For people early in their career with no previous investment banking experience.
For every available investment banking position, there are literally thousands of applicants, sometimes tens of thousands of applicants. So how do you position yourself to land one of these highly coveted positions in finance?
This is what I aim to answer, as concretely as possible.
Background
I have been fortunate enough to have worked at a bulge bracket investment bank, in lower middle market investment banking, and as a technology provider to the M&A industry (in addition to an engineering background that precedes my foray into finance).
Upon completing business school, I had my share of investment banking interviews (Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse, JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Bear Stearns and others). While I had multiple rounds of interviews with Goldman Sachs, they ultimately did not make me an offer. I did, however, receive and accept an offer from Bear Stearns, at the London office.
Further, I helped Bear Stearns recruit from well-known business schools.1 Consequently, I have experience from both sides: as the candidate and as the interviewer. Through this, I have formed some views on how to increase your chances of landing a coveted investment banking position, if that’s what you really want.
The Right School
By far, the single best way to get an interview at a reputable, well-known investment bank is to attend one of the top finance universities. In the United States, the schools are (in no particular order):
- University of Pennsylvania (Wharton)
- University of Chicago (Booth)
- New York University (Stern)
- Columbia
- Stanford
- MIT (Sloan)
- Berkeley (Haas)
- Harvard
- Northwestern (Kellogg)
In Europe, the prominent investment banking recruiting schools are (in no particular order):
- London Business School (UK)
- INSEAD (France)
- Stockholm School of Economics (Sweden)
- Oxford (UK)
- Cambridge (UK)
- HEC Paris (France)
- IESE (Spain)
Bulge bracket investment banks recruit junior positions almost exclusively from the business schools at these universities. In fact, it’s unusual for an investment bank to hire Analysts or Associates outside this narrowly defined pool of candidates.2 Why? Because the candidates are largely prefiltered for the I-banks through the stringent university admissions processes at these institutions.
The MBA
If you did not attend one of these schools as an undergraduate (like me), your next best opportunity is to get some work experience and then get accepted to one of these power schools for your MBA. This was the route I took at the Stockholm School of Economics.
Study finance.
If you have not attended one of these primary recruiting schools, the probability of landing a job at a premier, bulge bracket investment banking firm is very, very low. I’m not saying it can’t happen, but the odds are really stacked against you. Almost insurmountably so. Large companies run scalable hiring processes. Large scalable processes don’t do well with variance from the norm. Sorry to be negative, but that’s just the industry statistics. That said, the odds are considerably better at middle market investment banks, firms that consistently work on deals valued at less than $100 million.
Getting an Interview
If you find yourself at one of these top schools and you are still interested in working as an investment banker, you must attend all presentations the firms make at your school. Meet the company representatives. Have a personable conversation. Be normal. Ask for their business cards. Follow up with an email. Ask for an interview.
Attending the presentations demonstrates interest and allows you to absorb the I-banking vibe, to learn the language of M&A, and to get a feel for the various firms. They each have unique flavors. The company presentations also provide good networking opportunities. It’s much easier to land an interview if you have met their team face-to-face.
Side Note: Don’t Be “That Guy”
At nearly every investment banking recruiting event, there’s always That Guy trying to impress the visiting bankers with how smart he is. He will talk about the big transactions he’s read about in the news (as if he did the deal himself). He will spout off shallow opinions on industry trends he read in a recent article.
Don’t be That Guy.
Simply ask engaging questions as if you were making conversation with someone you just met.
Be smart. Be likable.
Attributes of a Successful Banker
Surprisingly, much of investment banking is about being likable. The firm that hires you needs to know that you have the technical chops in terms of financial modeling to do the work and that you can ultimately interact with clients to win business for the firm (eventually).
The required ingredients that determine if you can win business for the bank collapse into a simple formula:
Credentials + Competency + Chemistry (likability)
…not necessarily in that order.
The firm itself helps provide the credentials while you build your own. The other two items are on you to exude.
The Middle & Lower Middle Market
If you are unable to attend an elite university and are unable to land an interview at an I-bank, consider reaching out to the middle market firms or the lower middle market firms (those firms doing deals typically less than $50 million in enterprise value). These firms are considerably more likely to take a risk on a candidate with stellar potential, even if less formally brand-credentialed academically.
