WSO Podcast | E112: $3BN Family Office + Ultra High Net Worth Advisory to Venture Capital
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In this episode, member @EdmundBerke shares his path from a non-target school in the southeast US to breaking into an investment analyst role at a $3bn family office straight out of undergrad through a church program. Learn why he transitioned out of that role, how he helped add value to a legal firm for their ultra-high net worth clients and then was able to successfully pivot to a venture capital role.
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WSO Podcast (Episode 112) Transcript:
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:00:06] Hello and welcome. I'm Patrick Curtis, your host and chief monkey, and this is the Wall Street Oasis podcast. Join me as I talk to some of the community's most successful and inspirational members to gain valuable insight into different career paths and life in general. Let's get to it. In this episode, member EdmundBurke shares his path from a non-target school in the southeast U.S. to breaking into an investment analyst role at a $3 billion family office straight out of undergrad through a church program. Learn why he transitioned out of that role, how he helped that value to a legal firm for their ultra high net worth clients, and then was able to successfully pivot to a venture capital role. Enjoy. All right, Edmund Burke, thanks so much for joining the Wall Street Voices podcast.
EdmundBerke: [00:01:00] Patrick, thanks for having me on.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:01:02] So it'd be great if you could give the listeners a short summary of your bio.
EdmundBerke: [00:01:05] Yeah. So I grew up in the Midwest, on a small farm and attended a non-target school in the Southeast is medium sized, not a great business program. Didn't really want to stay in the southeast. And so I moved up to the Northeast after I did a fifth year there and landed a analyst position at a multifamily office and transitioned into private wealth management. After that, and now I've been at a strategic venture capital firm for about a year now.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:01:42] Very interesting backgrounds, let's go all the way back to your upbringing. You're kind of on a farm, why go to a school in the Southeast from the Midwest?
EdmundBerke: [00:01:55] Yeah, so family ties. From the beginning, my father, he was he was a day trader while also kind of tending our property and my mother was an attorney. But a lot of family ties to this, to this school in the southeast actually wanted to go to West Point and didn't get in. And so that was kind of my backup. Got it. So had a lot of fun there.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:20] So you went to school, there was. Did you know you wanted to be in the business program or were you always thinking because your dad does like that day trading stuff? Did he kind of encourage you to push, push you down that path? Or how did you end up kind of interested in finance?
EdmundBerke: [00:02:32] Yeah. So having the upbringing that I did with both my parents, I was obviously interested in both policy and finance. So actually did a dual degree program, two undergraduate degrees, one in public policy, another in finance. And so, yeah, growing up with my parents and my dad kind of talking about the markets, that's kind of what drove my interest towards finance.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:02:58] But you did you have like specific internships during during your undergrad, they kind of set you up? Or did you know a lot about how to do you know about investment banking or did you know kind of the direction to go? I mean, to to end up in the northeast, at a at a, you know, family office seems kind of like a tough first job out of school. So how did you even? Was this something you were targeting to be on the buy side right away? Or were you kind of thinking, Oh, I need to go be a trader in sales and trading desk or I need to go to a massive bank? And what was the thought process there?
EdmundBerke: [00:03:30] Yeah. So actually, I mean, I had no clue. I don't have a lot of finance family members, my family members or our military or or in the legal field. And so actually started using Wall Street Oasis in college to look at kind of the different industries within finance. Like I said, my program at my school wasn't the best are career management center wasn't the best either. And so actually, I mean, I had no clue about internships or anything like that. I worked at camps and worked on a ranch up in Montana one summer, so I don't regret it through research. I kind of knew I wanted to be on the buy side in investment banking, but really no practical experience. So it was really looking as far as post-grad jobs for things that would just give me a broad exposure to all the different kind of sectors within finance.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:27] So tell me a little bit about how you even. So you didn't have you had, I think, one finance oriented internship right during your undergrad?
EdmundBerke: [00:04:35] Yeah, exactly. And that was actually this summer after I graduated.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:04:37] So soon after you graduated, you tell me about that. Were you like, I have no job? What's going on? Like, what am I doing or what was the what was the progress? Or as you started learning more and thinking, Oh man, I should have had some internships. What did you do as you kind of approached graduation in case there's any listeners out there in a similar boat right now, just graduating since we're in that graduation week?
