8 Hot Career Tips from Investment Bankers

Let’s be real, the world of investment banking can be a total minefield of egos, a place where tips are doled out in exchange for social currency and priceless validation. Which is exactly why you need someone like us to cut through the chaff and curate the good stuff with eight of the best tips from the IB trenches, straight from the pros who’ve lived them.

Did we say minefield? We meant to say goldmine.

Table of Contents

Forget the Glamor

OK, we’ve all seen The Wolf of Wall Street, but the truth is, none of us are Leo. WallStreetMojo founder and J.P. Morgan alum Dheeraj Vaidya urges IB up-and-comers to leave delusions of dazzle at the door. On expecting your days to be full of nothing but high-stakes deals, Vaidya brings us back down to earth: “Do not expect this to be true, especially at the analyst or associate level. The tasks [will] be the ones that come down from the senior managers and [will] be basic grunt work.”

But it ain’t for nothing, as “It does pay back when you handle a much more influential position in the company, higher up the ladder.”

Plan for the Long Haul

You’ll find fewer deeper IB trenches than the forums at Wall Street Oasis, and it’s there that longtime partner Tom Cole stepped up to answer community-submitted questions and reveal why it’s so important for IB newbies to plan for the duration in at least two key stages. “There are two seasons in this industry,” he says. “The first 5-7 years [are] learn and survive, the following years [are] about relationships and revenue generation. These require different skill sets for each season.”

But those seasons do share some central themes: “If you are trustworthy, knowledgeable, and interesting, people will want to hang out with you – this is the fun part of the job. The more CEOs you spend time with, the more information you get about what is happening in the industry, and the more valuable you become.”

Know Thy Staffer

For all the money motivation, it’s easy to forget that working in IB is a very human-focused job, one that one-thousand percent hinges on relationships. Peak Frameworks founder Matt Ting thinks the most crucial of those relationships is with your staffer.

“There are going to be a lot of mid-level and senior people that you can spend time networking with, but by far the most important contact in the first few months is going to be the staffer,” says Ting. “The staffer is the person who decides which analysts get which projects. This is extremely important because those first few staffings are going to be the ones that you’ll put on your resume to recruit for buy-side roles.”

Just. Listen.

Another fount of Wall Street Oasis knowledge, a 14-year analyst user known as frgna stresses the value of keeping your ears open. Sure, the art of good listening is a virtually universal tool, but plenty of IB hotspurs need the reminder. “Some bankers and even some analysts are so garrulous that they miss key points, and their words just lose weight over time – they’re so eager to say what they know that they just blurt out whatever they know on a subject,” warns frgna.

The alternative is a quietly brokered power. “You want it so [that] when you speak, people know you have listened, and you’re saying something of value. Keep your cards close.”

Ease Up on Internal Competition

This one ties into both the glamor thing and the relationships thing. If you got into IB with a glorified idea of cutthroat scheming and internal ladder-climbing based on dramatic maneuvering, maybe go back to the drawing board.

Speaking to eFinancialCareers, Goldman Sachs vet and INSEAD adjunct professor, Graham Ward, offers a softer alternative. “It’s best to concentrate on your own objectives and not dwell on others around you. Only compare yourself with yourself.”

Ward expands, “The rewards in banking can be great, but only one person can be the best. People may earn more than you, and they may be given career breaks you feel you deserve. Advancement programs are by nature imperfect. Learn to live with that. If you are happy, keep working at it. In the end you will be recognized.”

Taste That VP Secret Sauce

Over at WSO, Tom Cole offers up what he thinks is the formula for the ideal VP, writing that “The perfect VP is one that can act like a Director. Someone who can manage the associate and analyst on projects, and build a relationship with his/her counterpart at the client.”

That theoretical hero VP needs to “be able to run execution from start to finish,” but even more importantly than that? They need to “know when to ask for help.”

Overcommunicate Upfront

Ex-FAANGer and current VC Sydney Chiu strongly encourages IB newcomers to overdo it when it comes to communication. “As things come in ad-hoc, as urgent things come through, making sure to tell the rest of your team […] is extremely important,” she stresses. “We’re all busy on like five, six, seven different things, so it’s up to you to overcommunicate and tell people when you’re going to be able to do something and when you think you’ll be able to deliver the actual thing.”

On communicating, more is more. Simple as that.

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Dan is a Dallas-based freelance writer and consultant specializing in tech, media analysis and lifestyle content. In his decade-plus experience, he’s been fortunate enough to work alongside finance-focused partners including Fortune, The Motley Fool, Bizfluent, Business.com, Chron.com and many more. You can find him on LinkedIn.