Why not skip the MBA and go back to school for Software Engineering?
The US only has 10,000 CS graduates a year when software engineering is the future. Machine learning is set to be a lucrative industry. I wonder what a post MBA from a top school would make even if he joined a firm like this, worked his two years off as an associate VS say someone who went to school, had technical skills of programming, could get a sizeable amount of equity in an area of technology (hadoop,hive, machine learning), start a business, make a shitt load of bank, but also have the option of working anywhere in the world, at his own pace, and for whatever money he wants.
Am I wrong by saying banking is overrated IN THIS SITUATION? Gotta make moves. Thanks
Yeah go for it, as long as your not chasing the money (salaries are not bad though), you will be Ok and you can easily change countries/locations unlike other professions
I hope you mean a coding class or something of the like. no need to get a full blow BSCS.
also, before you abandon a career in finance, read this: http://cbsnews-proxy-vip1.phx2.cbsig.net/news/a-shortage-of-scientists-…
it seems the stories of STEM shortages could be slightly overblown.
I think you're completely forgetting the fact that computer science isn't everyone's cup of tee. How many careers out there do you know that pay as well as 'high finance' that doesn't really require a lot of actual brain power but more so grunt work?
I have a CS undergrad. I thought I loved it. I wrote some good code. Then I started having to write some really advanced stuff, and then debugging errors, and everything else that would come along with a career in that industry. I realized that doing that day in and day out isn't for me.
Even more so, just getting the degree would be hard for a majority of people. Calculus and other high level math that is required in just undergrad for a CS major isn't exactly easy.
As someone who has gone from CS to finance how are you finding finance? For some reason I get the idea that I would enjoy writing code all day to the typical stuff I am doing now. I was a math major for undergrad so I keep thinking about supplementing that with some CS coursework and pursuing that. The odd time where I do get to do some advanced modeling involving VBA I can get lost in it for hours and not even feel like I am at work. Maybe it's just a grass is greener thing, or the fact that I am not writing 'really advanced stuff' as you allude to so I'm not really torturing myself with what a real CS job would end up being like.
I haven't gotten an IB job or anything like that yet, but from the modeling I've done in case competitions and everything, I liked wayyyyyy more than staring at screen yelling "WHY THE EFF WON'T YOU WORK!?"
I think the reason that the VBA stuff you can dive into for a few hours and not even know it is because you're learning it as you go, so something that would take a CS major a few minutes, takes you a lot longer because as you say, you're lost. Imagine going to a city you've never been in, and had to go from point A to point B, you'd get lost and it would take you a really long time to get there, but you'd enjoy the ride because you got to see things you wouldn't have experienced otherwise. Now, Imagine you've lived in the city your whole life, and you have to go from point A to point B, except instead of getting lost, there's construction, detours, then a traffic jam, another detour, and then no parking. You're not going to enjoy this and hate every minute of it.
I feel like that's pretty much how it is with every career when things don't go your way, but I felt like I dealt with that a lot when it came to programming. It wasn't even always the case of bad code either, I remember one time, I had an app running perfectly, it was a homework assignment, so I saved it, sent it in to the professor. Him and the TA both couldn't get it to run. I opened it back up on my computer, didn't work. tried it on my other computer, and it worked.
If you were one of the lucky few to land a sizeable amount of equity, I'm sure the payoff is much bigger than that of banking. Despite what people like saying, most tech company founders are enormously proud of their work products. When they're looking out for their own far-off payday, knowing how the big names in tech have cashed out before, good luck touching that equity.
On the other hand, with a bit of work, a lot of people can become bankers. I'm not saying they would be great bankers, or even good bankers, but it isn't too out of the question for a regular Joe to make the cut.
So, if you identify yourself as a slightly above average person, like many WSO users seem to, then would you take that gamble?
Struggle with software engineering courses -- or learn a little accounting and sprinkle it with some finance courses? Wait for your future payoff -- or get above-average pay now working those double screens and clicking at a keyboard?
When the mantra of finance professors everywhere is that a dollar today is worth more than a dollar tomorrow, finance-oriented folks are going to go after the lowest-hanging fruits. We are monkeys, after all.
Don't forget that CS is not easy by any standards. It takes serious brains, which one may or may not have. And if you don't actually enjoy the material, you're going to have a really bad time in classes.
Oh, is that all? Sounds like a slam dunk.
CAN'T WAIT (Bart Scott voice)
I mentioned this elsewhere, but it's more than a little presumptuous to assume that many of us would be able to succeed as a programmer. The skills and the education required are very different and not at all easily transferable. That's why we're here, whether as an analyst or an associate, this is one of the best places for us.
Masters in CS, or BS in CS isn't going to make you good at programming. People confuse CS with programming.
The programmers that are creating stuff are miles ahead of anyone, most likely been doing it all their life. It isn't something you just pick up, and this is why many coming out of undergrad in CS/SE are not competent.
Probably good if you want to build your own company/products . Hard to make big money working for a large corp .
