WSO Podcast | E60: $140,000 of Debt, Graduating in 2009? No problem.
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Member @Odyssy2112 shares how he has survived a monstrous debt load, horrible timing and some unforgiving industries including investment banking at Jefferies and an internal corporate role at Barclays. One wise piece of advice on what you should optimize for and some humorous stories along the way.
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WSO Podcast (Episode 60) Transcript:
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:00:05] Hello and welcome. I'm Patrick Curtis. Your host and chief monkey, and this is the Wall Street Oasis podcast. Join me as I talk to some of the community's most successful and inspirational members to gain valuable insight into different career paths and life in general. Let's get to it. In this episode, remember Odyssy2112 shares how he survived a monstrous debt load. Horrible timing. And some unforgiving industries, including investment banking at Jefferies and an internal corporate role at Barclays. One wise piece of advice on what you should optimize for and some humorous stories along the way. Enjoy. You know, my odyssey twenty one, 12. Thanks so much for joining the Wall Street Voices podcast.
Odyssy2112: [00:01:01] Well, thank you for having me, Patrick. And a pleasure and an honor to be in your presence.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:01:06] Just for clarity, that's Odyssey without the E, but it'd be great if you could give the listeners a quick summary of your bio.
Odyssy2112: [00:01:13] Yeah. So I'm a second generation South Asian male, but my parents immigrated here in the 70s to Long Island, New York. So I was born and raised there. Grew up a pretty typical lifestyle was really into music and economics and finance. I was actually pretty dorky, you know, in elementary school where I would, you know, I really was fascinated about like basketball and baseball stats. I'd actually make up my own players and create statutes on them, one of them on paper, which was really, really dorky. But I knew I always really liked numbers and calculating things and selling and talking to people. Mm hmm. So that's what helped me gravitate towards business and finance. You know, my dad's a doctor, so I always saw him
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:07] Mine to
Odyssy2112: [00:02:08] Work with this patient. Yeah, yeah. What kind of doctor? What kind of
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:10] Doctor, cardiac cardiologist?
Odyssy2112: [00:02:13] My dad's an endocrinologist. Nice. So very similar. Yeah. Yeah. So I've got some early memories of just spending time with my dad in his office and just talking to the patients and making their lives, making them feel better. Because I would, you know, go to work with my mom and dad, and it was kind of like, I didn't want to go to the babysitter. So I just spent time with my mom and dad at work. But yeah, I was always inclined towards music and math and economics and history. And so a lot of analytical stuff and I was always pretty intense, pretty serious. I took myself really seriously a lot. So I think
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:52] That's pretty typical for young. It's pretty typical for young males in finance.
Odyssy2112: [00:02:57] Yeah, exactly. We think we know the right age.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:03:00] We think we know everything. Yeah, so that's fair. That was similar to me when I was graduating.
Odyssy2112: [00:03:05] Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And then the decision came to school. And you know, my when I was applying to school was I was given the ability to go to whatever school I wanted. And there was a big, big thing in my family because I'm the youngest of three brothers and by far, I'm like ten years younger than my other brothers. Got it and my brothers, they had actually made a lot of sacrifices when they were making their college decisions because my mom was terminally ill and she actually passed away when I was 11. So that was probably like a key watershed moment for me. But when my brothers really and my dad wanted from me most was get the best education you can. And so it was a bit of an emotional decision in going to Stern where, you know, I was academically strong. I had, you know, above fourteen hundred on my sets. I was, you know, an A-minus student. Yeah, but I wasn't. I wasn't necessarily like the valedictorian of my class. I was I was like, you know, I used to play guitar. I used to go, You had you
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:06] Were well balanced, you didn't just do academics.
Odyssy2112: [00:04:09] Exactly. I was pretty well balanced and had a lot of different interests. And, you know, thought finance was like the good pathway in. But the financing decision that I that I don't regret. But, you know, coming in that I want WSJ readers viewers to think about is, you know, make the right financing decision about undergrad because I basically went on full loan. And so I started my journey and
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:35] I use expensive man. It's expensive there, right? Like 50. But back then it was like 50. Ok, now,
Odyssy2112: [00:04:42] Now it's like sixty seventy all in per year. Hmm. Right. Ok, yeah. When I was, when I was, when I was there, it was like thirty five forty all in. So it was a big decision for the family, but it was an emotional thing and it was like, No, sorry, the Odyssey 21 12, you have to you have to go for what's best for you. So I came in a stern saying, Look, I know finance at a high level I. I feel like I'll figure it out. I went in a with an assumption of saying, Look, I would want to have a more balanced college experience, but have the weight of stern behind me to kind of take me where I needed to go. That's fair. That was, you know, that was the initial intent.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:05:23] So like, you kind of knew you were going to go finance from the beginning from when you went to undergrad, you were taking on a lot of debt. You're like, Hey, I need to get a job right when I get out. And then the worst possible timing happens financial crisis, right? When you're what in your junior year?
