Thursday, August 30, 2007

The Best Investment Banks – top entry level hires

I’ve shorted listed a number of best investment banks from another source.
Collegegrad.com is a website dedicated for college students and recent grads. They have a list of Top Entry Level Employers for 2007. Employers are ranked according to their projected number of 2007 entry level hires.

Here are the investment banks on the list and their projected 2007 hires.



Bank of America – 2,500
UBS – 1,500
Morgan Stanley – 600
Lehman Brothers – 400

See the full list

You would notice that BoA, UBS, MS and Lehman all enjoy high ranking in almost any poll. If you want to start an investment banking career, you do worth investing some time visiting their career sites. You can find them on the right hand side of this blog.



Recommended career tools:

Amazing Resume Creator
A DIY resume is good enough for an entry level job. Investment bankers always want the best out of the best. To stand out from the crowd, get Jimmy Sweeney’s help to craft a best resume for yourself.


Amazing Cover Letter
A powerful cover letter is the perfect partner of your resume. Personalize and customize your amazing cover letter with Jimmy Sweeney’s help.


Best Investment Banks

Monday, August 27, 2007

The Best Investment Banks – top MBA employers

Fortune has a poll picking the top 100 employers most desired by MBA students. For the interest of my readers, I’ve noticed that there are 16 investment banks on the list. Let’s see who these best investment banks are.

Fortune 2007 - 100 top MBA employers
3 Goldman Sachs
10 Bank of America
11 Citi
12 Morgan stanley
15 Lehman Brothers
19 Merrill Lynch
21 JPMorgan
38 Deutsche Bank
39 UBS
43 Fidelity
45 JPM Chase
46 Bear Stearn
47 Barclays Capital
55 Credit Suisse
72 Wachovia
84 HSBC


Fortune 2007 - 100 top MBA employers – Full List & Methodology

Compare with Business Week’s poll of Best Places to Launch a Career, you’ll notice that Goldman Sachs has a high ranking in both polls. Citi being ranked as the Global Best Investment Bank by Global Finance, also enjoys high ranking in the MBA students’ poll.

I am sure you must want to dive into the career sites of these best investment banks and see if there are opportunities for yourself. Before we do so, we’ll look at another desired employer tomorrow.



Recommended career tools:

Amazing Resume Creator
a DIY resume is good enough for an entry level job. Investment bankers always want the best out of the best. To stand out from the crowd, get Jimmy Sweeney’s help to craft a best resume for yourself.


Amazing Cover Letter
A powerful cover letter is the perfect partner of your resume. Personalize and customize your amazing cover letter with Jimmy Sweeney’s help.

Best Investment Banks

Sunday, August 26, 2007

The Best Investment Banks – to launch a career

Best Places to Launch a Career
Business Week has a poll called BEST PLACES TO LAUNCH A CAREER. Of course it is not easy to determine who the best employers are for entry-level workers.


Methodologies & 2006 rankings

Best Investment Banks to Launch a Career
For the interest of my readers, I’m only interested to find out who are the best investment banks for entry-level bankers. Among the top 30, there are three investment banks, namely:


Rank 4: Goldman Sachs
2005 Entry Level Hires: 615
Average Pay: $55,000 and above

Rank 9: JPMorgan
2005 Entry Level Hires: 249
Average Pay: $55,000 and above

Rank 22: Lehman Brothers
2005 Entry Level Hires: 400
Average Pay: $55,000 and above

If you want to visit these best investment banks career sites, you can find them on the right hand side of this blog.


Tomorrow, we'll look at another best employers poll.


Recommended career tools:

Amazing Resume Creator
a DIY resume is good enough for an entry level job. Investment bankers always want the best out of the best. To stand out from the crowd, get Jimmy Sweeney’s help to craft a best resume for yourself.


Amazing Cover Letter
A powerful cover letter is the perfect partner of your resume. Personalize and customize your amazing cover letter with Jimmy Sweeney’s help.


