big ML: Who said anything about a mid level job?
Firstly: SkipE99 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > http://i.imgur.com/xblF4.gif awesome! Mathlete: Academic achievement is not just the grades - its about being able to say you were the president of the MBA students society, having relationships with professors, winning case competitions, and just being an active member of the student group. What you are claiming is happening 95% of the time is nepotism - that’s just not true. Nepotism is responsible for *maybe* 5% of new hires… I’m thinking its closer to 2.5% at a normal run rate… maybe 5% during 2008. The other 95% of hires actually deserve to be there. Trust me - I was a competitor in Toronto (and a winner) - virtually all of the finalists and hires deserved their jobs.
batgirl: See my previous post. Again part - time, work full time can’t run around campusing campaigning for student president when I have a mortgage to pay.
mathlete Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > big ML: Who said anything about a mid level job? Well in your next post you referenced a jr. analyst role. My point would be you may need to aim lower to get in if you are finding so many obstacles. Also, you say you don’t have time to socialize in bars. I would say you have to make time. Grad school is as much about making connections as it is about grades. Lastly, if you come off as negative in person as you do online, that may be something to work on too. I have sh!t going on in my life that sucks just as everyone else does. I don’t carry it around with me and don’t advertise it. My clients and co-workers don’t want to be bummed out by my crap and I would imagine the people you come into contact with don’t want to either.
batgirl4ever Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Firstly: > > SkipE99 Wrote: > -------------------------------------------------- > ----- > > http://i.imgur.com/xblF4.gif > > awesome! > > Mathlete: Academic achievement is not just the > grades - its about being able to say you were the > president of the MBA students society, having > relationships with professors, winning case > competitions, and just being an active member of > the student group. > > What you are claiming is happening 95% of the time > is nepotism - that’s just not true. Nepotism is > responsible for *maybe* 5% of new hires… I’m > thinking its closer to 2.5% at a normal run > rate… maybe 5% during 2008. The other 95% of > hires actually deserve to be there. > > Trust me - I was a competitor in Toronto (and a > winner) - virtually all of the finalists and hires > deserved their jobs. Just realizing that it doesn’t seem like you finished the MBA or the CFA. Could be part of the problem as well. Things may pick up when you’ve completed one of them.
mathlete Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > batgirl: See my previous post. Again part - time, > work full time can’t run around campusing > campaigning for student president when I have a > mortgage to pay. You may as well say “I want a GPA of 4.0 even though I only got As in half the classes and got a zero in the other half” Sorry, but if you can’t make the commitment to actually do an MBA right, then you can’t possibly expect the full reward now can you?
IF you think the connections thing is bad here, just try Asia… it’s even WORSE.
Interesting thread. I think one point that is getting overlooked right now is that we are in the worst job market for finance in the last few decades. there is so much talent with experience and qualifications unemployed that competition is just insane. i am talking about the US here, but i imagine there is a knock-on affect in other regions (other than asia) another point that i think is quite relevant is that getting into a true entry level position (which is requires enormous sacrifice in personal life for someone in their mid 20s, or people looking to start a family soon and in some cases financial sacrifice too) is also very difficult since most of those are ear-marked for interns from undergrad/mba. that being said, don’t give up! and the simple fact that you are posting here and pursuing the charter suggests that you haven’t. i am 3 years out of college (undergrad in engr + econ) working in product control with no relevant experience and an L3 candidate. i refuse to believe i won’t get a job in asset/portfolio management. call me whatever you want (i’m sure i’ve been called worse)
youre a bum kmm
what is product control kmm?
Alladin Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > what is product control kmm? its a glorified accounting role
@wake: that’s too far! a bum? that’s just mean dude! lol @alladin: group that supports post-trade support. basically stuff that trader or TA doesn’t want to do - calculate pnl, reporting, price verification, etc.
sorry, i should really start double-checking my posts (probably why i’m in product control) meant to say group that supports post-trade functions
kmm1486 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > @wake: that’s too far! a bum? that’s just mean > dude! lol > you said we could call you names
If the experience and result of obtaining the CFA Charter along with graduating from Harvard or Princeton was a sure path to success or domination in the field of investments, then it would be pretty obvious who the best analysts/fund managers are and their success would be well documented and attributed toward these things. Obviously, this is far from reality and success is built upon many other factors, such as hard work, connections, natural born talent, and luck/good timing (ever read outliers?) or as Buffett called it, “the ovarian lottery.”
ovarian lottery…i wonder if we are all inputs in god’s monte carlo simulation ps. i use the word god loosely so dont waste your time getting offended for whatever reasons.
DBD82 Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > If the experience and result of obtaining the CFA > Charter along with graduating from Harvard or > Princeton was a sure path to success or domination > in the field of investments, then it would be > pretty obvious who the best analysts/fund managers > are and their success would be well documented and > attributed toward these things. Obviously, this is > far from reality and success is built upon many > other factors, such as hard work, connections, > natural born talent, and luck/good timing (ever > read outliers?) or as Buffett called it, “the > ovarian lottery.” +1
mathlete Wrote: ------------------------------------------------------- > Batgirl: Really would love to spend my time in > bars socialize with MBA people, however for those > of us not being funded by our parents i.e. have > bills like a mortgage to pay that is not a luxury > I can afford. Doing an MBA, CFA and working full > time is about all the time I have for anything at > this stage. You also seem to be making the same > point twice that is “the who know not what you > know point”. I have no problem with someone hiring > someone else because of a personal relationship. > > I do however have a problem when junior analyst > are hired out of an undergrad in political science > and don’t know the difference between a stock and > a bond. I find in the Toronto job market (and > possibly elsewhere) 95% of jobs are given away to > acquaintances qualifications be damned. Its not > that your education is worth less than you think, > its that your education is really not worth > anything at all. > > Companies bear the cost of training new connected > hires from scratch rather than take qualified > people already in the job market. I guess the > moral of the story is that life’s not fair, its > just compounded by the fact that educational > institutions charge the rest of us an arm and a > leg on top of it all while offering no real > competitive advantage. So not only don’t you get > the job you want, you’re stuck with a worthless > piece of paper and tens of thousands of dollars of > debt. > > END RANT mathlete, although I share your sentiments regarding hiring clueless political science majors out of college, big firms do so from top colleges because it is considered a risk-less exercise. They let colleges do the selection process for them, so they know they WILL get a batch of smart kids regardless. As long the majority of the batch turns out expected, they’re good. Sounds almost like human resource arbitrage. However, if you want a position in front office finance without pedigree, nothing surpasses the importance of motivation and drive. This is not to say you should traumatize yourself with insane amount of studying and suffering; only do it if it helps. If 150 hours of networking and kissing ass gets you a job, then do not spend 300 hours studying for a test that MAY give you an interview. Passing L2 CFA has not given me the golden ticket to anything, however, it does give me the foundation to VERY quickly learn how to model for IB, ER, and other positions. With the foundation laid out, everything else is learned much quicker. And how well you learn these will ultimately help you get a job. Plenty of front office finance roles require technical understanding of things. If you can impress a REIT expert how capex, inflation, and depreciation affect their earnings forecast, I’m sure you will get somewhere. Does CFA do the hand-holding of teaching how to model a reit? No. It does however provide you with everything you need to know to learn it very quickly should you put in some effort and time.