Resources

Many students going into college are interested in pursuing careers in finance, but now more than ever, success in that pursuit requires understanding how the financial services industry has evolved its recruitment process to grant access to advanced careers. Over the course of my work coaching students through this process, I have found that success begins with an understanding the following five truths about what students will face as they hope to secure careers in financial services:

• Hyper Competition: Full time analyst positions at investment banks are almost exclusively filled via summer internship programs. Interns who show aptitude and good cultural fit during their program following their junior year will be given an offer to join the firm full time after graduating. As such, securing the right summer internship is indispensable for students aspiring to careers in finance. Summer internship programs at top banks currently accept fewer than 1% of applicants globally and an even lower proportion at their flagship offices in New York City.
• Accelerated Timetable: Because the top banks are in competition with one another to secure the best talent, the recruiting cycle for internships has regularly shifted earlier and earlier. It now occurs in the winter of students’ sophomore year. This means students will be applying for internships that don’t start for almost a year and a half after the recruiting process. To be optimally positioned for junior summer, a candidate needs to secure an internship for their sophomore summer even before this process commences, ideally having something lined up by the end of the fall of sophomore year.
• Resume Building: Unless a student has an excellent GPA, relevant coursework, direct experience, depth of engagement, and specific skills, they may not be considered for these coveted positions. There are only 3 semesters from the beginning of college to the start of the recruitment process, so anyone interested in this path must immediately begin to take and excel in challenging courses in finance, economics, accounting, and capital markets. The most competitive students also aggressively pursue joining relevant clubs and student organizations.
• Academic Supplementation: Simply taking applicable courses alone is not always sufficient to be competitive in this process. Unfortunately, academic courses in finance are not specifically geared towards equipping students to become finance professionals, and the highly technical, granular skills of financial modeling and valuation analysis do not come into play until a student has taken all the prerequisite courses—if they do at all. To ensure that they’re equipped to ace interviews, candidates should look into taking online courses on valuation, financial modeling, Excel, and accounting to build those necessary concrete skills.
• Soft Skills: Interviewing for financial services is a specific and unique skill that needs to be deliberately practiced and cultivated. Academic success alone will not prevent a student from getting tripped up by simple tricks, standard questions, and common tactics. The strongest candidates craft their own professional narrative, network effectively, and present themselves in the best possible light in these high stakes conversations in addition to having all the necessary technical information at their fingertips.

Careers in finance are competitive for a reason; the return on proper preparation is extreme. By the same token, though, it brings me great joy to help students achieve life-changing success by dramatically expanding and accelerating their skill development, improving their self-confidence, and guiding them every step of the way.

About the Author: Steven Menking

After earning degrees in Economics and Mathematics from Williams College and working at Morgan Stanley and other premier financial firms, Steven decided to leave the Wall Street path for to follow the fulfillment he found in teaching others, devoting his talents to a career as a professional tutor. A methodical, quantitative thinker, Steven has always viewed the learning process as a cornerstone of personal growth. Though he brings a trader’s savvy and rigor to academic instruction, Steven loves tutoring as a pathway to helping students chart their own intellectual development by demystifying the complex language and topics within economics and mathematics. Never satisfied with academic results alone, Steven declares his mission complete only when a student has mastered the material well enough to explain it to others and to bring their mastery confidently to bear in all their pursuits. In that spirit, Steven also helps students prepare for interviews and internships in the financial services field through both coursework in finance and accounting as well as independent pursuits of topics in investing, financial management, and market structure.