After my two contracts at well-known firms in Hong Kong, I’m convinced I want a career in front-office banking. Nonetheless, the finance industry is now in such a bad shape that hiring graduates isn’t a priority for most banks. Many of my friends who had previously coveted front-office jobs have now moved on. Some went into commodity trading firms (which are getting increasingly competitive nowadays), while others set up their own businesses (iPhone applications, tuition centres, dessert shops, electronics dealing etc).A minority chose to work for companies in the real estate and energy industries.

So here I am, trying to clock relevant front-office experience, hoping eventually to get a full-time offer from a bank. I’m giving myself until this summer, otherwise like many of my peers, I will choose to move to another sector, which shouldn’t be too difficult given my work experience in banking,

Back to front doesn’t work

I have encountered many graduates who couldn’t get a client-facing role, but then tried out the back office hoping to find a front-office job in the future. But this isn’t really a wise decision nowadays. Apart from the reality that transferring from back to front is close to impossible, investment banks are now even thinking of outsourcing their operations, finance and IT divisions to cheaper countries such as India, Philippines and Hungary. I have a friend who was told to travel to India to teach his new colleagues there about the job, but he doesn’t even know whether he still has a position with the bank after that.

I also know auditors who quit their jobs before one year was up. Some chose to be teachers, while others became trainees in other industries, taking lower salaries in return for a relatively more exciting job scope. Hearing such stories made me decide that the big four and back-office functions of a bank are off my shopping list.

The situation now in the finance industry is that hiring budgets are tight and headcount is frozen, but there is still a lot of work to be done, especially at a junior level. So by hiring contract workers or interns, like me, salaries are not recorded on the balance sheet, giving HR more flexibility. And of course, seniors get to unload all their unwanted work onto us. I’ve given one year of my life to investment banking and I really hope things turn around soon, so I can get the proper recognition that I deserve and become a full-time employee.

Where: Hong Kong. Incidentally, it’s the first time that the global event has been held in Asia.

When: Late April

Who: Champions in their own right. A hundred students first won competitions in their respective countries before competing globally. The 24 teams were given realistic business case studies, which they then analysed in depth and presented to 19 senior KPMG partners. Ultimately, the team from the University of Hong Kong emerged as winners.

It’s not the movies, you don’t join a competition to land a job

Gary Chui, one of the winners and a final-year law and accounting undergraduate, says: “I’ve never thought of landing a job through the competition. There were two main factors why I joined. Firstly, there were a lot of professional judges so it was a chance for me to learn from their feedback; I also wanted to build up my presentation and proposal skills. And lastly, I felt this would help differentiate my resume from other job applicants.”

How to win?

Show some group love: Chui, who aspires to break into the consulting and advisory business someday, says working as a team was a crucial element. “We’ve worked together previously on different projects in schools so we are very familiar with each other; we know our strengths and weaknesses, so we distributed the work accordingly.”

Slog it out: The winners went through four intense rounds of presentations in three days. They were also given little time to analyse and discuss each case.

Besides, KPMG looks out for graduates who are analytical and enthusiastic, says one of the judges, Roy Leung, partner, KPMG China. “It’s a challenging work environment, so we want graduate hires who can think positively and take up opportunities to develop themselves further.”

Roll with the punches: The team saw some unexpected issues crop up. During the first round of the competition for instance, their computer died a sudden death. Chui says: “We calmed ourselves down and continued to present to the judges from memory, without using the PowerPoint slides.”

Gotta live and learn: Leung was impressed with the team’s enthusiastic attitude. “One of the judges’ objectives is to provide timely feedback during the competition. We also observe if participants have improved from the feedback given – that’s something KPMG values and the winners did a really good job on that.”

Go deep: Leung says the Hong Kong team’s ability to provide strong, detailed analysis with both qualitative and quantitative considerations made them the shoo-in winners. “At the end of the day, that made our job as judges a lot easier.”

7.30am – 9.00am

It is always hard to describe a typical day at work because you never know when the markets or a transaction will take a sudden turn. That being said, I usually start my day around 7.30-8.00am from home. One of the first things I do is review my overnight emails on BlackBerry and deal with anything urgent. This often involves forwarding any overnight news or developments to the team and our core clients. I try to leave the house around 8.30am and clear my head with a 15-minute stroll along the Yarra River in Melbourne to work. I also go through media articles and the Australian Financial Review on BlackBerry to catch up on global and Australasian M&A and equity/debt market news.