Odyssy2112: [00:05:38] Yeah, yeah. I mean, like we started hearing about, you know, Bear Stearns failing, you know, the. Spring of my junior year, we're basically in Hong Kong for an international study project and RTA, who has signed on for Bear Stearns equity research as a, you know, experience associate, he just kind of got laid off because his offer got rescinded. So we started hearing that a lot. Yeah, and our year. I don't want to be biased, but like, you know, our year, you know, we had a lot of really smart folks and people started getting really nervous. And back to your question about, you know, what, I what I wanted to get out of school. I came in to school actually thinking I'd want to do like Econ International business, something a little bit more high level. I didn't know. I didn't even know that Stern was so well suited in finance, and I didn't really think that I want to do like hardcore finance or investment banking. I thought, you know, I could do something in public finance or municipal finance, so I didn't really have a plan set. So that kind of threw things a little bit in the grinder for me, too, because I didn't necessarily use my undergrad experience to its fullest extent. That being said, I did finance accounting. I got pretty good internships. But you know, my summer internship at Citi was pretty bad. You know, we had less than 20 percent retention of interns. We had people getting laid off left and right. I mean, the guy who was first year analyst who was training me basically got laid off the first week that I was at the at my summer internship. So it was real, like the struggle was real for everybody at that time.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:07:13] Yeah, no. Seriously, I can't even imagine it must have been stressful. But so you're doing your internship. Most of the people don't get a return offer, so you're coming in to senior year. What's the thought process like? Just scramble to get anything you can.
Odyssy2112: [00:07:28] Yeah, I mean, I think because I had had like a public finance background, it was really tough to make the transition into corporate finance. And I was up against folks who had started internships from their freshman and sophomore year. I was up against people who just really lived, ate and breathed finance at stern, and people were ultimately really, really competitive. I just thought that it would just create a lot of negative vibes about people. Yeah, and particularly for me, it was more like, OK, like, you're not investing in the relationships, you're really investing in yourself and you're just really being cutthroat about it. And Stern has that has that notorious reputation of, you know, shtick. Yeah, it's got that reputation for being that kind of place. And it was just it was just kind of accentuated. So it was definitely very challenging, I think. I think the saving grace for me in my senior year was that I was like the head of a school organization that was making a lot of impact from a humanitarian perspective. I met my future wife then and I told myself that I have to be patient with myself, and I have to kind of give myself more leniency. If, if, if I'm going to get out of this right, I had to be my own advocate, right, and
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:08:41] Get out of this really like getting out of the debt, do you mean or getting out? Yeah, getting
Odyssy2112: [00:08:46] Out of the debt. Yeah, getting out of the debt. I mean, I mean, I was fine as a student. I was always like, you know, you know, three five student, three, four three, five student. It was more about, OK, like, I have this like, really big thing ahead of me. You know, I have $140000 of debt staring me in the face. How am I going to get my stuff? How am I going to get myself serious about things? And so that was kind of like, you know, starting from zero point zero. So there were times where I had said, Oh, I could say I should think about being a paralegal. I should think about, you know, just starting things from scratch. I should just really start from a very, very bare bones perspective because I think, you know, it also comes down to your personality, right? I'm more of a high level strategic thinker. I really am excited about ideas and moving things and influencing people and being more of a coach and strategist as opposed to OK, I need to be able to go through like a hundred tab excel model and understand all the mistakes in there. That's just not my personality right there. So it was come to terms with a lot of those, those different things. But you know, a friend of mine, a very good friend of mine, got me into an offer at an internal corporate finance and franchising company called Edible Arrangements. It was a really cool opportunity where I was able to work directly with the CEO and his family. And I think it's a very big it's a big spoiler for me because I've always worked with like C-suites, I've always had that, you know, C-suite exposure. Yeah, I think it's part of because I've always been exposed to, you know, older siblings and I can walk and talk a little bit more maturely than people. And I look a little bit more mature than people. But I was, you know, tasked with, you know, doing a lot of restructuring work and corporate strategy work at a at a company that was in the middle of Bumble. Connecticut. Yeah. But I really I really cut my teeth there because it gave me confidence. It's a tell me of a you. You say,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:10:43] You said you got. Yeah, you said you. Had a friend helped you get that? Explain to me that. How did they just I mean, it was a really tough time to get a job. So, you know, tell me how that happened. It was an intro.
Odyssy2112: [00:10:54] Yeah, yeah, I think I think at those times that are tough, you know, you have to really leverage your network and your relationships, right? So this friend of mine was sitting in Connecticut. He was basically a part time paralegal for edible arrangements, and he was going to law school at UConn. That was literally what he was. But he was two years my senior from NYU, and him and I had really get to know each other. You know, when we were in the city. So you graduated in 2007? Yeah, I graduated in 2009. We'd really cultivated that relationship through college. So he did me a really big favor. I mean, my job offer was a joke. It was $40000, right? It wasn't like anything impressive, right? But I had to get myself in the door with regards to corporate finance, right? So I mean, the takeaway from there, really for anybody who's listening to this is that you really have to have a really good plan and you have to kind of lay out that plan. You know, through Plan A, B, C, and nobody could have kind of imagined what, what the financial crisis would have brought forward. But still, like, I think, you know, I'm not regretting anything that happened because I'm a firm believer that things fall into place, but you have to have a plan of contingency. And there are a lot of times where I took offers that I probably shouldn't have taken and things that I didn't do that I probably should have. But it's all part of the learning process of becoming so for sure.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:12:14] So you're basically you're at this firm for about a year and tell me about what the thought process of why you started looking. Was it because it was the middle of nowhere in Connecticut? Was it because you felt like you weren't growing enough or you just felt like at that point, Hey, the pay's too low. I really need to try and get a banking gig. Things are improving with the economy a little bit. Let me see if I can try it or like. Tell me a little bit about that thought process in that process that that that recruiting step that you made.