Best Investment Banks

Thursday, August 16, 2007

How to Choose the Best Investment Banks – Be Selective

While we were searching for a head of Asia equities, my boss made a very thoughtful comment which truly reflected the situation. Mr. A is the right person for that job; Mr. B is the person who wants that job. This is always an unavoidable dilemma that headhunters have to face. While searching for a best investment bank to start your career, try to make yourself the right person who wants the job. One major strategy is ‘be selective’. Don’t flood the market with your resume.

Select 10 best investment banks. One of the most popular questions during interview is ‘how many other banks have you approached or had an interview?’ Tell the interviewer how and why you’ve selected their banks. Successful investment bankers make lots of money, but please do give some other good reasons.


Opportunities
Few people stay with their first employer for 19 years like Anthony Leung did. However if the company you work for provides good training and opportunities for graduates, you will just stay there naturally. I’ll elaborate this further when I talk about Anthony Leung in my later posts.

Opportunities relate to size. If a bank is big enough, there are opportunities everywhere. However make sure these opportunities are what you want. Like if you fancy M&A, please target Goldman. If you fancy equities, you might want to target ML.


Training
Graduates need training and mentoring. Try to schedule some informational interviews through your alumni network. See which bank has the highest score while you ask about training and mentoring. Also try to schedule informational interviews with some senior bankers through recruitment fairs or direct approach. If time allows, many of them were happy to share their experience with young people of how they built their career. It would be an advantage if you come from a same university. Over the internet, you can collect the bios of many senior bankers and it is easy to find out where they graduated from.


Culture
This is an important issue and sometimes a determining issue. As a headhunter, I’ve witnessed some outstanding candidates didn’t receive/accept an offer due to cultural issues. Investment bankers spend more than half of their time at work, make sure to find a place you feel happy and comfortable. During an interview, do spend a good amount of time in finding out if the work culture of the bank suits you.


How to choose an investment bank?
eFinancial Careers Australia recently published an article for students who want to start an investment banking career. Though it is Australia focused, it is quite universal in terms of strategies. I would recommend your reading it.



Recommended career tools:

Amazing Resume Creator
a DIY resume is good enough for an entry level job. Investment bankers always want the best out of the best. To stand out from the crowd, get Jimmy Sweeney’s help to craft a best resume for yourself.


Amazing Cover Letter
A powerful cover letter is the perfect partner of your resume. Personalize and customize your amazing cover letter with Jimmy Sweeney’s help.

Best Investment Banks

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Best Investment Banks - in terms of career

Is the best investment bank the best place to launch your career? Obviously these are two separate issues. The best investment bank might not be the best place for YOU. Your interest, strength and expectations have to map with that of the employers. Therefore there are many criteria to consider while targeting your first full time employer.

As we are in the investment banking field, it won’t work against us if we know who the best players in the market are. So let’s talk about who are the best investment banks before we go on to talk about who are the best employers for graduates.

There are polls of all kind, such as 30 under 30 traders, 100 rising stars, top 10 employers and so on. Each year, various financial media run their own polls and many of them on investment banks. While Euromoney, AsiaMoney and some others only reveal their results to paid subscribers, Global Finance publishes its full list free of charge.


Global Finance’s 2007 Short List


Global
Best Investment Bank: Citi
Best Equity Bank: Merrill Lynch
Best Debt Bank: Citi
Best M&A Bank: Goldman
Best Private Equity: Kohlberg Kravis Roberts

Regional
Best Investment Bank in Asia: Citi
Best Investment Bank in North America: Citi
Best Investment Bank in Western Europe: Deutsche Bank
Best Investment Bank in Latin America: Citi


Check Global Finance 2007 full list and their methodology

Quote from Global Finance
“We have identified the banks that the best companies choose to get things done,” said Global Finance publisher Joseph D. Giarraputo. “We’re not just picking the biggest; we’re choosing the best, based on profitability, financial strength, as well as quality of staff dedicated to investment banking.”

Hedge Fund
Euromoney rank Citadel the best hedge fund house in 2007. Global Finance does not rank hedge funds.

Conclusion

When you browse through different polls, you’ll notice similar names like Citi, Goldman, ML, KKR keep appearing. Obviously they are the top players in the market. We will continue to see if these best investment banks are the best places for graduates to start a career.




