<p>Ibanking is killing this part of the forum. Seriously, what are my chances for colleges is completely different from saying evaluate my chances of ibanking? Thats like saying evaluate my chances of going to the NBA, or evaluate my chances of not getting a divorce.</p>
<p>There are things you can do to improve the situation, but really it revolves around what kind of impression the recruiters get of you. Your stellar stats might be overlooked if you come off as money hungry and selfish. Your weak stats may become a nonfactor if you charm the recruiter. </p>
<p>Recruiters are humans, not robots they don't have fixed procedural ways of getting an impression of you. Sure having good grades etc will be benefit but you have to come off as good as a package, and thats something that we can not evaluate by. BTW, thats why recruiters like top tier schools better. Lets say one year a recruiter gets a lot more Wharton kids than usual. Then during his performance evaluation at the end of the year, his boss says that his recruitees were excellent this year and are really contributing. What will the recruiter do next year.. continue hiring a lot of Wharton kids. Going to schools where on a whole recruiters think favorably of(good students make good reputation).</p>
<p>Finally, stop getting stressed out about landing the ibanking job. It's not all its cut out to be. Sure its on my list of possible careers but its too far away to tell. In reality, ibanking analysts have very tough two years. Two years of 16-17 hours a day including weekends sometimes and no time to enjoy that money. That are the very bottom of the ladder when it comes to M&A, and many frivolous tasks are passed down to them(photocopying, getting coffee,etc). Many times your hard work will be overlooked and spending an allnighter on a pitchbook will not even be complimented/thanked by your boss. It's a stressful life and thats why many are happy to leave after 2 years. At the same time, if you go to 2 year route, and decide not to continue whether or not you land a full-time job, you will make a smart move. Now other jobs will feel so simple too you and you'll be suprised how far your improved work ethic will take you. For example, if you become a business consultant, your work will be much better than the status quo.</p>
<p>These are my thoughtsu and hopefully some of you agree.</p>
<p>i like the simplicity and efficacy of your info ....a lot of the time people respond to ibank questions just to display their "intellectual superiority"(very abstruse essays-which i find a lot more annoying than the countless threads requesting info about ibanking).......i would like to ask...</p>
<p>are there any other very lucrative careers one can pursue after completing an MBA that are not quite as "demanding" as ibank jobs?....</p>
<p>Look ibanking is what it is, love it or hate it. You do need to go to a top college, you do need to have top grades there and then you do need to have the very aggressive personality it takes. That's a lot of gates to pass through. So if you are cut out for it, it can be a phenomenal career, so many who took me under theri wing during my internship loved it. Others wanted out after a while. It really is about a fit. But the hooey about it's not that special is just spread by the 99.8% who didn't get the chance. If you're lucky enough to and it's what you want, many really enjoy it and are able to give their families great lives!!!</p>
<p>i agree........i am just focusing on my engineering degree right now.......certainly dont think i would pursue i banking.......i just want to be financially stable so i can pay off my student loans as quickly as possible before it accrues over time.......</p>
<p>confidential- do i need to go to a top MBA school(like one would if the person wants to get into a good ibanking job) to get a profitable consulting job?.......i hope not......i dont want to add 100,000 on to my student loans.....</p>
<p>Not true. I-banking and business in general is not based on academics. Of course, a person with less than a 3.0 will find it difficult to make up for those bad grades, but this is not like med school or law school where anything less than 3.8 is uncompetitive. Plenty of nerdy straight-A students are passed by for someone with more charisma and charm.</p>
<p>Carl: it's very difficult and risky to try to make it up the corporate ladder without an MBA. It is virtually a requirement for moving beyond an analyst position in i-banking and consulting. These two fields are similar in that the analyst positions are typically 2-year stints. After that, a select few high-performing analysts may be asked to join for another year which is followed by a promotion to the associate/consultant position. However, the vast majority of analysts are released from the firm to get an MBA, after which they may or may not be invited back to join the firm at a higher position. It is possible to get your firm to pay for business school, but that would depend on your performance and deemed usefulness to your company.</p>
<p>I have to back up foreverzero on that one. Ib hiring is far more personality-focused than grades-focused. Obviously having good grades is better than having weak grades, but the fact is, it really doesn't matter that much. I've seen plenty of people with quite mediocre grades, but strong and decisive personalities, get offers over guys with with top grades but poor communications skills and poor assertiveness.</p>
<p>Yes you do need to have top grades. Maybe not to the point of medical or law school, but some banks institute a 3.5 GPA cutoff to even review the resume. 3.5 is not easy to obtain by any stretch of the imagination.</p>