EdmundBerke: [00:04:59] Yeah, definitely. The school I went to strong social network, especially being in the southeast, so our leverage that a lot attended a lot of our actually our MBA career events at our school. So met employers that way, but ultimately didn't really want to end up in the southeast. And so I actually applied to a program up in the northeast through a church is kind of a leadership program. And that was a year long, and that's that's how I landed my first kind of real position in finance.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:05:37] Were they paying you like right out of school, like at that internship?
EdmundBerke: [00:05:41] Yes, it was three or four days a week, and it was a paid kind of rotational analyst program.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:05:47] How did you kind of pay for did the parents help, right when you graduated further move up northeast? Or did you were you able to kind of string together enough for food and rent?
EdmundBerke: [00:05:57] Yeah, it's it's an interesting program. It's through church. So you actually work for the church couple a days and then they they help you land these internships. They're all across the US with different churches. So actually live with with a family church family for four that year, which was definitely the weirdest part, being twenty two year old guy moving to a different city, living with families. That's how that worked.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:06:25] That is odd. Yeah, that's I've never heard of that. That's cool. So it's it's kind of be a nice transition out of college to you have a little bit of support. So especially if you're far away from family, so you you basically got up there. They helped you land an internship and then tell me you're only there for what, five months or so?
EdmundBerke: [00:06:50] So I was promoted actually midway through is fairly small multifamily office. It was a year long rotational program, so multifamily office, we had several wealthy families in the northeast region, but we also had some institutional clients, some endowments and pensions
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:07:09] Before going into that. How did you even that you landed that role specifically through the church?
EdmundBerke: [00:07:15] Yeah. So just through some clubs in college, I played up my my finance experience with investments and things like that. I did some study abroad over in Europe and focused a lot on economics and played that stuff up, really just selling my experience for more than it was for me.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:07:40] And that's for the four land initial investment analyst role. And so like, did you feel like you were completely lost because you were doing due diligence on alternative investment managers on private credits right for this multifamily office? What did you feel like? Were you completely lost in Excel or did you feel like you had just enough to get by?
EdmundBerke: [00:08:02] Luckily, I think I had enough basics working three or four days a week, I had time to ramp up. They understood that I was in a learning position. Yeah, but really I was just deep dives on the job as far as hard skills excel. Different systems and things like that go Bloomberg terminals. It was all just, you know, staying a little later and kind of studying and brushing up on things after the office was.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:08:30] And surprise, that was enough. Was there anybody there that was helping you out, or is it a really small office?
EdmundBerke: [00:08:37] Relatively medium sized office we actually had. We have several they had several offices across the kind of northeast southeast region, but there's some other other guys that had done this program before me and had stayed on full time afterwards. And so they understood my position and there were a huge resource for me.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:08:56] So like in what? What would they do? They sit you down and teach you how to model or just like, show you how to look at different investment opportunities.
EdmundBerke: [00:09:03] Or how to. Yeah, a lot of a lot of my go to guys for questions. They encourage me to speak up if I was lost, not to not turn my wheels too much. And so it was a good experience as far as learning kind of on my own. But having those those guys that I could kind of turn to whenever I was just completely lost.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:09:24] How much of the job was like sourcing deals and how much was like pure execution of like the more senior members were bringing in deals? How how would I think about that?
EdmundBerke: [00:09:34] Yeah. So we had a an investment team across two offices. And so that's how we sourced deals also through through some of the families who just had connections in that way. Really, the benefit of a multifamily office is just being able to pull all that money and together for four larger finance for different funds. So my personal row role was a lot of pitch decks and things like that, doing due diligence on managers and specific funds and products.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): 00:10:08] So it started off as part time, you said, like three or four days a week. Did it scale? Like what were your hours like doing eight hour days, 10 hour days? And then when you went full, when did you kind of go full time and do you mind kind of sharing a range of pay of what it was like when your first job out of school? How that compared to like a banking job?
EdmundBerke: [00:10:27] Oh, yeah. Hourly is probably equivalent to around 50 60 year. It ramped up halfway through the year as they kind of gave me a promotion. I started working more hours, they gave more hours to me, but it was a year long program. I thought about staying on afterwards and we had a lot of discussions about that, but ultimately made the decision that I didn't really want to be portfolio manager or an adviser to wealthy families. So that's
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:10:59] Ok. So yeah, let's talk about that. So you kind of were thinking, Hey, I don't want to work in this family office for the rest of my life being an adviser and or, you know, do deals just for them. So what did you start looking into? How did you kind of think about your next step?