9am – 12.00pm

As I get into work, I grab a morning coffee to kick start my day and jump on to a 9.00am conference call to discuss the latest list of bidders for a sell-side transaction. We find out that one of our bidders is flying in a team to attend a management presentation and site visits for the asset. I quickly send an email to my personal assistant, who will assist me on logistics, flights and accommodation. It looks like my team will be heading to Sydney to host this presentation, while I will be accompanying the bidder’s representatives on site visits. Everything will have to run like clockwork on that day and my mind starts to tick over the immense list of things to do.

As I hop off the conference call, I quickly grab some breakfast from the kitchen. I have just received an email alert for one of the public companies that I cover in my sector. There has been a significant profit downgrade. I start to draft an email to send to my team and clients who will be keeping a close eye on the situation. I wait until 10.00am when the ASX opens and sure enough, the stock price is down 10 per cent in the first 10 minutes of trading. We hold an emergency meeting and start brainstorming strategic ideas for the company. Not great timing though as my team tries to juggle this with all that is happening on our sell-side deal. I jump onto yet another conference call as the company holds a webcast with its CFO on the profit downgrade. A few heated moments ensue at the end when brokers grill management on this latest downgrade. I listen in, slightly bemused, but also glad that I am not on the receiving end of this call.

12.00pm – 5.30pm

As I hop off the call, I hop into a taxi with my director for a lunchtime due diligence committee (DDC) meeting we are having with one of our clients, a private equity firm, and the board and management team from one of its portfolio companies. We pick up a couple of our ECM bankers on the way out. We are holding the DDC meeting with a group of lawyers and accountants as we help the company ready itself for an IPO. That goes on for a few hours, followed by a session on process with the ECM bankers. I then stay back for a prospectus drafting session, hoping that we progress enough so that we are on track and no one has to work on the public holiday coming up. Fingers crossed!

5.30pm – 12am

By the time I head back to the office it is 5.30pm. After an entire day of calls and meetings, I decide it’s time to clear my mind and I head to the gym for a quick run and a relaxing yoga session. After grabbing a bite to eat while partaking in a bit of team banter, I settle down in front of my computer and get started on updating my valuation models, and the management presentation. When I finally get into my taxi to go home, it is almost midnight and I have an early flight to Sydney in the morning. Just another day in the life of an analyst!

What is the one tip I would give students seeking a career in investment banking? Try to gain as much life experience as possible while you are still at university, whether that be through casual work, going on exchange, travelling, networking, running student societies or playing competitive sport. Investment banking offers young people an incredible opportunity to work with senior and experienced members of the corporate world. Hence, it is important for junior bankers to possess a diversity of experience and a certain sense of maturity and worldliness when dealing with clients.

Last week, eFinancialCareers sat in on part of a business dynamics course for 26 UBS graduate trainees from across Asia Pacific. All hail from the middle and back office – including compliance, IT, risk, operations and HR.

The five-day programme held at the UBS Businesses University in Singapore centres on a business simulation, whose premise sounds ripe for reality TV. Trainees are split into five teams and compete fiercely against each other with their mock businesses. The goal: to run a profit-making enterprise at the end of five years.

Intense is an understatement

From the get-go, participants knew that it was going to be extremely intense. The programme kicked-off each day at 8.30am and wrapped up at 9pm, sometimes even later as teams broke out into their own discussions. The first morning started easily enough though with introductions. The trainees, most of which have worked for under a year, talked about their current role at UBS, their aims for the week, their least favourite nickname, their most embarrassing moment and a talent that they have.

Becoming CEOs

Once the ice breaking got out of the way, the trainer solicited responses from the attendees on the factors needed to run a successful business – including the location, debt, equity, assets, inventory, cash flow, employees, customers, nature of the company, suppliers, competition, marketing, research, management strategy, profits, revenue, costs, investments and the regulatory/political environment. The trainer then got everyone thinking about how those aspects related to their roles within UBS.

Next up, trainees were inducted into the basic rules of the game and split into teams. They were an Australian luxury yacht company that has been around for 70 years. While it had previously always made a profit, the last couple of years had been difficult, with the firm sustaining some small losses. Disgruntled shareholders had dismissed the old board and had brought in a new one (i.e. the trainees) in hopes that the firm could be returned to profitability over the next five years.

The rebranding challenge

Some background information was provided: the firm had only operated within Asia Pacific, it had only every made entry-level yachts, never venturing into more upmarket models. The firm also had an image problem, thanks to its rather unimaginative name of Yachts Inc.

Trainees had to first rebrand the firm; coming up with a new name, logo and tagline. Teams also had to allocate the different board roles including CEO, CFO, director of production and procurement, director of sales, and director of marketing. The only proviso? Those who had direct experience in any of these areas had to take on a different function. Each team was also mentored by an experienced manager from UBS who provided some guidance as they went along.

