The "Am I good enough for Investment Banking/Consultancy?" Thread

That's not how banking works!

Why not?
I mean the principe seems quite logical..
Team A gathers the money from the customers/ do the consulting job
Team B invests it in the market or recommends stocks/bonds etc
And team C administrates everything

Did I get something wrong?

Well, very, very simply:

'Team A' are investment bankers who neither invest, nor bank. Their revenue comes from the deals they work on. That money pays their salary and goes to the banks profits.

'Team B' are traders who trade the bank's money and client's money and if they make a profit, then great.

If at the end of the year Teams A and B have made more money than they have cost - everyone i shappy.

'Team BCG' do the consulting - not sure what you're talking about.

'Team C' do all the administration i.e. HR, IT and Finance - or more, accurately, not making any money for the bank. They are a drain on the profits made by Teams A and B.

You really need to look this up more!

Without Team C, however, Team A and B will not be able to do their job properly.

Well they could do the job but with no HR support etc. but back office is not more prestigious!!

HR support isn't the only thing Back Office does. It includes other support functions, such as Finance, execution, compliance, etc...

So, without good Back Office, a Bank is screwed.

And if you're after prestige, Banking will only be interesting for the first few months. The ones who burn out first are usually the ones who joined for the prestige only.

I don't understand what you mean. Are you seriously suggesting that a BO job is better than a FO job? That's crazy!

Execution is FO!

Nobody burns out after a few months unless they just don't enjoy it but then that's pretty much a different reason. Suggesting that a "better" role is one in the back office is just ignorant of the practical realities of career hunting.

Hey what do you think I have a chance of landing a BO job in a BB?

GCSEs: 8A*s, 2As
A-Level: Italian (B), History (A), Biology (B)
2:1 in Biomedicine from a Redbrick uni

After graduation got a temp job in account management in medical marketing for a few months to gain basic .office/admin experience.

ECs: grade 5 clarinet, volunteering as chief accountant at NSPCC, hobbies are acting and
dancing

What are chances ?

This will be my profile next year when entering the job market:

BA Tourism Management from a small university in Austria
MSc Marketing & Strategy from Warwick Business School (planning to write a project-based dissertation with a company)

- have spent an exchange semester in Sweden
- have done a 6-month internship with great responsibilities at a tourism company in Canada
- have taken a summer course in Strategic Management at LSE
- fluent in German, French, English, Spanish and have taken 3 years of Russian

What are my chances of getting a job at one of the big consultancy firms? Am I screwed because I focused on tourism after my A-levels? Can the MSc from Warwick make up for this at all?

Looks like I change to chemsitry at Warwick, sweet
Would there be any differentiation between these in terms of an IB application:
Chem
Mchem
Chem with management
Chem with medicinal chem ?

Me: GCSE's: 8 C''s yes i know there sh*te
A levels (predicted): Business Studies A Economics A History B
Degree: Financial Management Hull University (prof experience) hopefully in a small/medium IB
Work Experience: pizza takeaway (2 and a half yrs), Greggs (a year), Redmayne Bentley Stockbrokers (2 weeks)
EC's: Financial director young enterprise, starting trading portfolio next summer.

What do you guys recommend i do to enhance my CV particularly ECs to pursue a career in IB preferably FO.
Cheers