EdmundBerke: [00:11:14] So I definitely I leveraged our mild alternative investments experience thing with the multifamily offices. They did a lot of risk adjustment that was kind of their main thing, but were five 10 percent of these families. Personal portfolios were in alternatives, whether it was private equity funds or hedge funds. So they had a lot of local connections within the area. They're gracious enough to introduce me and to give me access to a lot of them. But knowing that it was a year long internship, I definitely scrambled and was interviewing just as much as I could across my city, actually. When did you kind of start on the West Coast?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:11:53] When did you start doing that? I mean, it sounds like you were there for a little bit over a year. Is that correct?
EdmundBerke: [00:11:58] I mean, a year, three or four months, maybe.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:12:01] Yeah. Okay, so you knew you kind of the clock was ticking, right? Exactly. And so when did you start kind of actively interviewing and tell me a little bit about that process and what types of firms were you interfering with and stuff like that?
EdmundBerke: [00:12:15] Yeah, so my soft stop date was kind of the beginning of the summer, but I talked to them and they let me stay on through the summer. They had another, another intern kind of coming and taking my my role and I think September or October that year. So that was that was my hard deadline. So I mean, I started three or four months out of when I anticipated kind of taking a new job. And then luckily, they kind of extended that through the summer in order to interview it. Kind of all the different places.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:12:50] Cool. And so tell me a little bit about that process. So you were getting you're getting intros through their network, which was which was helpful. Did you know you wanted to go venture capital? For sure? Were you interviewing a corporate finance positions? What other stuff were you looking at?
EdmundBerke: [00:13:05] So I knew kind of getting out of wealth management was my goal. Definitely was interested in alternative investments. Interested in the private equity space. So that was what I was getting for, which was very difficult with my educational background and very low level of experience. And so ended up actually interviewing at Carlyle and some other big name shops kind of in their internal fund accounting roles, things like that just to give me hard skills. Look at some other hedge funds, things like that, just through the connections with the family office, mostly fund accounting roles and just hard kind of analyst investment analyst roles figured out I needed to get more, more experience on my resume. So that's kind of how I went about it, but was focused on the alternative investment space, for sure.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:13:55] So tell me how that like, what were the interviews like or are they super tough? Did you feel like it took you a while to ramp up? Or how were you prepping for those online resources?
EdmundBerke: [00:14:05] Honestly, just studying different, different websites. Just really understanding the lingo is definitely a part of it. Just doing your basic financial statement analysis questions things like that. Things that pertain to alternative investments, knowing that lingo was huge. The interviews themselves were probably 60 70 percent technical, 30 40 percent fit lot, just depending on the size of the shop.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:14:34] That's. So tell me. Like, were there specific? Firms not not to name the firms, but specific firms like private equity that you felt like were harder or easier versus like VC.
EdmundBerke: [00:14:49] Uh, so, yeah, definitely, I mean, the hedge fund and private equity shops, you know, you obviously have to have your tentacles down. But really, they just want to see how you think the problem. So a lot of brainteasers things like that, they want to see it. They want to see that you can be agile in different situations. So, you know, did do some case studies I interviewed at some other family offices and investment roles there. So here's a portfolio. How would you adjust it kind of stuff?
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:15:19] And so where did you end up? What was your what was that next jump?
EdmundBerke: [00:15:23] So actually landed at another kind of advisory firm just for a short couple of months? It was. I had an offer out in Seattle, actually, but knew I wanted to stay in the city that I'm currently in and so ended up just taking taking the one offer that I had actually interviewed there a couple of times three three rounds or so. And when I started, the people I interviewed with one of my my boss or the person I was going to be working with had quit the day before. Oh man, I walked in to just just a storm of stuff. They were asking me to write down how to's on my first day because I would be training the next person that came in. And so it was not a great situation. So actually ended up because I interviewed it so many places. Some of those interviews were kind of ongoing while I started that job. So finished up a couple of rounds at some other firms. And that's how I ended up kind of an ultra high net worth advisory, so paid a lot better.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:16:27] Yeah. So let's talk about that. So ultra high net worth advisory. Talk to me a little bit about what that job entailed day to day when you say pay a lot better, were you getting closer like 80000 at this point when you say pay a lot better, what was the range?
