Military reserves to ride out bad job market

I am 25, (about to turn 26), awaiting L2 results, and have been working in the corporate actions group in operations for the last 2.5 years. I have been trying to get into an investment consulting or wealth management job and have been unsuccessful. In order to ride out a bad job market and pursue something I’ll never get the chance to pursue I am wondering how a commission as a reserve officer in the Army would help my chances in landing IC/WM jobs? Also, once I complete basic training and OCS I will soon be 27, then I would be doing the 1 weekend a month thing. Would my age work against me given my experience?

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I doubt this would look negative experience-wise (unless the guy hiring you is an ardent pacifist :slight_smile: ), but you do risk being called up to exotic countries that end with - stan

What is your question? Will you be too old for a finance job? Will you be too old for the army (27 year old 2nd Lt without prior service is old – its like a 27 yr od IB analyst). Will the reserve thing hurt your chances of getting a job? I’ll ask one thing: Do you want to do guard or reserves? With the guard, you sign up with a state for 6 yrs. I don’t know if officers can transfer commissions to different states. So you might be limiting yourself geographically. That def hurts. The military thing will hurt you with some firms and help with others. If its something you really want to do, then go for it. Don’t be a slave to your career. I think being a veteran helped me get a job more than passing LIII. For some firms, the respect you get will outweigh the fear of being deployed. For others, no. And there might even be some ethical people in finance (bear with me) who won’t penalize someone for serving their country even if it means losing a key employee for a year+.

Thanks for your comments buyicide

I am looking to go into the Army so that I can have geographic flexibility and dodging suicide bombers is much more appealing than my reorg job, than again the grass is always greener on the other side.

If you are going to do it, now is the time. 2 years from now you could be in a great job, and face the prospect of either walking away from a good gig or living with the regret of not doing something you always wanted.