<p>uc_benz: that's a total myth most will review every resume regardless of grades. I know one guy, for example, who had a 2.8 at wharton and got offers from GS,JPM, CSFB, Deustche Bank, & Citigroup...places that people think you need a 3.5+ GPA to even get reviewed...grades are important but personality is even more so.</p>
<p>Judging from the guys who I've seen hired at the bulge-bracket firms who had nowhere near a 3.5, I have to back up bern700 and say that it is indeed largely a myth. There probably a few banks out there that institute grade cutoffs, but they are few and far between.</p>
<p>Notice I said some I-banks. The BB firms can afford to look at resumes of those with GPA's under 3.5, but some of the smaller firms still have that cutoff.</p>
<p>Foreverzero i think you might have misunderstood my question.......</p>
<p>im GOING to pursue an MBA but what im saying is - do aspiring i bankers and consultants have to go through basically the exact same route to get those jobs?.....we know they both have to get MBAS but </p>
<p>with ibanking, ive read alot of posts hear and it seems like if one doesnt go to a "TOP" school to pursue their MBA, then its really not that useful of a degree(since recruiters go to top schools to recruit)..........</p>
<p>is it the same for an aspiring consultant?(who has an undergraduate degree in industrial engineering).........can you go to an OK business school and get a good consulting job?</p>
<p>wow.....i hope you understand this.its really a VERY simple question but you might just have misunderstood it.......</p>
<p>'Often the consultant provides expertise to customers which only rarely or occasionally require this particular type of knowledge, thus providing an economy to the client.</p>
<p>More recently the term is also used somewhat euphemistically to mean a person that is only temporarily employed by a company and working under the company's direction in a skill area that the company already has, in other words as an adjunct to the company's core set of employees. This usually implies that the consultant is more expendable when the demand for that particular skill diminishes.</p>
<p>Often a consultant is not an independent agent but is a partner or an employee of a consultancy, that is a company that provides consultants to clients on a larger scale or in multiple, though usually related, skill areas.'</p>
<p>Carl: whoops, I did misread your question. I guess I missed the word "top" :). To answer your first question, yes, aspiring i-bankers and consultants have similar career paths (2-3 year analyst positions followed by an MBA program and then a series of higher positions). Yes, consulting is also very tough to break into. For all business jobs, an MBA from a top school goes a long way. No, it's not required, but it's much harder from a less prestigious/lower-ranked school. I read some articles (editorials, so don't think that this is facts) which basically stated that an MBA from a no-name university is not worth the money and time. It's hard enough to break into i-banking and consulting from a top MBA program. From a non-target school, it's much much harder, because not only will your degree be less prestigious, but your networking resources and ability to establish worthwhile contacts will be greatly diminished as well.</p>
<p>After you have completed your BA/BS degree. There is plenty of time for would be IB to develop their leadership skills through EC activities. If you're at the top schools, develop your contacts through your EC right away. Create your own IB experience through fundraising and investing those funds in the stock market. Learn to create partnerships with other student organizations. Become their number one stop for financial services. </p>
<p>From there, it's important to get a summer internship as soon as possible in IB. The sooner. The better. Forget about making the big money, unless you're are a Managing Director. As an IB Analyst, use that opportunity to learn about the industies that they deal with. Use it as a learning opportunity that you can apply to any business field because finance IS the lifeblood of the global economy. The more you're able to work with different types of people from different parts of the world, the more successful you'll become.</p>
<p>Have fun with your college experience. Investment banking is not going anywhere. The less you think about it....the better you'll be.</p>
<p>dead on guys......all the info i needed.......i also heard industrial engineering is a very good major to take(in terms of how closely related it is to what consultants do)....is this true?</p>
<p>confidential, you say that IB is good experience for developing work ethic for other types of jobs when you leave. I have IB as a possible career but don't exactly want to do it based on what I researched about the "IB life." Do many people quit before completing the two years? I suppose I'll check it out if I get some offers since it might help in other business fields. Also, is consulting that much better in terms of life?</p>
<p>when you say consulting its a very generic field. unlike, ibanking, consulting is much more open because the infrastructure of consulting agencies are very different. Some are very big like McKinley, PWC,etc. some are smaller. Some are small consulting agencies that get contracted by the government, some have services for various companies. It is almost impossible to create an ibanking company. it is not very difficult to create a consulting company. its too generic, but for the most part its much better in terms of life. I mean it really can't get humanely worse than ibanking in terms of quality of life.</p>
<p>Oh, I thought you were talking about only management consulting at the top firms. I always had the idea that working for McKinsey (or other top MC firm) and working for an IB like Goldman were no different in terms of life.</p>