I feel like a failure for not getting GS!

I don't know where to begin. Shut the fuck up.

It's obvious that you come from a quite privileged background if you're getting so upset over not getting an offer from GS. Maybe it's me coming from an under-privileged background where I can appreciate getting anything but i agree with the first poster, it's not the end of the world. Chill out you still got food on your plate and a job at least and quit crying over reputation and prestige of firms.

Simply pick a team for which your BB is number 1.

Make it your personal mission to help your firm overtake Goldman Sachs in terms of prestige and profitability. If you can't join them, beat them. Pick yourself up and stop relying on other people for your self-respect.

Why do you want to work at Goldman, or why do you think it is more successful?

1. Better pay? All the BB banks pay the same.
2. Better prestige? Maybe to some people, work hard at your current bank, get ranked top, move to mega fund and you will get your prestige. You can even lateral to goldman after your 2 year analyst program if you really think that is the ultimate place to be.
3. Better exit opp? Coming from target (assuming HYP) the exit opp will be the same for you no matter which BB you are in if you are doing well in your BB.
4. Better hours? False
5. Better people? Maybe or maybe not

You get the idea, people judge on your success when you are 42 and not 24.

I'm glad you're humbling yourself and exposing your situation for some well deserved e-bitchslapping.

First of all, do you realize only 2% (maybe rising to 3% now with China & India) of the world population has a college degree? so I'm pretty sure you can imagine what percent is from Ivy. I suggest you take a trip somewhere where you can genuinely learn to be more grateful. You have it made pretty good. The worst thing someone can do to upset whichever higher being you look up to for guidance is to NOT be grateful.

Get a grip of yourself and don't let your insecurities make you who you are. If you truly care about the profession you want to go into, believe me you'd find a way to make the most of it. You don't have to go work for the Big Dick on Wall Street. Some of the best in the world (in any profession or sport) have been those that have been underdogs. So, like lolbaringslol suggests, you make it your personal mission to kick some GS ass and let it fuel your passion for your career. Hey, maybe that's just what you needed to come back to earth. At least be grateful for those fighting to keep us safe while we go after selfish ambitions.

Pray about it. You're a smart guy.

why not come up with a different metric to value success? dont you feel that letting goldman sachs determing your hapiness is a little ridiculous? youre in the industry you want to be in at a fantastic firm-smile =)

The one point that I would make is that, regardless of how great your credentials are, BB recruiting in now way goes GS gets the top 8 kids from your school, MS the next 8, etc. Like just about any event in the real world, a proportion of the decision ultimately boils down random variance - pure, dumb, unexplainable luck. Unless your last name happens to be Blankfein, rest assured that chance plays a much larger proportion in the decision process than you could imagine. To attribute the failure onto yourself when you are confident that you did your best and were a worthy candidate is very much erroneous.

Psychologists would argue that rationalization such as yours (internal, uncontrollable, and permanent) when confronting an issue is the reason people become depressed, when in reality you need to take a step back and realize that so many parts of the issue are external (Goldman interviewer was a frat boy from your rival that hates nothing more than a perfect 4.0 candidate), controllable (stop listening to the narrow minded Goldman HBS KKR bullshit, success is far far different from that), and not permanent (IB analyst is but two years anyways.)

Travel, see some people in other cultures in the world or even in different parts of US) and the struggles they face and what aspirations they have and then reassess your statement.

gs is not going anywhere. no one says you cant join them in a year, 5 years, 10 years, 15 years down the line

All i have to say is wow

I have friends that chose MS / JPM over GS and as for laterals I have friends that chose CS over GS (better pay) ... GS is not theend all be all of IB

you shouldn't measure your success like this, rather you need look at what you've done so far

you can't win them all, kid

oddly enough, I really enjoy the candor of this post. There are a lot of people out there who wouldn't admit this. As far as drawing the line when it comes to ambition, some people never do that and it makes them miserable for all time. As far as remedies, my recommendation would be to start smoking more weed. Also, my guess would be that you're road to happiness would involve you telling your parents to get the fuck off in some way. Mine did.

