| Topic Name: |
Switching I-Banks |
| Message Name: |
Don't believe everything you read |
| Date Posted: |
05/29/2000 |
| In Reply To: |
The overwhelming consensus is that MS and GS are the top two banks on the Street, arguably followed by ML, SSB, and CSFB (in no particular order). I'm starting as an associate in IB at one of the latter banks in a few months, and I've got a few questions.
1. Are the exit opportunities really that much better from GS and MS than from ML, SSB, and CSFB?
2. Is it better to be working in a good group at SSB, ML, or CSFB, or to be working in any group at MS or GS? (FYI - I'm going to be in M&A).
3. If it really is that much better for the career to be at MS or GS, then is it very difficult to switch to one of those banks after a year or so? |
| Message: |
Imagine, for a moment, the year is 1980. You are an aspiring technology manager.
Think, for a moment, what people (mostly without any real experience) on a hypothetical message board might have said if one existed back then:
"The only place to go to work is IBM. They are the best, they get the best recruits, they are the best way to get into business school, they are where everybody that graduates from a top b-school wants to go.
You want to go work for a bunch of Harvard drop-outs (Microsoft)?! A bunch of engineer geeks who couldn't hack it at a real company like Fairchild Semiconductor (Intel)?!!
Or perhaps later, a screwdriver shop like Dell or Gateway 2000? What kind of a loser are you?"
Established firms do many things well. One of the advantages they have is that they retain home court advantage in recruiting. As you can see from uninformed opinions, despite having expensive educations which are meant to teach critical thought, most people apply no critical thought whatsoever to their choice of firms. They simply learn to categorize "facts" based upon fourth-hand knowledge, and become very vocal in the defense of that way of thinking.
It always astounded me in undergraduate classes how many people would attempt to discuss Marx without ever having read Marx. Or accepted basic assumption while never thinking to question the underlying truth of those assumptions.
The flipside to the "established firm" coin is that there are some things that established firms do not do well, no matter how smart the people they recruit. IBM, GM and others are useful guides in this respect.
Don't get me wrong, for personal reasons I am a vocal booster of Goldman's culture, capabilities, and talent. However, I am not blindly reverant of the firm, and neither should anyone be. People who go to Goldman because "it's Goldman" are the worst sort of lemmings in the employment world.
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