Odyssy2112: [00:12:39] Yeah. So I think there's a thought process there was I studied corporate finance. I've spent a lot of money. I am also getting married because I met this really amazing girl in the end of 2008 and our families really like each other and I really miss New York, it was a lot of everything, right? It was, it was give my degree a full shot, a b believe myself and believe in what I need to get done. And it wasn't just that I need to pay off these loans, but it was more like investment banking is the right platform to springboard off of anything after that. I really was a firm believer in that based off my research. Mm hmm. It was either that or that or consulting, but it really felt good about banking because I really like I was enjoying the corporate finance side of things after kind of my experience at Edible Arrangements. So the combination of those things, and I felt like I had the I had the motor to do it. And so I interviewed it a few banks, actually, I didn't really even interview at all. I was letting all my relationships because there was a guy in the marketing team at Edible Arrangements who I just developed a good relationship with, and I was just communicating my frustrations with what was going on at the small company. We had a couple of good conversations who said, Hey, look, one of my nieces is connected to somebody at Jeffries.
Odyssy2112: [00:13:59] Maybe I could shoot your resume over. It turned out that that woman who was the connect that Jeffries was also stern, a woman she knew a lot of my old friends from stern to. And I just got pulled into Jeffrey's, given the fact that it was a very strong, stern network and Jeffries was known to be a little bit more scrappy and he was willing to invest in people as opposed to being, you know, we need the guys and girls where three point nine GPAs and who have, you know, immaculate modeling skills and all that stuff. So it was known to be a scrappy bank, and at that time it was actually a really interesting time for Jeffries, where because Lehman had collapsed. Jeffries is marketing itself as kind of the only pure play investment bank left on Wall Street. And they were riding on the coattails of inheriting a lot of the old UBS people like Bill Morello and or all those other kind of ex-hubby guys. And it was kind of an exodus that built out molas and Jeffries and Green Tech Capital Advisors a really interesting time at Wall Street at that point. So I interviewed with a couple of teams and I, you know, I took the first team that that accepted me, which was the maritime team, OK, which is, you know, shipping investment banking. Ok. I'm 23. I'm looking at sorry, go ahead. Yeah.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:15:25] So go ahead. Continue. So you do a couple of years there. So how was that?
Odyssy2112: [00:15:28] Yeah. So I'm yeah, I'm 23 and I'm saying, OK, I got an investment banking job. I'm working with a very specialized team of kind of like mad scientists who know how to talk to Nordic and Greek ship owning companies and making them feel like they don't know anything so very specialized, but also very, very nice people. You know, if somebody you know there's a bad stick on Wall Street that says, you know, you usually are stuck with people who are type A's or they don't really care for your wellbeing. I came into a place at Jefferies where the, you know, the team that I was part of was very, very accommodating. You know, my Sep at that time was a phenomenal person. And you know, he's written all my LinkedIn. He understand my, you know what was on my plate. You know, I told him I was getting married. He looked at me like, you're crazy or 23. You have, you know, have your whole life ahead of you. But there are just some things that just kind of aligned. And I was always I'm always a firm believer in saying, don't force against momentum if things are happening, just let them evolve. Yeah. So I was getting married in July 2010. I get this offer in April 2010, excited about the fact that the base is like, you know, 80 percent higher than what I was making. And then there's the potential bonus, right? And it was a foot in the door on Wall Street. It wasn't the end of the it wasn't the end of the road for me, but it was OK, what do I what do I get out of this? So you know that to your experience was a was a phenomenal ride.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:17:04] What were your hours like? What were your hours like and how did your bonuses turn out, if you don't mind?
Odyssy2112: [00:17:10] Well, ours were, you know, anywhere from like, you know, 60 to 90 or even 100 at times. Right? Yeah. Bonuses turned out to be pretty good, like 80, 70, 80, 90 percent of my salary. I would say that, you know, I got a lot of credit for, you know, being very conscientious and being a really good worker for them and really sticking to it to learn the industry. And one of the things that you know, I took away from that is I knew that I was very flexible like I had just learned, you know, in 2010, 2007, 2008, I learned a lot about. The public finance infrastructure of how to raise municipal bonds, and then in 2009, I learned about the franchising business and now in 2010, I'm learning about the shifting business. Yeah, and it's more it's all. It's all more international. It's macro, it's tied to oil and gas markets, it's tied to underlying commodity markets. So I'm just getting a lot of I'm just getting I'm just getting really enriched. And so I'm just loving it, right? Because I'm just I'm feeling
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:18:13] Like I'm the learning curve is not flattening out at any point, really. You're just kind of soaking it all in.
