<p>If I go to Princeton, and then to Harvard or Wharton for my MBA, is it like a guarantee to get a job if I have a 3.0 GPA? Potential firms I am interested in:</p>
<p>Goldman Sachs
JP Morgan
Blackstone</p>
<p>How much money would I start off making in a good year? </p>
<p>Thanks. (I'm not trying to be arrogant or anything, obviously there are some big ifs.)</p>
<p>Do understand that you probably won’t go from Princeton to Harvard/Wharton without 3 - 5 years of work experience, and you probably won’t get a job at GS, JPM, or Blackstone with a 3.0 from Princeton.</p>
<p>Your starting salary is $60k, sign-on bonus is $10k, and the average bonus after that is about $30k–a total of $100k. </p>
<p>If you’re a great analyst, though, your bonus could be much higher, especially in good years.</p>
<p>^
Wait… I can’t get an MBA directly from Princeton? Uh oh. (That killed my dreams of starting work at 24.)</p>
<p>How high of a GPA do I need? There’s no way I get higher than a 3.5 with grade deflation.</p>
<p>Are The University of Chicago, NorthWestern, and Columbia just as good or close enough for undergraduate?</p>
<p>Also, I heard that you started as an Associate if you had an MBA. Is this correct? What’s the big deal about Investment Banking for analysts? 100 K is pretty lousy. I know teachers who make near that amount.</p>
<p>Wow. . . . </p>
<p>There’s so much in that last post to respond to I don’t even know where to start.</p>
<p>Solomonm, I’ll try to handle it!</p>
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<p>You can do this, but it’s improbable that you will go through with it for two reasons. First, you probably won’t be admitted, considering you’re being compared to people with (significant) work experience. Second, many banks don’t like to higher MBAs who don’t have work experience, especially considering that MBAs are typically hired as associates.</p>
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<p>You probably want a 3.5+, but even that will not give you any guarantees. It will probably land you an interview, but at that stage, your interviewing skills will get you the internship/job.</p>
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<p>No, they’re not as good for recruiting; whether or not they are “close enough” depends on how you define it. In the context of recruiting, I would rank them: Columbia > Chicago > NU. You can land an interview pretty easily from Columbia, but it’s harder from Chicago and much harder from NU. (This is all relative, of course.)</p>
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<p>MBAs do typically enter as associates. </p>
<p>Analysts start at around 100K, but if an analyst performs well, that number can go up significantly. The other piece of this point is that analysts in IB have excellent exit opportunities, particularly after they complete their MBAs. Many will go to HF, PE, or VC, which are all extremely lucrative.</p>
<p>I think re-reading, all of the above posts are serious.</p>
<p>So my kid interned at one of the companies you mentioned this past summer. She was given an offer. Higher starting than #2 post said. Sign on, right on. Her very good fellow intern from Yale did not get an offer.</p>
<p>No guarantee, no matter what school.</p>
<p>morrismm, what school was she from?</p>
<p>IRJunkie,</p>
<p>Please look at the following:
<a href=“http://www.mmss.northwestern.edu/students/Internship_Directory.pdf[/url]”>http://www.mmss.northwestern.edu/students/Internship_Directory.pdf</a>
[Kellogg</a> School of Management Undergraduate Certificate Programs - Kellogg School of Management - Northwestern University](<a href=“http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/certificate/students/jobs.htm]Kellogg”>http://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/certificate/students/jobs.htm)</p>
<p>Quite a few NU students did get internships/job offers from big banks. The links pertain to only two programs there and not all other students. Note how some Kellogg cert students go straight to HF and PE, according to the website.</p>
<p>But the NU certificate is quite a tough program to get onto. You’ll be competing with the best of NU.</p>
<p>The new starting salary for analysts is 70K, up fro 60. How high your bonus is depends on a lot of things. Most first year analysts in banking or trading that I know of made more than 100K their first year, but they also started a couple years ago when people were more optimistic. Also, 100K for a 22yo is not a bad thing (should keep that in perspective, some profs might make that much but they had to work for a lot longer to get there)</p>
<p>MBAs do start as associates. their starting salary is 100K. not sure what their bonuses look like first year. Strong 3rd year analysts can be promoted to associate, which is the non-mba way to get there. I even know of a couple of cases where guys were promoted to associate after their 2nd year as an analyst. I imagine they were 1. absolute top performers among their analyst class and 2. had a really competitive offer from a hedge fund/prop trading type place so their BB responded by promoting them sooner to retain them</p>
<p>RML,</p>
<p>That’s true. But even at Columbia, you will be competing with the best to land an interview. Essentially, you will be competing with your peers for on-campus interviews and only the best will get invited, no matter where you go. Kellogg cert is only tough to get in in the sense that you need to get good grades in all the pre-reqs. The number of people that actually qualify isn’t that large because for many people, the pre-reqs are either too rigorous or just pain in the neck. Both cert programs haven’t reached their full capacity (underenrolled).</p>
<p>First of all, saying that making 100k first year out of college is not that much is ridiculous. Anyway, like other people said, you will very likely not get into a good MBA program (let alone T10) without any work experience… so you can forget about that.</p>
<p>Compensation for new analysts is 70k, signing 10k as mentioned. As far as bonuses are concerned, the past 2 years are historically low. For analysts (in S&T as far as I’m aware) are somewhere between 75-100% of Salary (again this is in general).</p>
<p>Sam Lee, that’s why everyone who has come out from the Kellogg Certificate program is highly sought after. I would rank it on par with a BBA from Wharton, if not slightly a better program, in my personal opinion.</p>
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<p>Considering Wharton doesn’t grant a BBA, I’m OK with that statement. (FYI - it grants a B.S. Econ.)</p>
<p>Let’s be real here. The Kellogg certificate students are great, and many of them will get jobs; however, to say that it is better than Wharton is ridiculous. This is not to say that all Wharton students are better than the Kellogg cert. students, but the top 10% of Wharton is probably more attractive than the #1 guy from the Kellogg cert.</p>
<p>^ That’s your personal opinion and I will respect that.</p>
<p>I have to agree IRJunkie on this…Kellogg is good, but I think most people would agree it is not at the same level as Wharton</p>
<p>^ I personally think that many employers don’t see it that way. Those students on the Kellogg Cert program were picked from the best of the best at NU. They’re - to me - the equal of the top 25% of Wharton already. If they’re not that exceptionally brilliant, they would always be beaten by every Wharton grad in the employment competition. But we do know that many of them have been hired by some of the most selective firms/industries because of their brilliance, exceptional wit, and strong competitiveness. I’m sure many of them have been favored over some Wharton applicants testifying that the Kellogg program is as much of a force to be reckoned with as the Wharton program is.</p>
<p>Of course, the name Wharton carries more weight, in general. But once you’re in the interview phase, I don’t think the Wharton name would play a significant role anymore especially when you’re competing against applicants who came from a highly respectable name in the industry such as Kellogg.</p>
<p>Is anyone even going to point out that Princeton does not have an MBA program?</p>
<p>I don’t recall anyone saying anything about Princeton MBA, just Princeton undegrad to Wharton MBA.</p>
<p>So does having a prestigious undergrad school name increase your chances at getting into a prestigious graduate school or MBA?</p>