I Want to be an Investment Banker-->Private Equity: Please Help

I graduated from a small but prominent business school around the Boston area in May of 2009 with a Bachelor's degree in Finance. I have not realized my desire to be in the Investment Banking industry until about six months ago and have since been trying to ramp up my knowledge, network, and credentials to best position myself to land a summer internship that could transition into a full-time offer. I plan on doing this by working for another year and getting into a top 15 B school in the country. I plan to ultimately work for a boutique private equity firm in the Boston area.

I am currently working at a custodian bank as a fund accountant. I am trying to find a more challenging job in financial services, but am finding it particularly hard. Even though I consider myself a recent graduate, I am competiting with this year's graduates for entry level positions.

Any insights are welcomed on the track I should take, the feasibility of my goals, jobs I should seek out now to make myself more competitive for Business school, anything! I would greatly appreciate it if someone could take a peak a my resume also. Thank you so much guys - SF really changed my life! =)

You should probably do the CFA program, if you haven't already started. Also go to analystforum and ask away there, as I imagine there are quite a few i-bankers to help you, or you can at least read the threads to get informed. Good luck.

There have been about a 1000 threads about this.. Just search for "I wanna make mad moneys and enjoy models and bottles at an investment bank/PE/HF". If all fails, ask a gentleman by the name of Fuuma for advice. He is our resident Finance/IB expert on here.

but like

-Target School
-GPA
-Internships (gained from target school + gpa)
-Connections (gained from family)

Originally Posted by office drone

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You should probably do the CFA program, if you haven't already started. Also go to analystforum and ask away there, as I imagine there are quite a few i-bankers to help you, or you can at least read the threads to get informed. Good luck.

Thank you for the advice. I've been doing a lot of research, and it seems that the consensus is that the CFA is relatively useless for Investment Banking/Private Equity and that most people in the industry do not hold a CFA. Was I misinformed?

Srsly, Fuuma can really help you out, I would PM him.

Are you a mathematician? Seriously, all those stories about hotshot young college graduates who may or may not be gaming the system making millions a year are math geeks. If you just want to be a garden variety investor like you read in the paper, then good luck on the corporate ladder. If you want to be an entrepreneur than start designing your own programs using your math skills. Not as romantic and mysterious as the movies, but this is the truth.

Take it from me: no, you don't. Do something else with your life that doesn't consume you with self-loathing. That is, if you want to do it solely for the money, which it sounds like...

Originally Posted by bringusingoodale

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Are you a mathematician? Seriously, all those stories about hotshot young college graduates who may or may not be gaming the system making millions a year are math geeks. If you just want to be a garden variety investor like you read in the paper, then good luck on the corporate ladder. If you want to be an entrepreneur than start designing your own programs using your math skills. Not as romantic and mysterious as the movies, but this is the truth.

From my experiences (and that's not much), you don't have to be a math wizard or a modeling wizard, for that matter to be an Investment Banking Analyst, which is still considered to be an entry level position, where you are not expected to know everything and will learn to hone all your skills during the 1-2 year stint. In regards to my goals and where I want to get with IB, I really just want to gain some dynamic experience for about two years to break into a boutique Private Equity firm. By no means do I want to get into the trading or hedge funds.

Quants are sucks. Thier models are fail them.

Try going through your universities' alumni networks. Connections are everything in the business world.

Originally Posted by jays978

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I plan to ultimately work for a boutique private equity firm in the Boston area . . . I am currently working at a custodian bank as a fund accountant . . . Thank you so much guys - SF really changed my life! =)

Originally Posted by MetroStyles

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+1000

Originally Posted by JoelF

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+1000

Fine!

Originally Posted by Bhowie

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Srsly, Fuuma can really help you out, I would PM him.

lol