Odyssy2112: [00:18:18] Yeah, yeah. I'm taking it all in and I'm just enjoying the experience. So, you know.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:18:23] So when did you feel when did you feel like it was a good time to start looking or when did you feel like? Was it because of the learning curve was flattening? Was it because you just started getting hit up by a lot of recruiters as the economy kept heating up and getting better? As we went from twenty ten to twenty 12 13, things started getting a little bit better at that point. Can you tell me kind of what the thought process was of kind of what your next step was going to be?
Odyssy2112: [00:18:48] Yeah, I mean, look, I was already two years into my marriage. I had, I would, you know, be commuting every day and I would be on the black car and I had gained a lot of weight. I was like 200 pounds, almost in like typical weight was like 165 170. Yeah, I had managed to keep my marriage together, you know, those first few years despite not, you know, despite not seeing my wife a lot. And, you know, I was always part of I was my decision making process is not always about, Hey, I have to prioritize. My career right now was about making sure the career fit with my family and my overall wellness and, you know, making sure that I could see my dad, you know, who was, you know, who is, you know, living in Long Island, you know, and I was I could commute back to kind of make sure he's doing OK. He was a widower for 20 years, so we always have this thing in our family that we need to kind of keep ourselves together. So a lot of those things that kind of influence my decision making process about not staying in banking at that point.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:19:51] Yeah, I think it's interesting because a lot of people aren't willing to kind of make that. That's a really tough sacrifice to make, especially if you were married so young. So it's like, I can understand it's really got to be rough on your significant others if you're working those 80 plus hour weeks pretty consistently. So when you were thinking about this, was it like a discussion with your wife? Was it something where you guys are just you started saying, Well, this isn't working, that the commutes brutal the what? Let me start thinking about other options. Or did you start talking to your network? How did you kind of figure out your next step because you still stayed in finance, but it was kind of a pivot a little bit.
Odyssy2112: [00:20:32] Yeah, I think I think my goal was to say. You know, look, within two years, I paid off all my debt. I was really happy about that. You know, I was really happy to be at, you know, at zero in terms my net one in terms of my net worth. Yeah, right. By August 2012, I was really, really happy about that. But the decision process is more multifaceted. It was more about, Look, I still have a lot to learn and I think it was still I was still excited about the prospect of just being an explorer and seeing different sides of the coin and leveraging what I learned from one piece and trying to take it to the other side. Did you ever
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:21:13] Feel like jumping around like from to different things like this, though, would hurt you? Like, did you ever have that sense of like, well, maybe it'd be better if I just stayed and just went all the way up? What? What gave you the confidence to kind of be almost more like, more entrepreneurial with your career?
Odyssy2112: [00:21:28] Yeah, I think what gave me the confidence to do that was I really need to focus on my, my happiness and my wellness and other sides of the equation. Like what? Like work was one part of my one, part of my identity, so to speak. Like, I had other identities that I play to that that make up who I am, right? Like, there was always a point of transition and like, I'm always the type of guy that likes to eat something up and kind of nod it and then just kind of move on from there. Like, That's just my personality. Ok, that's fair. And so the other part of it was that when I was looking at the senior bankers at Jefferies, it was like, these guys are just glorified salesmen, right? There's nothing that differentiates a banker from a real estate agent. Right. Fair. And I didn't want to be that person. I mean, I think, you know, seeing like the advances in technology, seeing the way trends were shifting, it wasn't that I felt like investment banking was going to die, but I felt that like, what am I going to keep on doing all day long? I'm just going to keep on like selling stuff to people. And, you know, even when I was at Jefferies, like, you know, the companies that we were dealing with, a lot of the deals that we did end up hurting those companies end up
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:22:46] Hurting this company eventually.
Odyssy2112: [00:22:48] Yeah, yeah. Yeah, like the deals that we did for them, like the internet and eventually just like kind of were. Why do you think that transactions that kind of
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:22:55] Just because like there were acquisitions that just weren't a good fit or whatnot? Or is it was the M&A work or was it like leveraged? You guys are putting on some leverage on the company?
Odyssy2112: [00:23:06] Yeah. No. So one with one company, we literally did a deal where we helped them acquire vessels, and those vessels were focused on commodity markets that basically failed right after that. And then the cash flows of those vessels wouldn't be able to support the underlying levers they took on. And so six months later, we helped them raise equity to bridge a lot of the company compliance there. Right. And it's just like, you know, like, I'm seeing all this and I'm like, I'm seeing like, but that's like banking.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:23:39] That's kind of bad timing, too, right? Unlucky in terms of like people couldn't necessarily predict that commodity collapsing and maybe they could have.