A little drama

More challenges were thrown in during the week. The board faced off against their demanding employees in three town hall meetings, they also underwent cut-throat bidding for contracts. Another spanner was thrown into the works when each board had its sales director suddenly leave for the competition. By the time day five and the shareholder presentations came around, the boards had dealt with several unexpected problems.

One firm had to close down its China factory, while others had to grapple with smaller market share. Investors, as role-played by the trainer and facilitators, were merciless, asking tough questions around cost, profitability, future plans and so forth. Before announcing the winner, Lee Elliott, executive director of operations at UBS, also shared some insights on building competitive advantage within the firm.

In the end, as with any competition, one team, Nauticus, emerged as the clear winner. Cordelia Chan, 26, CEO of the winning team and a HR graduate trainee based in Hong Kong, says the biggest challenge was having to be adaptable when things didn’t go to plan – for instance, when the team didn’t cinch certain bids that it thought were a shoo-in. “My biggest takeaway was that I needed to make sure I understand my internal clients at UBS. It also helped me to be more innovative and think outside the box.”

Those who know the reality have probably done an internship in the sector, be it in ECM, DCM or M&A. Some of these people have continued to bite the bullet and become full-fledged analysts, but many interns I know have decided that banking is not for them.

So it was with this rather mixed knowledge that I chose to take up contract work in the investment banking division of a bank. I was first alerted to this opportunity by a friend who informed me that the team needed a junior person for a short period. So I sent in my resume, went for an interview, and got the job. I then had to decide whether I should actually take up the offer.

I’ve long heard about the inhumane hours that IB juniors put in, and that alone was enough to make me think twice. Nonetheless, after several consultations with friends and senior finance professionals, I decided to say yes, while still looking for a full-time role.

Well, I can now safely say I’ve been IB, done IB, and I’m not interested to go down that path. More than a month has passed since my first day in the job. In fairness, things could be worse. I go home before 10pm everyday and I get weekends off.  Not too bad, considering a fellow analyst in a tier-one bank wrote “finally going home” on his Facebook page at 6am one Saturday morning recently. Scary…I don’t think I could do that.

Did someone say slides?

Work-wise, it’s: PowerPoints, PowerPoints and more PowerPoints. According to a banker friend in Hong Kong, doing slides takes up 80 per cent of the average analyst’s time. So, if you’re good at that, congratulations because you’re a top analyst. That surprised me as I thought I would spend more time building financial models on Excel, but apparently not.

Apart from PowerPoint formatting, a junior is expected to do execution stuff like updating financial statements when earnings season hits, and updating market figures to send to clients and internal capital-markets professionals. And of course we cannot escape the occasional buying of breakfast, lunch and coffee for those higher up the food chain.

Perhaps what surprised me about investment banking is the huge amount of legal work that goes into it. It’s no wonder that many lawyers become bankers later on in their careers. Consider things like defining contract terms, minute nuances in sentence structures in the term sheet – all work of a junior lawyer. Not my kind of thing really; I still prefer numbers and charts.

If you’re a student thinking of what course to take during college, I would recommend law. It’s a professional degree and it gives you tremendous flexibility between law and banking.

Such is the life of an investment banking junior. Not really glamourous, but hey, everybody has to start from the bottom. The good thing is that you get paid a lot by graduate standards and your prospects are tremendous. And doing corporate finance work opens a lot of other doors for you, should you not choose to stay in the sector.

In this blog, I’m going to talk about the profiles of the fellow candidates I’ve met during the course of my interviews for grad roles in Hong Kong, so that junior job seekers can assess the competition they are facing.

1) Fresh grads

These are mainly people who graduated from local universities this year. The best of this lot have outstanding grades (either first-class honours or summa cum laude), stellar CCA records and at least two months of front-office internship experience in bulge bracket investment banks.

Many i-banks have not converted most of their interns in the front office due to a hiring freeze. As such, a lot of impressive undergraduate resumes are still flying around; it’s scary.

2) Front-office wannabes

The second profile of candidates belongs to those who graduated 12 to 24 months ago (class of 2010 or 2011) and have up to two years’ experience in a bulge bracket bank, albeit in the back or middle office. I see hordes of people who are unhappy with their jobs in operations, risk, finance etc and hope to make the switch to the front office, leveraging on the reputation of the bank they work for. Barclays, UBS, Goldman Sachs etc: you name it; I’ve seen it.

