Any career advice from veterans?

Water Cooler Careers
#1

Hi all I’m currently a level 3 candidate mainly interested in portfolio management down the road. My story is rather tortuous so if you have any advice I’d really appreciate it:

I went to a target school in the US, studied econ. I wasn’t very successful in SA and FT recruiting, due to being an international student and lack of networking. Plus I wasn’t quite certain about a career in finance at that point so I was not as committed as I could’ve been. I’ve spent more than half of my life in the US, the visa issue was merely due to bad luck with the bureaucracy.

When I graduated the only thing I could find was a job at a public pension fund and I was on a temporary work visa. It was a FO role but have zero career prospect and not in a hub city. I networked for a year and found a middle-office role at a very good HF in NY and decided to take it. Unfortunately my green card application was denied and I couldn’t get the work authorization I was expecting so that job fizzled out.

I had to go back home while waiting to fight my case, which took almost another year. During this time I started the CFA because I could not work while unable leave the country to another place where I could work. I tried to find some related experience and was only able to find some unrelated remote work for some extra cash. Thinking my chances of staying in the US were slim I applied to a finance masters program in Europe. Also during this period I did both CFA 1 and 2, now doing 3.

I started school again in September and surprisingly my green card was approved around this time too. However since I have been closer in this area and I was in school again, I started applying to numerous summer programs offered by BB this part of the world. I had big doubts about my success since my CV history has been quite bizarre. I only had one interview with a BB in ER and I thought I did really well but didn’t pass the first round.

It’s been quite hard in the past half-year, in a program to see younger peers getting straight into my dream jobs. Sometimes I feel I have a decent background but just this entire upset with my visa in the US has made me into damaged goods. I honestly admit I do feel dejected but I’m very passionate about this industry and I know it will be an uphill battle breaking back in. I intend to return to the US as soon as my program ends this summer. I’m doing all the networking and resume submission possible and unfortunately I’m just not getting any results.

I’m mainly shooting for FT hiring now since I’m unfit for most SA programs in the US. I’m rather at a loss after missing all the typical analyst class recruiting. I’m not sure what to apply for at this point, even second third tier funds won’t even give me a call back. I’m thinking of maybe getting into corporate finance but I have very little idea about the day to day of the role, despite having done most of CFA.

Any suggestion is appreciated. Thanks in advance.

#2

At this point, you should be open minded to opportunities outside of finance. Maybe you will eventually get a buy side job, but if not, you don’t want to miss the next interesting thing that you had not originally considered. Peter Thiel started Paypal because he failed to get a clerkship out of law school. One chancellor of Germany went into politics after failing art school. So, who knows what will happen. Good luck anyway.

#3

At this point your best bet is get a job in something like corporate finance that can be leveraged for something better later on. BB won’t hire you since they either directly hire from graduating class or SA class and since you’ve already finished a master’s degree you won’t get access to on-campus recruiting either.

Network, networ, network is probably your only shot once you find something remotely related to finance.

#4

Yeah, thing is, I would rather work for some startup than corporate finance or Ops. I guess everyone is different. But my point is to keep an open mind.

#5

Hey thanks for the advice. What kind of role in corporate finance should I look for? And also any particular way to choose which industry to get into?

#6

Anything that can improve your financial modeling skills and understanding of the industry. Once you get a few promotions you can probably get a MBA and leverage that into an associate or analyst role in Equity Research.

#7

if you’re considering corporate finance why not get a certificate to supplement your CFA. Obviously CFA is the gold standard, but adding really specific skill sets like financial modeling and valuation (in excel) can help you a lot in the interview process