Odyssy2112: [00:23:48] But yeah, no, you're totally right. I mean, you know, I just got a I had a bad taste in my mouth. It's like I'm so exposed to market risk. Right, right. And I wanted to get like, I think to your point, I'm kind of sounding it out. I wanted to de-risk that element of my career that it's so tied to the market. Do something.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:24:10] Yeah, absolutely. So like, you wanted to get out of the commodity oil and gas space almost and
Odyssy2112: [00:24:16] Want to get, yeah, yeah. And I also wanted to get out of. I had offers to like Spottily or Netflix. And, you know, I also was kind of weary about tech companies because I had seen my brothers go through like the dot com boom and I had seen all that stuff like I. I had heard all these stories. So it kind of built up like a kind of like a gnawing kind of like risk aversion around me.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:24:38] It's like, I'm not going to go to that tech company, which is no cash flow and it's just growing fast. Top line.
Odyssy2112: [00:24:43] Yeah, exactly. And like, I cut my teeth and like, you know, like asset cash flow, asset based cash flow generating right companies, right, like shipping companies are all like they're like real estate. It's like a ship can generate x EBITDA, right? But it has to make it break even point if it doesn't, you know, beat its mortgage, right? It's like it's very simple economics, right? But I'm cutting my teeth in this kind of thought process that's very like asset intensive. Yeah. And so anything that anything that looks remotely asset light and just dependent on users and dependent on like user growth, I just didn't know it. Yeah, I didn't have faith in it.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:25:20] It feels risky. Yeah. And like you said, your brother's had some struggles with the dot com. And so tell me so you ended up doing what? Why don't you share what kind of the next jump?
Odyssy2112: [00:25:29] And yeah, the next jump was more to say OK, like, Hey, I want to do like this long term corporate thing and I want to do. You know, I want to do internal strategy for a company and help drive initiatives forward, and I was like still like very googly eyed about the whole strategy thing and, you know, all these things. And so I joined Barclays as an ADP within their strategy practice to help enhance process and improvement of how to run a wealth management platform.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:26:03] And was that a pay cut, literally from banking? Because I can assume the I can assume the bonuses weren't as crazy high. But since it was more like an internal, almost like a middle office, you're still C-suite. But like, how does I guess easier way to ask is how what was the pay like? And that was it.
Odyssy2112: [00:26:18] To cut the pay from the pay from a base perspective was the same, but there was definitely not nearly any upside in terms of bonus. And what about the hours? And what about what about the hours 10 to 20 percent bonus? Got it. But the hours were like 40 or 50 hours.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:26:32] Not that it's a big deal. That's a big drop in hours.
Odyssy2112: [00:26:36] The big drop in hours was able to do a lot of different things. Cool. I was able to get involved in something like, you know, non-profit work and get more involved in my marriage, right? Yeah. But what I learned from there again was internal corporate is just all politics, right? When you look at investment banking and the cool thing is your transactional, you're selling, you're actively involved in projects, there's sprints, you're deep diving. And there's some sort of end to something, right? When you're in corporate, things just kind of linger on. There's constant kind of bickering of minutia that ends up being, you know, politically driven. That doesn't really mean anything at the end of day. Right? And so you feel disconnected from the change. The great thing about investment banking is that, yeah, you know, you could be doing companies dirty by messing up their capital structure, but you are learning the art of selling. You're learning the fundamentals of how business is run. You are actively working with C-suite clients and you're just you're kind of in it, right? I mean, yeah, probably the better counterpoint to anything of this is probably consulting and being totally honest because consulting offers all that in a long term learning process and potentially a more smooth exit to internal corporate. If that's your cup of tea.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:28:01] Got it fair. Ok? So you're doing this internal corporate thing. It's it sounds like it wasn't the most enjoyable experience because it was a lot of politics and stuff like that. And it eventually. So you start to kind of I'll call it a time of kind of your jumping here, you know, to a few places. Is that fair? Yes or
Odyssy2112: [00:28:20] No? I think it's jumping to one place. Ok, so we'll talk about yeah. So I was really starting to read a lot more about the economy improving, and I started getting acclimated to all like SAS business models and kind of how these companies are growing. So yeah, that was like my nighttime reading just really, really just learning about what's going on in tech crunch, learning about like Planter Technologies, ZocDoc, like all these companies, just started coming up. Yeah, really, really, really heavily. So, you know, at the end of my time at investment banking, I'd actually interviewed for Teach for America. So I thought I would really, really enjoy teaching and imparting knowledge on people. I really enjoyed being a coach for people. I ended up not getting it. So actually, my boss at Barclays was actually, you know, negotiating his own exit package. He had actually interviewed at Wall Street Company. He said he's like, Look, this is a little bit too early stage for me. But if you're interested in this, you like financial modeling, you like analytics and you like working with people. Maybe this is something that you really want to look into, because at that time, even the ED tech revolution was in full swing, like with the MOOCs and Coursera and Duality. Yeah, so so while she appealed to me a lot because it was kind of a marriage of edtech and my skill set, and I thought of this as a potential like pre MBA opportunity, where I could differentiate myself as an MBA, pre MBA candidate and actually do something that's giving back to people, right? So I had interviewed a lot of different startups I interviewed like Newton and a couple of other places ZocDoc here and there. But I ended up going with Wall Street prep, and the thesis for that was, Hey, look, you know, I still like corporate finance. I still like kind of like deals and analyzing transactions and companies. But I want to do it on, you know, I really want to, you know, see what this teaching thing is all about. I really wanted to understand my personality. I mean, I think the common theme around all this is that I'm still learning about where my strengths and weaknesses lie or relative strength, relative weaknesses lie.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:30:33] So tell me about that transition to becoming almost like. A teacher, really, I mean, I'm still in financial modeling and still in your in your wheelhouse of expertise, but how was that transition? What did it feel like to go from doing deals to, you know, doing live trainings and helping students?
