accounting and finance classes if possible (e.g. placement exams, advanced finance tracks offered by your school)
You could take a Coursera over the summer in accounting/finance to give yourself more time to internalize those concepts
If you’re an URW, take advantage of the summer programs (e.g. Jumpstart etc)
Don’t reach out to alums just yet, wait for your IB club to teach you how to do that and once you have your story straight etc
What would be the advantage to testing out of the basic classes? The advice I've sort of heard is to take accounting classes pre-mba as you've said, and then re-take basic accounting when you get to school so you can maximize your grades during recruiting, while also giving yourself an easier body of work while recruiting.
Most banks don’t care about grades and business school isn’t that hard (unless you’re at Booth or Darden). I found it helpful to be in the intermediate class learning about DTA/DTLs and some basic purchase accounting rather than learning the basics again.
It also depends on your school. Testing out of accounting allowed me to take Finance immediately rather than in the second half of Fall (and I could take Valuation instead then).
I've been on both sides of this (pre-MBA & the recruiting team from a BB). There should be a club at your school with folks that have gone through the IB recruiting process and could help with this. It really depends on the school. I filled in for one person for interviews for a school I didn't go to and the process for them was very different.
If you are doing this now then you will probably get the 2nd years who should already have jobs and may get the task of doing the first resume review after they start in the fall. Just don't be a weirdo when you reach out to people in the club since they can be the first line of folks to ding you.
I’m a current MBA who just got a summer offer at BB. I’d say brush up early on the technical prep (BIWS, WSO guides; TTS; IB book) so you can focus on informationals (coffee chats) once the semester starts. Be mentally prepared to do A LOT of those. If you go to school in NYC or around the area, expect to do ~40+ chats. Also, they'll ask you technicals during those "chats", so knowing your technical cold would be a huge advantage. PM me if you want to chat more!
Are you headed to NYU / Cornell? Just curious.
The recruiting process is essentially this: Go to open invitation "firmwide" events, hear a canned company presentation that's pretty much the same for every bank, and break out into banker circles where you just don't do anything weird and get business cards and then send thank you notes to everyone you meet. Next are coffee chats or informational interviews, which IMO are make or break in the early stage of the game, where you need to have your story down pat and do a little ass kissing so the bankers you meet with think you're normal, smart, and pass the 'airport test' so they put your name on the list for invite only events. If you're invited to invite only events, you've got a 90% chance of getting a 1st round at that bank, so you just go to some fancy event and ask canned questions, be normal, and don't get too drunk or shake someone's hand after eating ribs or something. Then interviews which are pretty thoroughly covered elsewhere.
I see some answers here focusing on courses and grades, which are largely irrelevant. If I were you I'd prioritize the following:
1) Get your "story" down COLD. If you're not familiar with what I mean by "story", it's your 1:30-2 minute pitch on your background, why you chose your previous career / school and why MBA / why banking now. This is #1 because you'll be telling it as early as some firmwides and 100% in every informational, so if it's well thought out and compelling then you'll shine vs. your peers.
2) Polish your resume and really dig deep to find relevant line items that will catch bankers' eyes. Advised clients on X? Led a team on project Y? CFA? Have some kind of excel credential or programming language? Have you presented something important to important people? Your school will give you a format to put your resume into, so maybe google that and put it in that format now (they force you to use their format for conformity).
3) Breaking into wall street guides. 1st semester is DRAINING with the transition back to school, social events, classes, tons of recruiting events, and coffee chats for days (maybe less so if you're not in NYC). You'll thank yourself later if you have the discipline to get through the BiWS guides and start thinking about behavioral questions and at least familiarize yourself with technical content you'll be expected to know cold come interview time. You'll have to go through them again pre-interviews, but you'd rather be in the position to refresh the information and teach your classmates than to be stressing about technical prep when your limited time is best spent networking with bankers.
4) Get 2-3 tailored (fit > expensiveness) charcoal / navy suits and a bunch of blue / white shirts, polished black shoes, and some conservative ties if you don't have these ready to go. Bankers need to judge you from the crowd somehow - don't be the guy who doesn't know how to rock a suit. Presentation is important.
5) DO NOT get business cards. One dude from Georgetown gave me a business card at a multi-school event and it was real weird. I'm assuming i'm on his "list of people to kill".
This is already super long, DM w/ questions if you have any.
100% agree on NOT getting business cards as a student.
Also, don't be weird in the large crop circles that form after the firm wide events. Its ok if you want to ask about what someone has worked on but don't assume that the person you are talking with worked on the latest mega deal the firm did.
Maybe I am a jerk but the most memorable conversations I had were about things not directly related to the job. It was a little strange though when someone went deep on Google to look up my high school hockey stats. They weren't great and that made me wonder what else this person did in their free time that I didn't want my firm exposed to... DM me if you have additional questions.
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