When do you have time?
IB is known for its long hours. As a prospect in the industry, when do you have time to go workout or run an errand when you’re working 70-90 hour weeks? How do you even have time to hit the bar or go out with your friends? I understand there’s a gap in working when you’re waiting for your MD to give you comments or whatever. I know there’s some sacrifices but sometimes I also feel the number of hours worked are inflated. Would love responses to shed some light on this topic.
You dont. Main reason why you shouldn't so IB if you value your time.
lol after your first internship you will definitely not think the hours are inflated
The hours aren't inflated. The issue is you're always on call, even if you're not doing work because you're on a deal and your waiting for something. To answer your original question, it's usually the weekend where you have the most time, and sometimes after midnight. I do know a few people who went to workout around 9:00 PM and then came back at 10:00 to finish their work and stayed till 2 or 3. Once senior members leave the office, you usually have some free reign as long as you finish your work by the morning.
what time do senior members usually leave?
It's different depending on the divisions but it's mostly Analysts and Associates by 9:00 (unless someone is working on a big deal) and then usually just analysts by 10:00.
Ask yourself when do you ‘fulfill’ yourself. How many times a day and per week?
“Making time” in banking is all about shifting priorities and making sacrifices.
E.g. If gym is important, you wake up earlier, lift at night and stay that much longer later, or lift at midnight or whenever you get home (24hr gyms or apartment gyms).
E.g. You run errands that are important to you—buying holiday cards for your family and friends you might do yourself but you might live in a high rise where you can drop off your shirts to the doorman and they take care of it.
E.g. You start pregame at midnight Friday night, hit the club at 1am (after inhaling however many shots in that hour so you feel lit in an hour or so). And you wake up the next morning at 9:30am after getting hone at 5am so you can go back into the office, pick up coffee on the way, get breakfast over seamless and finish whatever work that needs to be done.
E.g. if sleep is more important, then you do none of the above and go to bed asap.
I’ve seen a lot of posts about “finding time” in banking and it really comes down to just priorities and sacrifices. You have a finite number of hours in a week. You subtract 80-100 or whatever your week comes out to be that week. And everything else becomes optional besides time to eat and some hours of sleep (Id personally include exercise in there but some do not). Is it norma to have to prioritize like this? Answer is no but you don’t get into banking or private equity or hedge funds or whatever to live a normal life. Work becomes an extreme thing and the rest of your life needs be configured in a way to be extremely optimized in a way that your high priority items are maintained and low priorities are either removed or automated (usually by paying more for services).
I rarely have time because of work, my son and working. out. So I wake up at 6am, finish working around 5pm to 6pmish... cook dinner, head to the gym and by the time the day ends, it’s close to 11pm then... I stay up til 2am to hustle, doing my own personal stuff, whether it’s reviewing my strategy or coding. I sleep four hours a day and make up for it on the weekend. it seems there isn’t enough time in a day. it’s not healthy, I know but you have to do it what you gotta do because no one owes you anything in life. also your body gets used to this when you do this consistently.
appreciate the description even though you're nto a banker and OP was speecifcailyly asking.
I don't know if the body gets used to it consistently. If that was the case, we would have fine tuned our bodies to just not get any sleep at all ever. What do you think?
4 hours of lseep is giong to cause long-term damage if it already asn't. Appreciate the hustle though!
And this is boys and girls how you have a heart attack at 50
Sint est omnis earum quia deleniti occaecati nihil ipsam. Autem corporis nostrum laudantium rerum.
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