Odyssy2112: [00:30:53] I think, like the like, the element of it is that, you know, if you enjoy performing and I was always a performer, I played guitar in high school. And if you enjoy seeing people improve, if you have that kind of internal kind of like compass, then this job is really, really rewarding. That being said, you know, I had to get my evaluation stuff right. I had to go through like two months of rigorous training internally. I had to polish on my skills on how to present and how to make sure that I was, you know, sharp on everything that I knew. I had to know the content inside and out, right? And it's also like, you're on the ground, on your feet for like nine hours out of the day. So it's not like, you know, firing in the park, my knees. Yeah, it's not like you're giving like a tour. It's not like you're giving like a ten minute TED talk here, right? Yeah. For nine hours, you're going through a 300 page deck. You are literally teaching people how to do a financial model for the first time sometimes. Yeah. Are teaching people a basics about like, Hey, you shouldn't like, you know, daisy chain links or how does you run a sensitivity table? Or how do you think about doing some advanced lookups? It's definitely very grueling, but I felt like I was. I felt in it because I was giving something to myself like my heart was. I don't know how to explain that.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:32:20] Yeah, but you just you felt passionate about it like you could see you're helping kids that we're trying to improve themselves, right? Yes, exactly.
Odyssy2112: [00:32:27] Yeah, exactly. And I get it.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:32:29] And my mother, my mother was a teacher. Yeah, my mother was a teacher. I get it. Yeah, she was a teacher who
Odyssy2112: [00:32:36] Was a teacher. And then and you're also part of this whole concept of actually teaching people, giving back, trying to get themselves into.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:32:42] Yeah, absolutely. I want people to go in and why eyes wide open and not be drinking too much Kool-Aid. So it's good that you'll see in all of our social channels. We don't sugarcoat banking. We give the ugly too.
Odyssy2112: [00:32:56] Exactly right. And that's what gave me the ability to kind of tell my story like, Hey, look, I. You call me lucky or unlucky. It doesn't really matter. Like, money is not the only defining factor for me. It is a defining factor for me. But it was about Look. Enjoy your experience and go come into banking or consulting or whatever you want to do, but just be very cognizant of your decisions because it's your career is important. But if your career isn't really that truly important for you, then you shouldn't really do something that's going to take you away from things that you really want to pursue. So I think that was what was really helpful for me is when I was teaching is that I was able to sprinkle in a lot of my horror stories and give that impart that knowledge onto people.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:33:41] Tell me one of your horror stories.
Odyssy2112: [00:33:44] One of my horror stories,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:33:47] I guess, I assume, from your banking days.
Odyssy2112: [00:33:49] From your from my banking days. Yeah. Oh man.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:33:53] Or what's that like one of the funnier ones, too?
Odyssy2112: [00:33:56] Oh yeah. I remember like two months in, like I'm on this M&A deal for that company that we tried to help by vessels from, which is to convince to buy vessels for. And literally, like the VP of the of my team has just left. He was six years into the job and he was a star guy. He hired me, but he went to do something else in the Middle East or in Houston, I think. And literally, it's like the MD me who's like a very like green lateral first, your analyst and an intern who is this like little Asian dude who's just really eager and passionate and he's also really wicked smart like he's from. I think he's a Cornell, and he was an intern at Jeffries. So literally rerunning running this deal and like, it's the night before this M&A transaction closed. And like, this guy is like working on a couple of comps outputs for me and he's like, Hey, do you need me to stay here? And I'm like, Hey, yeah, dude, you need to stay here, right? And so then he emailed me like an hour later, he's like, Hey, I'm just telling you, like, I'm going to be here and I'm just going to take a nap in the closet on the fourth floor here. But you know, you know, you've got my back and I'm here to stay for whatever we need. So he literally pulled an all nighter with me and he slept in the closet and then like at like eight morning the next day, one of the first year analysts opened the door. And here's that guy I just like tucked away in the middle of the closet and he's like, Oh my God, it's like, I have to do this deal. So it's just a phenomenal kind of like moment.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:35:22] So you didn't need him. He just was staying there just in case you needed him kind of thing.
Odyssy2112: [00:35:26] In fact, effectively, yeah.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:35:28] And so he was still asleep in.
Odyssy2112: [00:35:31] He slept in the closet and people found him there. And you know, and I mean, look, I you know, God bless him. The guy is literally like a director at Metal More Capital now, so he knows a shit like, no, there's no nothing, no if ands or buts about it, like he's a good guy.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:35:46] Put in now, put in the put in the hard work as an intern. That's awesome.
