Tips I Wish Someone Gave Me When I was Starting My Analyst Stint

Hello everyone. As I enter finance purgatory (i.e., the last few weeks before I leave for the buyside), I wanted to post something I think a lot of people incoming analysts would find useful. I know that intern season is upon us as well, and there should be helpful tid-bits for interns here as well. I scoured many threads before hitting the desk and there is tons of useful advice out in WSO land, but I wanted to note the learnings gained from actually experiencing my 2 year stint.

#1: Seek suffering 

Now, before I trigger the WSO community into thinking I am one of the hardos who gained pleasure by having no life & continuously worked 100+ needless hours to prove what a godsend banker I am, let me explain. The life of an analyst, particularly a first-year is difficult. I was the absolute opposite of a hardo where I didn't understand why I was given so many tasks to do and the load wasn't spread equally across deal teams. What I didn't realize till later on is that a first-year analysts suffering is by design. Good analysts are meant to get as many reps as possible and build some experience to quickly be able to give direction and review a juniors work later on. If you as a first year are comfortable just taking notes and sending planners while your associate handles asks coming in by the VPs / MDs, then take some time to internally reflect on your deal teams perception of you. I certainly am not suggesting new analysts are running with CIMs or operating models, but I've seen good analysts getting tasked with responsibility and a lot of tasks early on. The same analysts as 2nd years get to have much more control over their lives since they get to split their work into things they need to execute on and things they need to review.

#2: Not Everyone You Work With Is Going To Be Good, And That's Okay 

My biggest frustration with banking was the mixed talent / quality of people I worked with. As someone who played competitive sports all my life, I was always about "the team". When I worked with bad associates and VPs I covered for them incessantly. One time I stalled my VP for 3 hours while covering for an associate who was AWOL. I was covering since the VP explicitly asked the associate for the task to be done at like a 7PM on a Tuesday. A few months post that I realized that there are going to be bad people you work with who will lead to later than necessary hours and more wheels spun than needed. If you are good and develop a knack for how to do things, you can step up to the plate and take the reins. It's important to not throw a team member under the bus, but it is equally important to distance yourself from mediocrity in a way that allows you to handle tasks you are comfortable with but also push projects along.

#3: The Best Way To Win Is By Talking

It's no surprise that bankers like to talk. When people throw around "politics" in IB office culture explanations, they are right. There's tons of cultural dynamics at play. Some offices are fratty so politics is around what group "fits the vibe". Some offices are more cut throat, so the politics is about specific cliques being made. However, one thing is common. You need to talk to people in your team to get people behind you. Every banker has different conversational needs but here's a rough guide:

MDs: Don't like being bored with work stuff. They'll talk about their kids or if you can find something personable that they can relate to and "feel slightly young again", do that. Remember, you are an analyst, so they don't care what your interpretation of ABC stock's YTD performance suggests.
Directors: Same as the above. Can ask them how they think about crafting their practice as an MD and what they want to look like. These guys have salivated over that their entire lives and are a whisker away from it so will talk your ear off if given the chance.
VPs: Very important to have a good relationship with them. They are just now beginning to reclaim their lives and entering the real worlds so talk to them about what's cool and what's trendy for example which new bar or restaurant they should go to with their GF / BFs (do NOT suggest the bar you and your college grad friends will be throwing up in). 

ASO: This depends a lot on the ASO. If an older associate such as an MBA, they are probably spending a lot of time just working and barely any outside of that. Ask them about their lives and their tales of lore, they'll be so glad that there is someone there to listen. If it is an A2A, then they are likely a little miserable and hate the job and stupid tasks. Be a sounding board of frustration for them and let them vent.
 

#4: Staffings Do Not Need To Be Random Nor Discrete 

Develop a relationship with the staffer and outline the things you hope to do. You can never avoid bad staffings and you can never know what will turn out to be hellish. What you can do is position yourselves to strategically time when things get busy and when they don't. Hear about a bakeoff happening in 2 months? Try to jump on it immediately. It buys you roughly 2 weeks from now of lightweight work. A coverage team needs some help with an ECM project? Assuming you are on M&A, as an example, your required input would be lower; try to get on it. As you navigate your journey, you will learn about the people and teams you want to get pigeon-holed with. 

#5: Set Milestones That Are Individually Achievable

One of the biggest mistakes I made and saw my peers make were setting unrealistic milestones, or milestones they had no real control over. Want to be a part of 2 closed transactions by the end of your first year? Well, there is no way to predict that and you have quite literally 0 influence on that happening. There is no real sense of accomplishment if it happens and the value of accomplishment gets lost if it doesn't. You are just getting out of college where everything is a milestone: Semester, Exams, GPA, etc. The most common unrealistic milestones I've seen in analysts: # of transactions closed, $ bonus number, bakeoffs won, deal toys, etc.
Temper your milestones to things you know you will be doing. Tell yourself what you want to achieve from your banking stint. If you want to get really good at running 3 statement models, then tell yourself you'll be a wizard at them by month 3. Set lifestyle milestones as well. Run x miles in your first 3 months. Eat healthy x% of the week in your first year. Make sure to take a weekend at least each quarter to unplug and go recover in whatever way you find most useful. At the end of the day, this is just a job and is a part of your life.