First note: software engineering != computer science. If you want to learn software engineering, do it on your own.
I would say that it's good to have basic skills and to learn how to build a simple web application (search "hartl ruby on rails tutorial"). Past that though, you have to really like it and really know how to answer your own questions.
For example, people will often build their first web app. Great! Fast results. What makes you a really good engineer is your ability to answer questions about why you structured the code the way you did, why you picked that particular database, why X data structure is better for the situation than Y, etc.
To get good at that would take more time than an MBA. You can learn to code in 3 months. That'll make you a developer. But that's a far cry from being an engineer.
Maybe the grass always looks greener, but as someone in the product delivery arm of IT consulting, I can happily say that you can make really nice coin in your 20's (e.g. 160K). But you'll be making the same coin (perhaps a little more) in your 30's. Ultimately, unless your intention is to run your own start-up that you initially spin up with your own skills, you need executive leadership credentials to break into the same salary range where IB folks are in their late 20's.
Short answer: because coding and software engineering in general is totaling unappealing to the overwhelming majority of the population. Different interests, different skill sets. It's like asking why NFL QBs don't just become MLB pitchers.
I sometimes get the sense that people say "Oh I'll just be a software engineer" like it's not a big deal to learn everything a software engineer needs to learn to do a good job. I don't want to discourage anyone, but I want to make sure people say this with their eyes wide open.
I have a lot of respect for what an accountant needs to know to do his job well. But a CS degree has three times as many required courses as accounting, and most accountants will tell you that CS classes are more challenging. Most employers look for software engineers with CS or CE degrees because they're not just looking for people who can write code but can also be system architects, design database queries, and use dynamic programming to get runtimes down. You can certainly learn this without a degree, but IMHO it's more work.
I think the other big problem is that if you're 25 or 26 and haven't taken courses in Boolean logic, algorithms, data structures, and all of the math classes that go into this- and then go into the theory of machine learning, some people at that age are going to really struggle with this. As you get older, it gets harder to learn math.
As long as you know what you're getting yourself into- that becoming a software engineer without a huge background for it is probably going to take an MS or ~5 years of changing jobs- go for it. I did another post about a month back on what you need to know to be a quant or a quant developer, and I would say that a machine learning expert would have about the same requirements at least in the stats department.
Just do yourself and all of us a favor and pursue this because you want it- not because you don't want an MBA.
I second Illini's thoughts on this. Software developing really requires a specific type of mindset to thoroughly enjoy. There is a very strong math/logic focus that requires a solid foundation. I took a few programming courses during university but quickly felt out of my depth. The way of thinking through problems was much closer to the AP math courses I had taken in highschool and I was simply too far removed from those courses to make the mental shift happen smoothly.
This reminds me of the tech bubble in the 90s where everyone wanted to go into CS. Then the bubble crashed.....
Anyway programming or rather software engineering (since some guys say the term programming is low class) isn't easy for anyone to get into. A lot of people will struggle and basically drop out. Everyone only hears about the successful ones but never about the millions who failed and are now in dead end jobs or just quit the field.
Speaking of successful ones, have you noticed that quite a lot of the programmers who eventually made it big have been doing this stuff since a young age? Just look and Bill Gates or Zuckerberg. They've been programming since they were early teens in a time where there was no easy working internet to view all resources that we take for granted today. That's already some serious dedication right there. People with little relevant background who only start being serious about this stuff at age 25+ are going to be against a uphill battle. It doesn't help that programming favors young people who are quick and full of energy.
Then there's all the hardcore math concepts I'm sure some CS/STEM guys can talk about.
As previously stated, some of us know our limits. That's why we try and take a easier way out.
Then again maybe some of us hope to become like Steve Jobs. That guy wasn't really technical but hey, he was a good salesman.
One of these threads pops up on WSO every month or so and it's the same story. "I got into finance because I thought it would be fun but my job is tough and I'm bored."
Look, most jobs are tough. I learned that when I started mowing lawns at the age of 10. The grass wouldn't just stop growing just because it was 100 degrees out during the day. It still had to get mowed. And mowing lawns was boring, repetitive, and a physical challenge- at least for a 10 year old with a push mower and a handle that came up to his neck.
Every job I've had since then has gotten better and more interesting.
Look, a job isn't supposed to be particularly interesting or non-repetitive. The fact that they pay you is what makes the job more interesting.
Whichever industry you are currently in is the industry you thought you wanted. If you were wrong about what you wanted a few years ago, what makes you think you'll make a better decision now? Our generation (millennials) need to (1) stop having everyone assume they're smarter than everyone else and everything should come easily for them and (2) stop daydreaming about how life could be better and focus on the task at hand- which often does make life better for us.
Why not go into software engineering? Because I like finance. I'm not just chasing whats next or the next big thing, I'm chasing what I like, at what could be argued at the highest levels.
Trust me, the grass is brown everywhere...it's just differing degrees and shades.
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