Odyssy2112: [00:35:51] He put in the hard work. Yeah. From other stories, other stories are dealing with, like an associate who was from the Greek army and you just had very high standards for everything that we wanted to put out there. Mm hmm. So, you know, there be times where he would call me like, you're a bitch or like, you're this or that. Like, get your act together, like, you know, and what people need to realize is that, you know, you need to have a little bit of a thick skin in this business and don't take yourself too seriously. Right? Sometimes the analysis that you put out there is totally illustrative and bullshit to the effect that it doesn't really matter, right? So you just have to kind of play the game there and just do what you're told and don't think that you're smarter than your associate. I think one of the things that I always kind of, you know, catch myself on as I feel like I know the game and sometimes I feel like I'm too good to play the game. But nobody's too good. Nobody's too good to play the game, right? I think unless you're seeing
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:36:49] Something unpacking
Odyssy2112: [00:36:50] Where like somebody like snorting coke in the office or somebody like, you know, sexually abusing somebody, yeah, like you should alert that. But other than that, like, it's basically fair game.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:37:01] Yeah. Like if you're getting reamed out or whatever chewed out, it's just like par for the course, is what you're saying.
Odyssy2112: [00:37:07] It's par for the course. Yeah, exactly. So a lot of that is just people using their reverse psychology to just test your limits. So enjoy. Enjoy that. Embrace it. I think it's good to get rattled a bit. Right? It's good.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:37:22] Yeah, yeah, for sure. You're kind of putting yourself in a little bit of stress. So. So you're with Wall Street prep for a good run there and then tell me a little bit about your latest move. What's going on now?
Odyssy2112: [00:37:35] Yeah, I spent like five years at Wall Street Prep, you know? I've also taught kids in private tutoring sessions, and one of my stories is that I've taught, you know, like a kid who was like the son of like an amazing, massive institutional investor where he was basically walked into like a Goldman Sachs internship and his mom was having lunch with Lloyd Blankfein during a game to game. And so is he right? Yeah. But like in 2014, I'm like, you know, staffed for a private tutoring project that's at the Trump Soho, the former Trump Soho. And I'm going to this hotel and there's this kid from a very rich family, and he's accompanied by this tutor who is, I'm going to tutor the tutor who's at the end of tutoring the kid. That's what it's like.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:38:29] That's crazy. Ok. Ok, so you're tutoring the tutor? Was that was the tutor able to pick it up fast enough? Or would you would have been easier to?
Odyssy2112: [00:38:38] Yeah, the kid. The tutor, interestingly enough, runs his own website, but he's like a Princeton grad and the hockey guy. But he just likes to just like, you know, work for the family. Got it. Phenomenal, right? It just doesn't make any sense out of The Twilight Zone. But you know the guy that I end up tutoring. You know, he has ADHD, and he also has a lot of pressure to feel like he has to perform. So like at the end, like, I gave him a pep talk and he really broke down. Oh man, that's sad. You don't understand. Like, you know, there's a lot of pressure and I have to perform and I'm from a rich family. Yeah. I'm like, Dude, you just need to kind of take a chill pill and you need to figure out what you want to do. The single most important thing is you need to figure out for anybody is figuring out where you're going to leverage your most, the most of your energy. Like, where is your passion in a lie? Yeah, that's what's going to take you through.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:39:28] Yeah, I 100 percent agree with that. I think the hard part with it. You know, hearing that story is, you know, everyone thinks the kid with money has it easy, but it's almost like they're starting on third base. No one else from giving them give them credit for getting home. And it's like they can never. It's almost like they can never outlive that a little bit. And so everyone is always going to see their any success they have as given to them, which is a really tough spot to be in, you know, because anyone who you know, they don't have to worry about, you know, paying bills and whatnot, but just to kind of build your own path and find your own passion, I'm sure it's incredibly can be depressing right now.
Odyssy2112: [00:40:07] It's immensely depressing. I mean, I've thought similar kids like that. I mean, you know, and it's hard for them to stay focused like you would rather just go hang out with his girlfriend is like Russian model girlfriend who I walked in, you know, seeing in our in our shorts, you know, nine in the morning. It's like, I'm here to fucking teach a course. Sorry for my French. Yeah, no, I'm here to teach a course in corporate finance. But you know, this beautiful Russian girl is sitting in the couch, right? So I don't know how to. Are you having trouble focusing?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:40:38] Yeah. Fair enough. So, OK, that's crazy, man. So you had this kind of one off projects that was that sounds like it was a pretty rare occurrence. However, it was one of those just strange.
Odyssy2112: [00:40:51] It's happened like it's happened two or three times. I taught another girl who was the daughter of like a hedge fund tycoon who was like the protege of Carl Icahn and had a very similar experience with her too. She kind of cried and said, like, you don't understand that. So yeah, I've used this time at Wall Street Prep to kind of understand that like, I need everything to understand that it's not that serious, that you just kind of have to go in and focus and give yourself time and find that right place for yourself to actually bloom. And you have to love yourself. So people really have to give themselves credit for what they're doing. And if they're really focused but they're hard on themselves, they'll end up always feeling disappointed in themselves. Like, I think people need to really harness that strength inside to find, OK, where am I? How am I going to stay happy? I think that's like the most important question everybody has to ask themselves and if they could do it by doing one hundred hour job and finding that piece of place happiness after doing a job, then that's good for them, right? It's not for everybody.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:41:57] Yeah. People should be optimizing for happiness, not money. I think that's really important.