EdmundBerke: [00:16:43] Yeah. So it was actually kind of their tax advisory firm. Yeah, it was a large law firm, actually. So they're tax advisory kind of a huge kind of top twenty five law firm in the US. And so, you know, 20 to 30 ultra high net worth family clients who have their own family offices or even VC funds themselves. And so dealing with a bunch of kind of CPAs and lawyers, they needed a guy that could kind of talk the financial lingo and kind of talk to these family offices and basically be a liaison for them. So that's that's how I landed. That role was again, just through being able to speak the language. And so my back office experience at the at the multifamily office was a huge plus for them. And just knowing different financial systems is someone that they needed.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:17:39] So like day to day, what would you be doing there?
EdmundBerke: [00:17:42] So actually, I onboarded a financial kind of portfolio management system. And so these these attorneys and CPAs, they had to go through the financial advisors in order to get all the investment information. And so doing tax advisory, you have to have the whole picture, you know, real estate, life insurance plus investments and everything in between. And so, you know, a lot of times these families have three or four different banks that their money is at and so actually onboarded the system to kind of consolidate all that information into one place and actually develop some estate planning models in order to give our clients kind of a live a live picture of what their estate is, how much money their kids would get, depending on the sway of the market. A lot of our clients were executives and Fortune 20 companies, and so a lot of their net worth was tied up in single stock, which was the company they were an executive at, and so their net worth would swing a ton. So this system was was huge for them.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:18:44] Awesome. Awesome. So how long did that take you to get set up? It sounds like were you just like, did you actually help decide which one to go forward with and stuff like that? Or were you just like they had decided and use helped implement it and get get everyone connected, get everything connected?
EdmundBerke: [00:18:58] Yeah, I mean, that's that's one of the ways I landed the job was because I was familiar with the systems that they were working looking at. Got it. So I did help them help them decide and do. I did do some contract negotiation because it was a fintech firm that their clients were multifamily offices and private wealth firms. And so a law firm was was different for them. So.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:19:19] Got it. Cool. Okay. Tell me a little bit about kind of your next step then. So you were there for a little over a year, correct?
EdmundBerke: [00:19:26] Yeah.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:19:27] Tell me when you started looking why you were looking stuff like that so people can get a sense of, you know, when they should start looking. Yeah.
EdmundBerke: [00:19:35] So landing at this law firm, I knew it was kind of a temporary move for me. It was more so to get out of the situation that I was in. The pay was great. Law firms pay hourly. And so I had a great base of around 80 K, but I got paid every time. And so that was that was huge.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:19:54] Nice. Yeah, it's a big difference.
EdmundBerke: [00:19:56] Yeah, so knew I wanted to be in the alternative investment space again, looking at VC firms, PE firms in the area. I kind of gave myself an ultimatum that I'd either go back to business school or I'd get a different job. And so luckily, I just passively through recruiters in my city and just through different. Kind of industry events, things like that again through kind of multifamily office connections, just interviewed at places. My employer didn't know at the time. And so that's kind of how I landed my my VC analyst role. Started looking. I was looking probably for four or five months until I finally landed the.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:20:40] Do you have any other offers along the way that you turned down, or was it more like you were just in a lot of discussions with a lot of different types of firms?
EdmundBerke: [00:20:47] Yeah, a lot of again, kind of private wealth management roles, analyst roles, investment analyst roles, portfolio management. And I turn I turn those down just because I was in a comfortable position. So they will be a little more picky.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:21:01] Yeah, yeah, you kind of we're in a good spot, so you're really looking for something more on like the the investment side. Exactly that fair, so tell me a little bit about the interview process for VC. Was this the only VC kind of fund you you interviewed at or were there others? What was that like? Was it? Were they testing like, were you investing for direct investment rules or more like this? Support analytics rules? You know, portfolio company management type stuff. Can you tell me a little bit about? How you kind of positioned yourself?