Best Investment Banks

Thursday, August 2, 2007

Craft Your Own Sample Resume – Investment Banking

In today’s exercise, you are required to use Henry Hunter’s sample resume to craft your own. Remember your resume is an important tool to set your feet into the Wall Street firms.

Let’s go back to 1993 when Henry was just graduated from MIT with his dual degrees in Science and Management. With such qualifications, he was likely to outperform any other candidates. But that’s not enough. Investment banking is a matter of human relations and networking. Therefore, you should also list your extra curricular activities to demonstrate your people skills.

While nowadays Henry doesn’t need these to appear on his resume, he is reluctant to write his list. I have therefore borrowed my niece’s instead. Actually I have shortened the list by half. Isn’t it amazing that a young person can do that many things while studying full time? If you’ve read Margaret Thatcher’s autobiography, my niece was actually quite lazy.

Make sure you keep a good record of yourself and be selective of what to include in your sample resume. List activities that are people-oriented and with team spirit. If you play football and swimming, list football. If you won a photography competition and a debating competition, list the debating award.

When writing a resume for your first full time job, make sure to include your internship experience. Hiring managers always want people with a well-rounded personality and a good balance of life.


Your Sample Resume
If you have 0 to three years of experience, make sure to write in this sequence:
1. Name, contact phone and email
2. Education: degree, university, city and country
3. Activities and achievements: select people-oriented items
4. Work experiences
5. Any other information, hobbies or skills that are useful to your application

Length: limit to one page

Let’s expand it and use Henry’s and my niece’s data to craft a new sample resume.

YOUR NAME
Phone: +81-90-1234-5678 Email: henryhunter@email.com

EDUCATION
1993 Bachelors in Computer Science / Bachelors in Management - MIT, Cambridge, MA
1994 Masters in Computer Science - MIT, Cambridge, MA (expected graduation 1994)

ACTIVITIES AND AWARDS

· CBS Distinguished Student Scholarship Award (2006)
· Dean’s Certificate of Academic Achievement (2006)
· Reporter of CUHK’s Press Committee (2005 - 2006)
· Debater of CUHK’s English Debating Team (2004 - 2005)
· Hong Kong Young Ambassador Scheme – Gold Medal (2002 - 2003)
· Hong Kong Bank Foundation of JPC Award - Best Member Award (2001)
· The Hong Kong Award for the Young People - Bronze, Silver Award (2000 – 2002)

WORK EXPERIENCE

HSBC
Summer Intern, Equity Research, Hong Kong, 2006
Member of the Asia ex-Japan equity research team. Assisted in data collection and compiling of research reports.

FORTIS INVESTMENT
Summer Intern, Risk Management, Hong Kong, 2005
Member of the reinsurance brokers team for 15 Asian clients’ reinsurance programs. Developed skills in risk management and spread of risk across variety of financial instruments.

PERSONAL
Born in 1970, speaks fluent English, Mandarin and Japanese. Knowledge of Bloomberg.

If you have gathered three years or more experience, use this sequence:
1. Name, contact phone and email
2. Work experience
3. Education: degree, university, city and country
4. Activities and Achievements: select people-oriented items
5. Any other information, hobbies or skills that are useful to your application

Length: limit to one page

Always keep your incredible achievements on your resume, regardless of your experience
As you gather more and more experience, the significance of your activities weight less and less. If at some stage you consider your experience is solid enough to sell yourself, you can omit your activities list completely. However if you have something really outstanding, it is always good to list it. For example, one of my candidates obtain straight 'A's in any of her examinations, she always keep this info on her resume.

To whom should you present your sample resume?
In my next post, I am going to talk about how to look for an appropriate employer to start your investment banking career.

Recommended career tools:
Amazing Resume Creator
a DIY resume is good enough for an entry level job. Investment bankers always want the best out of the best. To stand out from the crowd, get Jimmy Sweeney’s help to craft a best resume for yourself.
Amazing Cover Letter
A powerful cover letter is the perfect partner of your resume. Personalize and customize your amazing cover letter with Jimmy Sweeney’s help.

Sample Resume