3) Semi-experienced guys who think they’re grads again

These are by far the most qualified and powerful of my rival candidates: people who graduated maybe two years ago and have experience in the front office of an investment bank. They may not necessarily be at a bulge bracket, but the firm will be renowned enough to make recruiters’ eyes twitch.

These people are here for graduate interviews because they have been let go in the recent round of retrenchments, and they do not mind taking a pay cut in the current climate. They are a tough lot to compete against. In one of my interviews, I met a candidate who was a forwards trader in a well-known investment bank. However, he was made redundant just seven months into the job because his entire desk, including his boss, was axed.

And oh, did I mention those who do not only have undergraduate degrees but master degrees as well? With the demand of jobs far outstripping the supply, be prepared for a bumpy ride. I certainly am.

So what are boutiques looking for on your CV and what’s the best way to stand out from other applicants?

Boutiques want to see evidence of working on deals and what you can really do!  The five essential points to include are as follows:

1. Make sure you write the number of deals and types of deals you’ve worked on.  If you are a junior, even mention the deals that didn’t close; it’s not your fault and you still carried out all the analysis.
2. Tell your story and sell yourself. Talk about your experience in completing valuation models, due diligence, research methodologies and your participation in client presentations.
3. Show them you are an entrepreneur – Why? It’s an entrepreneurial work environment! You have a great opportunity to generate your own business early, close interaction with clients and the ability to take responsibility for your career.
4. Make sure your CV refers to the full spectrum of your experience. Jobs in boutiques are broader by nature and having someone who can support where needed is a real asset. Think about all the variations in your work – from the models you run, deal size, the sectors you cover or have covered and your additional duties and responsibilities.  Could you sort out the IT systems if they go down, or update the website?
5. In a bulge bracket bank you are one of hundreds at your level. In a boutique it is your differences and individuality that will help make you a success. What are your interests, both in work and outside? What do you do to keep up with the sector? Are you a keen sportsman or woman?  Have you led expeditions to Everest?

More than anything you can do to your CV, the key to successfully applying to work with a boutique is knowing who to talk to at the company, and then what buttons to push once you have that conversation.  The only way to do this is to be dealing with the right recruiters.

1. Get away from the screen

“There’s a temptation to stay at home and use the internet to solve all your problems,” says Lee. “Sitting in front of a screen all day feels a bit like an occupational activity, which is why it feels attractive.” Instead of hanging out at home applying for jobs online, Lee advises that you: “Get out there and talk to people face to face.” Only use the computer for your job search during the evening.

2.  Send a hard copy of your CV

This may be a double-edged sword. On one hand, dispatching a hard copy of your CV (ie. sending a letter, preferably to a line manager) may differentiate you: it will be opened by someone in the business rather than HR. They probably don’t receive many letters. They may read your covering letter and CV and decide to hire you. At worst, they may remember you. On the other hand, a hard copy CV may identify you as an anachronistic old-schooler unfamiliar with emails. Nevertheless, James Caan, the recruitment mogul, advocates sending hard copy CVs in his new book. It will get you noticed, Caan says.

3. Don’t use all your high level networking contacts immediately

If you have some high level contacts who might help you get a new job, don’t contact them all at once. “Wait until you have a really good message,” says Lee. If you contact everyone in the first few weeks, you will have no one to try later, when your message has been honed.

4. Reduce your networking message down to 3 or 4 key points

“In your resume, you probably have 200 pieces of information. But if someone is going to recommend you (and you are not in the room), they are going to mention 3 or 4 things about you,” Lee says. “You need to provide them with short bursts of information. “People [who are hiring] like simplicity,” he adds. “Too many candidates say they’re complicated.” Think about what you’d like people to remember about you. What can you say about your special skills or sector knowledge? What’s different about your approach? Lee advises ensuring that this is mentioned in all your communications, whether by email or face to face.

5. Remember: it’s not all about you

If you’re networking and you do nothing but talk about yourself, you will not get far. Networking is about encouraging the people you’re meeting with to talk. Lee advocates asking the people you’re networking with about their careers: how did they achieve their position?

6.  Anticipate the elephant in the room

If you have a long period of unemployment, or other issues on your CV, don’t wait for someone to ask about it: raise the issue pre-emptively and prepare short, upbeat answers to help address potential hirers’ concerns.. It helps to get to the point and say, “I expect you’re worried about X…,” says Lee.

