Advise on a career path in finance/investment

i'm an undergrad and no expert, but this is really good wake-up advice for people who've not just graduated but are in the midst of undergraduate studies too. many in my school who study finance have the mindset that they are a shoo-in for investment banking/sales and trading roles. but the reality is, both do the same things when they graduate regardless what role they get - they do the ***t work of 3rd year analysts, Associates, VPs and maybe run errands for clients. it doesn't matter if you work in a boutique or a BB, or even FO or BO, your job is to smile and still get the dirty work done.

You can try to look for roles that you're interested in, but an actuarial background is best suited eventually for a role in IB Risk or some other Risk management related role. Your background sounds impressive but you seem confused and too idealistic. Your options now given such a lousy hiring market probably are

1. stick it out and do an MBA related to risk mgmt, or even applied finance, then reapply
2. jump for a junior analyst role in a fund mgmt house/PE/VC - something similar to a fresh grad job (short term pain for long term gain in terms of pay vs career development, btw you have to network your ass off to get those jobs cos they only take in Ivy/Oxbridge)

i believe if you want something you'll eventually get it, but dont chart your course towards it. gotta let things play out and see how they go. just don't quit again when you get your 'ideal' job due to some other reason. haha, good luck!

And the funny thing is people are complaining that foreigners are "stealing" our jobs. LOL.

Originally Posted by flatstopix

End of the day nobody can advise passer-by’s problem, just take a look at the kind of job he wants to do:

1) Highly paid - seeing he went to insurance, IB, now want to go investment, fund manager etc., he won’t accept normal fresh grad pay in other functions in normal / smaller companies

2) Cannot be desk bound – Must got opportunity to go out meet big shots, get business exposure, don’t want to face PC whole day

3) Not technical / No Exam – Don’t want technical job, don’t want to go for additional exam.

4) No administration – Too boring for his action figure self

5) Not stressful frontline – Must have excitement, but cannot be too stressful and affect his mental & physical health, must come with work life balance.

6) Good boss – Management cannot be too ambitious, supervisor cannot be emo and pass the stress to him and environment must be “non-toxic” whatever that means

7) Cannot be routine – Because he super big shot, so routine job troubleshooting for others and helping to solve problems for others is beneath his stature

8) Cannot be always restructuring – Complain organization too big his team job scope too limited, then complain why his department keep changing due to restructuring

9) Must have business and investment exposure – Whatever that means… As if any company going to hire a freshie job hopper to make their investment decisions. LOL

10) Must have transferrable skills – Because he still want to move back to FO in some unspecified time in the future

11) Wants to be fund manager – Yep, but I suppose this fund manager job must meet all 10 conditions above also

So what does he have to offer from his side?

1) Normal uni degree

2) CFA not complete yet

3) A hooch pooch of jobs in which he stayed for a year or less in each place

And this guy wonders why nobody is hiring him?

[poorman]

The above post is a hard knock out summary of what's exactly wrong with the current generation of fresh graduates seeking to land that 'dream' job

Thread may be closed lol.