Odyssy2112: [00:42:02] Yeah. Optimize for happiness, not money. And also just realize it's not that serious. Another piece of advice is like, like, don't think that you're a hero. Like, if you have a day, like be a hero by, you know, by saying at a soup kitchen and helping feed poor people. Be a hero by mentoring people. Be a hero by spending time with your mother and father who have, you know, painstakingly, you know, worked really hard for you to get on your two feet, right? I mean, take a value in those things that are going to be longer lasting than a job that's really, really important.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:42:36] Yeah, no, I 100 percent agree. So, yeah, I think I love. I think it's a really important message, and I think it gets lost in all the hey, what technical interview question am I going to be asked in this high review? You know, it gets lost in all that, so I appreciate you pointing that out. So, yeah, tell me a little bit more about your last step. Or maybe you don't want to talk about it. That's fine, too. But just what's next for you in general?
Odyssy2112: [00:43:04] Yeah, no, I mean, I think,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:43:07] Have you found yourself? Have you? Yeah, have you found what you like? Have you do you feel like you feel like you're still kind of searching and enjoying the path and the journey?
Odyssy2112: [00:43:17] I think I think you have to keep things continuously interesting for yourself. I think I think if you go down a path and you find yourself really, really focused on one path and then you look back and you're like, Wow, I just did one thing for the past 20 years. You'll regret that, right? Yeah. I think if you enjoy the journey and you try to find different aspects of what you want to solve, that keeps things interesting. So, you know, while I was at Wall Street Prep, I took it upon myself to do a lot of offsite CFO consulting for early stage companies. And I worked on some pretty cool things, one of them being, you know, a $5 billion startup that's run by a former, you know, big time CEO. And you know, you could call me unlucky because I'm not working on that platform, but there's also some cultural considerations of why I wouldn't work with that tech CEO. Right. So. So you find your happiness in what you like doing like, I like helping solve problems. I help. I like helping being restorative. So teaching the consulting that really resonates with me right now. I've taken a break from Wall Street prep full time because I've got a family and young kids. And so I've moved out of New York and I'm living in Washington, D.C. and I really like the education system here, and I like the fact that I could spend a little more time on my family. So I'm actually at a hospitality company and doing corporate development. And so I'm taking all my experiences from franchising and investment banking and tech. And really, it's coming into fruition where I could add value in a lot of different ways to support the CFO and head of corporate development of this hospitality company. That's great. And then I could I could really give the bankers a run for their money because I'm interfacing with them, right?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:45:06] Oh, I'm sure they love that. Yeah. Sorry. Oh, sure, they love that. You're like, Actually, this doesn't make any sense.
Odyssy2112: [00:45:13] Yeah, exactly right. And so it's nice to be able to call them on their BS because at the end of the day, the banker is a salesman. So yeah, I like that side of the equation. I like being at a publicly traded entity where I'm looking at the downstream effects of what a transaction does in terms of financial disclosure. Strategic direction of the company. Yeah. You know, you try to elevate yourself to an operator. Right. And so and like every banker is the same. If I'm talking to Goldman Sachs or Mollis or J.P. Morgan, I'm not going to take anything away from the fact that those guys are really smart or anything like that. But whenever we're having these conversations, it's like a script right of the buy side is going to talk in a certain way to sell sides and talk in a certain way. There's retraining of a potential M&A transaction. And then, you know, all of the qualifying language that banker comes with like this is very illustrative. This is high level. This is, you know, we're not we're not, you know, we're not threading the needle here or the banker is going to say, I'm not an operator, but we think it works like this, right? Because the type of analysis that the investment banker is going to do is going to be very paper driven, very illustrative. It's not going to take into account the downstream effects of like, OK, how much you have to spend to integrate this company into my business. Like how do I think about the synergies or synergies? How do I, how do I, how do I factor that in? So that's kind of the part of the analysis that I'm really focusing on, and I'm still leveraging a lot of my financial modeling and structuring skills to support startups on the side. So I do consulting for early stage startups across different areas, in different industries. And I think of myself as a guy who could probably get involved in private equity or VC, but I'm not desiring to write. So I have all the skill set that a bonafide professional could provide, but I'm doing it on my own terms.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:47:03] Got it. No, that's fair. And it sounds like you have your priorities straight with getting more family time and especially the young kids and all that. So that's great. So congrats on that.
Odyssy2112: [00:47:11] I appreciate it.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:47:14] I really appreciate you taking all the time to kind of come on. Come on the pod. Thank you so much. And thanks to you, my listeners at Wall Street Oasis. If you have any suggestions whatsoever, please don't hesitate to send them my way. Patrick at Wall Street Oasis dot com. And till next time.
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