EdmundBerke: [00:21:34] Yeah. Absolutely. So they're looking for a pre MBA kind of associate role. My firm is fairly specific. There are strategic investors that we do direct investments, it being strategic, it's smaller investments. And so they're they're looking for someone with some modeling experience, but really kind of a blank slate. They had some people move internally from their fund management side of the shop to the internal accounting side, so they're looking to fill those positions. So really, it's just kind of luck of the draw. The opportunity came up. They're looking for someone that that could teach and grow and so came in did a lot of studying. Honestly, VC wasn't really what I was gunning for, looking for more. But in my in my city, there's just more VC firms.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:22:28] And so how did you even I mean, what were they interviews like? Were they like quizzing you on like unit economics cases? And then talk to me a little bit about what it was like when you first started? Or is it the most, most of the work portfolio work and the types of analyses you were doing? I think it's interesting to people to hear kind of what that's like.
EdmundBerke: [00:22:46] Yeah, definitely. So they're pretty open firm. I mean, all firms kind of say that they're horizontal and not vertical, but this firm, since they're strategic, we do a lot of technology investments. So the majority of the firm is actually engineers, scientists, people that can vet that technology. And so their their investment side of the shop is smaller. So it's a smaller team. So they were looking for someone that could do pre deal due diligence, have a basic understanding of what makes a business tick, what makes a good investment. So had a little bit of that just from my private wealth experience, kind of knowing what to look for in an investment.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:23:25] Did you have to like prepare like, were you ready to talk about specific deals you had done at the, you know, previous at your previous firms? Are you ready? Like, did you did you? I should say, did you structure your resume in such a way that was like the typical investment banking résumé where you had, like transaction experience and you listed that?
EdmundBerke: [00:23:42] Yeah, definitely. I mean, I played up my alternative investment experience, played up my my relationships with kind of the the other funds and other managers at these families had connections with that efforts on smart.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:23:58] And then so when they would drill you on those, you would talk about it as as if you were an investor. So like when you got there, were you? How much of the work were you doing? Was it like portfolio work getting on the call, like doing meetings with portfolio companies? Or was it more like taking the data that was coming out of the portfolio companies and trying to like, you know, get it together for poor management to review?
EdmundBerke: [00:24:21] So both the size of my firm, they definitely needed both. We we have hundreds of portfolio companies, which is a little above average for your average VC. And so they really needed and still really need systems. Yeah. Management being able to look at the different portfolio companies and there where they're at and they're financing things like that, but still did some due diligence. I do due diligence currently, but we have a couple of guys that are extremely experienced in that, so they lead. So a lot of my role is kind of on the post-deal
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:24:59] Management side of things. How do you think about your future and the skills you're developing now that you're there?
EdmundBerke:00:25:05] Yeah, so again, as I said earlier, I was looking at either kind of getting a job that I was actually interested in or going and getting my MBA. I never really anticipated being in VC, but as I've been in the industry for about a year now, it's definitely grabbed my attention and it's something that I could consider doing long term. I get bored easily, and so having different portfolio companies kind of come across your board and being able to look at different deal structures and things like that. Super dynamic. And you're learning something new every time there's a deal struck.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:25:45] Did you feel like there were certain areas where you were weak or that you needed a lot of work on? And can you just specify where those were and kind of how you've improved?
EdmundBerke: [00:25:53] Yeah, absolutely. I mean, VC is another world that's honestly one of the reasons I kind of did an AMA on Wall Street waste. There's not a ton of information on VC. Vc is kind of a niche area, depending on the strategy of the firm. So, I mean, public equities, even private equity, things like that, there's tons of information on really easy to talk about, but with venture capital, you're cap tables and different capitalization structures. There's a ton of legal speak in there, so the vocabulary was definitely super difficult to get my head around. It's probably the steepest learning curve I've had for any transition, for sure.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:26:37] Yeah, we need to release the venture capital course on Wall Street Oasis. At some point they were working on it, trying to find the right instructors. So if you know anybody, let me know anyways. Anything else you'd like to share before we call it in terms of advice you'd give to people who are kind of in a similar boat, maybe they are at an on target, maybe they're at a they're not really sure what their first step should be kind of looking back and kind of your path. Any advice you'd give?