7.  Send a hard copy letter of thanks

As with the hard copy CV, posting a letter of thanks may identify you as old and superannuated, but David Schwartz, a former head of European recruitment at Goldman Sachs-turned headhunter, insists that it works. “A letter makes an impression. Your typical recruiter gets hundreds of emails a day. He or she doesn’t get many letters. I remember the ones I got. It may not have been a crucial factor in the hiring decision. But it certainly made me remember the candidate,” Schwartz says. Letters must be typed, not handwritten. The stamp must be demure, not crazy.

Needless to say, their life together has changed substantially. She seems more perplexed than annoyed, but her insights are fairly spot on. If you’re thinking of working in M&A, this is what you need to know.

1. You have to really want it

“He always wanted this, to go into banking,” says the girlfriend. “I remember how one time back in our university days, we talked priorities. For me it was happiness, and being surrounded by loving people. For him that came second. The job was first.”

“He is incredibly competitive,” she adds. “He’s got more willpower than I’ll ever have….”

2.  It will take over your life

When he was an intern, her boyfriend’s hours were 9am-7pm, says the girlfriend, but, “In the first week when his proper job started, it was work till midnight every day. It’s crazy how you adapt to that. These days when he finishes at 10pm I think to myself: ‘Wow, that’s really good’.

“When he comes home really late he’s had six Red Bulls and he’ll want to talk. But I’m exhausted. I am thinking, tomorrow morning we’ll have a chat and a lie-in. But then he gets an email, saying: ‘Be in the office tomorrow by 9am’,” she adds.

And when you do escape? “A little while ago we were having dinner and he got a message that he had made a mistake. This threw him off completely. He couldn’t stop fidgeting, wouldn’t listen to me. The rest of the evening he’d fret about work.

“Everything has become provisional. When we plan something, he says ‘But I may have to cancel’. When we’re out, there is always the chance of him getting called back into the office.”

3.  You will get fat and feel pressured to drink

“I tease him about his weight gain,” says the girlfriend. He doesn’t drink, but: “This is not making things easier for him at the bank. In fact his parents have said that if he has to drink to get ahead at the bank, then this is okay.”

4.  You will be financially empowered

“I live with my parents. I have huge student debts, a big overdraft … Now he has a really good salary, he looks smart – suddenly he holds all the cards in the relationship.

“He says things like, let me take you shopping,” says the girlfriend.

5.  You will work with alphas

“These colleagues of his, they are like super people. Incredibly good looking and intelligent and accomplished,” the girlfriend observes.

6.  But those alphas will have no perspective

“Sadly, all they can talk about is work. Same with his flatmate who is with the same bank, but in a different division. You will not believe how boring and childish conversations between the two can be. Who works harder, how to get into the right jobs, how hard it is – they can go on all night. ‘My bank is better at M&A’. ‘But my bank is great at … ‘“

7.  The work you do will actually be mundane and boring

“He’ll be telling me that he spends at least half his time formatting documents; measuring the space between lines to make sure everything looks perfect. Presentation is so important in banking.”

8.   People around you will crack

“He has this colleague who cries all the time. She can’t take the pressure… She’ll be crying in the toilet and he’ll cover for her, make up excuses why she isn’t at her desk.”

9.  You will want to get out – after a few years

“I asked him if this job is want he wants to do with the rest of his life and he answered no. I was so surprised…. He told me he wasn’t completely sure [how he saw his future] but that he would have to slog it out as an analyst for a few years. After that he could practically go into anything.”

Days into 2012 and most major bulge brackets have already completed their offers to “deserving and qualified” graduate candidates, so what options are we left with? We made several resolutions to give our resumes some “oomph” factor. I proceeded to go through that list with a few career counsellors and here is some of their feedback that I thought was interesting:

1) Start my CFA Level 1

This came from a friend who still lusts after an investment banking job. However, according to the career advisors, embarking on a CFA just before a job hunt has almost no effect on swaying the minds of HR managers screening your resumes. Furthermore, it can prove very expensive and time consuming. The time spent could better be used working without pay, or on short-term contracts with financial institutions.

2) Speak to line managers real early

Many US investment banking “walk-through” forums advocate arranging meetings and informational interviews before the recruiting period has even started.

3) Consider other sectors

This is my personal view and my counsellor agrees that it could be a prudent move to make. Go into a relevant industry like technology and media or real estate development, develop the insight from the business point of view and eventually break into banking again as a subject matter expert in this industry.

To all finance industry hopefuls like me, I urge you to keep pressing on and not give up if you truly believe that this is the right path for you. If you think out of the box and find new ways to access this elusive industry, I have faith that despite the looming bad news, the rewards will be satisfying and encouraging. Until then, it is back to the laptops for the rest of us, wishing and praying for that friendly email from campus recruiters.

The author is a final-year finance undergraduate.