Come on Man! A winner will take this as an opportunity to prove them wrong for not picking you and put in everything you have to make sure your firm is better than GS

ps: you deserve these 2 words though! f**k off !!

Go suck a chode. You don't deserve Goldman Sachs if you're gonna complain like that.

I'm sorry, you have mistaken this site for an online-diary hosting site for finance professionals. It is not that.

FYI... after a few years of experience, if you end up at the right place, you'll realize you would rather be there than the "best of the best of the best" group/bank because quite frankly (1) its not all its cracked up to be, (2) there are a lot of opportunities that are 10x better than the ones WSO Prospective Monkeys jerk off to, (3) the 'star' term is very loosely used in the highly structured environments of a BB bank. A star is someone who does a shit load of work, never complains, and is always itching for more. If you actually have something besides your soul (read: time) to contribute, you'll be looking for an environment where the contribution is far more differentiated and not commoditized.

MS M&A > GS most groups

Recruiting is largely based on luck and interviews are often crap shoots, so don't trip--not getting GS isn't in the least bit reflective of your education, GPA, or interviewing skills

Thanks for the responses everyone. I realize I don't have any particularly solid reason for GS except for everyone giving them lots of respect and prestige. I was just attracted by their top tier status.

All the F off responses is exactly why I'd post this here. While it's not GS, I bet there are some people out there who are always looking to move up but they just don't talk about it. Why wouldn't you? Everyone is looking to move up in this world and when you're the low man on the rung you want to move up to the next and then the next. You think you'll be satisfied with what you have but then you find yourself looking into the distance for that next thing.

You should feel like a failure. You have failed in that you do not have a GS offer, you are not dating two Swedish supermodels at once (while hooking up with some nightclub promoter on the side), do not have a stable of European sports cars, and are not hung like Ron Jeremy. Your life is doomed to eternal mediocrity - you have reached the pinnacle of your achievement in college.

Get real bro. Any BB IBD offer, especially in this economy, is something to be proud of. It's only once you start comparing to your peers that you will always find yourself lacking. The real question you need to be asking yourself is whether Prestige in and of itself makes you happy - and I can almost certainly guarantee that it is not the case. If that is so, then find what does make you happy (money, family, European sports cars) and work toward it.

Let's say you started at GS. What then? Would you be satisfied, or would you feel like a failure a year or two from now when you only get TPG instead of KKR or Blackstone. And if you got GS TMT, then went to HBS, then worked for KKR, would you be pissed off that Warren Buffett hadn't personally selected you to run Berkshire Hathaway after him?

Be reasonable. You don't even know if you're going to like banking. You don't even know if you'll be any good at your job.

If you had been offered a GS operations position, would you have taken it? What about PWM? What about ER? Would you have felt like a winner if you were offered a trading position? But what if it wasn't for the macro prop desk? Would you kill yourself?

Maybe that's what you should do. Clearly, you're an utter failure. Your parents don't love you, your friends don't respect you, and your girlfriend is sucking my dick right now (she's not even that good).

What a fucking wanker.

You sound like a nerdy Azn male ( math major? ). You should be disappointed b/c this moment marks the highlight of your IB career, from my perspective at-least.

I'm guessing you were looking for others to say "It doesn't matter IB is IB"

Wow. just... wow.

Right now I'd be estatic for any megafund, but now that you mention different tiers... lol

I was really looking for sympathetic heartfelt responses from a banker forum

i do think there would be a lot of chin-up responses had it been a no name boutique or another bank besides GS. Why all the hate b/c it's GS? I'm pretty much in the same boat as everyone on this board, just a lowly monkey analyst.

You runnin' with the JP now?

I can't wait until this douchebag experiences some real obstacles in life. Good luck dealing with those when you can't even handle this. You've got bigger things to worry about than not getting GS.