Industry Expert
An alternative route, and I have a good friend who did this, is to come up through the ranks as an executive within your chosen field and become an industry expert. In doing so, you have an opportunity to transition to a corporate M&A role (typically on the buy-side). Corporate M&A has a different vibe compared to working for a large investment bank (often on the sell-side), but it’s still M&A. You still get the pleasure of meeting a lot of potential target company CEOs and founders within your industry.
I-Bank Interviews
Investment banking interviews have a certain flow about them. There’s a lot of information online about the kinds of questions that you might expect, so I won’t cover that here. My overarching advice is that you need to be able to tell a succinct story about yourself. This story needs to answer these questions:
- Where do you want to go with your career?
- What have you done to date aimed at this objective?
- What are you doing now that’s leading you to where you want to go?
Tying your career goals and accomplishments to the interview…
- Why I-banking?
- Why this firm?
- Why you specifically?
- What unique skills and attributes would you bring to the firm?
To tell this part of the story (and the story form is the best method, so prepare that), you need to have performed enormous amounts of research about the firm, and competing firms, prior to the interview. Don’t be shy to take a risk here and form an opinion about the competitive position of the firm in the marketplace and a view about the pros and cons of the firm’s position as you project the market unfolding in the near future. You might get it completely wrong, but the interviewer will appreciate a well-thought-out thesis (a unique thesis that you did not read elsewhere).
That kind of thesis is precisely what got me hired at Bear Stearns. Turns out, as the future unfolded, my thesis was incorrect. But I was fortunate that the Head of Global Investment Banking, who I was talking to at the time, held the same strategic view for the firm. On the spot, he invited me to come to London to interview.
So, rehearse your story in the flow of the questions above to demonstrate a cohesive path to an end-objective that culminates with you working at their firm.
If you cannot tell a coherent story to the interviewer that answers these questions, it may appear that you don’t really want to work at an investment bank, you just want an I-banker compensation package. If that’s the case, and you actually get the job, you will be miserable. It’s definitely a love-it-or-hate-it type of job. Personally, I loved it.
Interview Prep
Incidentally, much of the interview prep storyline I presented above applies to most jobs for which you might interview. Even if the interviewers neglect to ask you directly, it is incumbent upon you to ensure you do not leave the interview without answering these three key questions:
- Why this position?
- Why this firm?
- Why you?
If you leave the interview with any of these questions unanswered, you have not had a good interview. Don’t expect an offer.
How do you craft this story? You first research the firm thoroughly. Read everything you can on the firm. If possible, talk to people who work there. You then write the story out. Your story should follow a linear career progression with a solid beginning, middle, and end… about you, the central character with a plan.
If you have no idea where to start, load your resume, the job description and the company’s website into an AI tool and prompt the AI to provide you with a cohesive storyline that helps map what you have done to date with the position description and the firm. Then, and this is a critical point, weave that generic story into something with personal narratives unique to you. And by “narratives”, I mean, tell a few stories from your personal experience.
Once you have a well-crafted short story along these lines, you should begin rehearsing it by saying it out loud. Verbal communication sounds different from the written word. It flows differently. Adapt your script to match the spoken word version.
Then memorize it verbatim.
Then practice some more to get it flawless.
Then practice making it sound like spontaneous thought, like you have not memorized it.
Then, don’t use the verbatim version in your interviews. Just talk… and be you. The rehearsals will allow you to present yourself as knowledgeable, thoughtful and articulate without sounding scripted.
Now, research the firm some more.
After all of this, you might be ready.
The next step is to land as many interviews with various investment banks as possible. This is about getting in the requisite reps to be good in your interviews. More reps. More learning. Better outcomes. Just like everything else, you learn by doing. Interviewing is no different.
Is this difficult? Yes. Will it take a LOT of time and effort to get right? Yes… but this is good practice for what is to come, should an investment bank make you an offer. If you don’t enjoy what you learn by preparing for potential interviews with investment banks, you likely won’t enjoy being an investment banker either.
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FOOTNOTES:
- Note: Analyst and Associate recruiting for investment banks has shifted to a much earlier process, with internships and early-identification programs that start well before graduation.
- Undergraduate programs for Analysts. MBA programs for Associates. Investment banker (Corporate Finance) titles listed from most junior to most senior are: Analyst, Associate, Vice President, Director, Managing Director, Managing Partner.