EdmundBerke: [00:27:05] Yeah, kind of. As a young college student. I thought that networking you kind of had to have a purpose, and so I would encourage people to kind of in that boat to always be networking. I had a professor tell us that strangers have what you want in life and have what you have, what you want in life. And so you have to be willing to reach out and take a coffee chat. Reach out to people. Don't be afraid. Even if I've had jobs come up, opportunities come up six nine months later from a talk that I had that I just took. So use your network, build it, keep an Excel spreadsheet of all your contacts and where they work.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:27:52] Yeah, it's so true. I mean, it's funny. I got an email yesterday from just a random listener of the monkey to podcast. You know, I mentor three college students trying to break in to careers in finance. And he referenced one of my pieces of advice to grace because she was like, you know, she was networking, but she was networking with like alums and this and I was like, just network with anybody with a participating background like you don't limit yourself, just get scale. And he he had written me, he's like, Well, this strategy, he's like, How do you do that? Because it doesn't feel like there's a connection? He had kind of pressed me on that. And basically, I I wrote back this long email saying, it doesn't matter if there's a connection, you make any sort of weak connection. It does not matter. A lot of people just like helping younger people. So to make if you're shy and it's even better if you're shy because if you're shy means you have more to work on to get better. So like the more calls you take, the less shy you become, the more confident you'll become in telling your story, the better you'll be at interviewing. So there's just so many additional benefits from just building your network.And so I just was trying to get that across that. Let's say you spend an hour every day sending out 50 connection requests. That's like what, eighteen thousand requests in a year. What, let's say, only three thousand of them, except your connection. Only three hundred of them take a call. That's almost a call every single day. Yeah, for a year. So like if you do that, your network becomes incredibly strong and I can almost guarantee that one of those connections will have a dramatic career impact on you one way or another. Whether it's not that year, maybe it's two years down the road, a few years down the road. It's having those having those connections. Having those conversations will teach you so much as well. So. Something that people like to think that's just it's too aggressive or it's too whatnot, I mean, as long as you're polite, as long as you're respectful of their time and as long as you show a genuine interest of what they're telling you and you're not just asking these basically memorized questions that you're giving to everybody. And you're listening to what they're saying and actually trying to learn about what they what they do. I think you can have some amazing benefits from that and putting in that time, definitely.
EdmundBerke: [00:30:01] Reps are huge. Just knowing what questions to ask and those mentors or people, you reach out asking you questions you know, to anticipate. And I mean, I'm in my late 20s. I feel bad for the guys before me that didn't have LinkedIn and all that kind of stuff. I mean, it's it's too easy nowadays. I mean, look at someone's profile, look up where they work because there's probably a profile there. Pick out one thing that you can share an interest with and include that in a cold email. And if you spread a wide net, yeah,
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:30:32] If you can't find anything that's a common interest, then you could at least talk about how you're working toward a career in investment and whatever investment management, investment banking, private equity, hedge funds, and it was interesting to learn more. And just if if you're having these conversations when you're not actually asking for anything, when you're not trying to get internship, especially when you already land an internship, it's even more powerful because then you can say to them, Actually, I already have an internship plan for December, but I'm just really curious about your role in what you do. Therefore, there's like it takes it off the table that you're you're trying to get something and understand people sometimes just wait till when they need something to network, and that's it's almost too late.
EdmundBerke: [00:31:13] Do your do you research, find what specifically you want to do, because if you just reach out and say, Oh, I'm interested in investment banking, that doesn't really do much. But if you find someone that's in an industry within investment banking or whatever it is, find something specific. I mean, people love to talk about themselves and focus on that. I've had calls industries that are particularly interested in years down the road. I've kind of looked up experts in the industry, and I have a great job now, but I've called them up and just ask them to tell me more about what they do. And people are so willing to do that. So definitely encourage people to reach out, whether they have a purpose or not.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:31:51] Because I think intellectual curiosity oftentimes is a great measure of somebody will be a good employee. So when they hear you're curious and then you actually sound genuine on the phone, sometimes you end up sticking in their mind when the position comes up.
EdmundBerke: [00:32:04] Yeah, who knows? Two years later, you could be interviewing at that point.
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:32:08] Exactly. So anyways, long rant there, but I figured it was it was relevant because I just got that. Just got that email. But anyways, Edmund Burke, thanks so much for taking the time to share your wisdom today with all the listeners.
EdmundBerke: [00:32:24] Patrick, thanks for having me. It's been great
Patrick (CEO of WSO): [00:32:26] And thanks to you, my listeners at Wall Street Oasis. If you have any suggestions whatsoever, please don't hesitate to send them my way. Patrick at Wall Street Oasis dot com. And till next time.
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