So after 5 years of work experience, I am recently laid off from work. I didn’t try hard yet to find another job and I didn’t register for L3 either. I have studied just a little from old book as yet. In short, I haven’t even finished a session. My dilemma is to either postpone L3 and jobhunt or study L3 full time. (yes I have more than enough savings, so money is not that issue)
I will just share my thought process and any form of feedback is welcome.
For some personal important reason I am travelling for the month of January. So that halts my studying and job hunting too. I will not be able to properly study for the whole month. I guess all I can do is try to squeeze an hour here and there.
So if I start proper studying in Feb, that would leave only 4 months of quality studying. I fear that is too short for L3 even if it is full time studying. Just to give idea of my studying abilities, I will mention my stats for previous levels.
Level 1 - studied very hard for 5 months with normal (read: not so demanding) workload and passed with flying colors
Level 2 - Started studying in February with normal workload and failed at Band 6. For next attempt, started quality studying end of January and passed at the border.
On the other hand, the aggressive job hunting might be too time and energy consuming and might not result in anything. If I have to have a job, I would prefer a big jump at career. Previously, I was working in a small investment boutique.
Just trying to decide what to focus on. It will be ideal if I study full time and pass and then the charter adds big value for job hunt. The job hunting will get way easy in that case. (my work experience is approved by CFA institute)
I have got mixed opinions from other professional aquaintances. One say focus on L3 and then job hunt while others say you don’t know when you arrive at a good job so keep that option open.
I want to stay focused on one thing from Feb. So should it be L3 or jobhunt?
Personally, I’d jobhunt. I couldn’t stand to be unemployed for five months. Plus, do you want to explain to prospective employers that you took five months off to study for a test? (Even if it is the CFA exam?)
I think a lot of it depends on what your job (or potential job) will be, and how much the charter will benefit you. If you decide to focus on the exam, then in August-ish, you should be able to put “CFA” on your resume. But if the employers don’t see that as a plus, then…
Who says you have to do one or the other? I mean, how much time can you spend job-hunting? And how much time can you study before you burn out? Spend 10 hours a week looking for jobs, and 30 hours a week studying. And a whole lot of time relaxing.
Job hunting is definitely not more work than a REAL INVESTMENT Job, and 80% of the people who write level 3 will have a day job with some people working long hours.
Personally, I worked 10-12 hrs a day while studying for the level 3 exam. I would study average 3 hours a day after work. I highly doubt you need more than 10 hrs a day for job searching.
Additionally, job hunting deminishes at time goes by once you have applied to most of the big firms; it’s just a sit and wait game after.
Go write level 3, and stop thinking about focusing on one thing. You are not a child and can multi task; you have done it many times in university in your last year while studying and job hunting.
CFA is meant to be done on top of a full time job. There’s no reason why you should not have time for job searching. If you do decide to study full time, don’t tell employers this…
my 2 cents…do both together; very much possible; job hunting is tiring, often discouraging and lengthy. Preparing for the CFA would keep things positive, increase the endurance for job search, would reduce the guilt feeling that the cost of job search is not writing the level-3 exams.