I did a quick look through the analyst class for Moelis and have yet to stumble upon a single person that went to an ivy league school. I am seeing a lot of non-targets. Decided to do the same for other boutiques as well, and am noticing a ton of non-target students (Fordham, SMU, university of arizona, Bing, etc. This wasn't the case when I was recruiting several years ago, so I am just curious, that is all.
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Yes
who gives a fuck. non-target students usually have to work 2x harder for those spots.
From what I've heard a lot of the Ivy-types are getting less and less inclined towards banking these days, more opting to get into tech or consulting or whatever as it's viewed as a quicker path towards entreprenurship (more facetime with VCs and other like-minded folks), so it genuinely could be from that lack of interest.
In the alternate, it's possible that the more "grindy" nature of the EBs means that they've looked inward and realised that non-target guys have got a bit of a chip on their shoulder by virtue of the fact that they've had to try a lot harder than the Ivy guys, and as a result are more thankful for the opportunity and less likely to bail after a couple of years - essentially reducing their churn by a bit. As I've never worked in an EB environment, I'm not too sure how accurate that assessment is, however based on stuff that I've seen on this forum (which may not be entirely reflective of subjective reality), it makes more sense for the EBs to hire people who are almost/just as capable, but more likely to stick around longer. IB really isn't a heavily intellectual business - at a junior level it's all about being able to essentially withstand the grindy aspects and put in the hours.
'Almost/just as capable' LOL. What of the good % who are more capable?
Same thing applies, i was more or less trying to avoid a monsoon of butthurt ivy league hardos MSing the comment. I’m not an American so i don’t really have a strong grasp on the dynamics at play when it comes to university admissions - this is more or less just what i’ve put together from reading WSO
Can say that I have heard from Moelis employee that they like non-target kids for the reason the first sentence mentions
del
At least at my old firm (EB), recruiting at nontargets was part of a broader diversity intiative (not just limited to racial, gender diverse candidates). HR specifically told us that because a lot of students don’t have access to target schools (financial reasons, high school resources etc.), we should not make school prestige a major factor in decisions
Could be for a lot of reasons, but definitely noticed this trend happening, especially for this recruitment cycle. Not to say targets didn't place well despite the shitty job market (Most placed solid considering the conditions), but I did see BBs like BofA and some EBs take quite a few more nontargets than usual across the board. Might be that more women and diversity candidates applied from these schools, the fact that they grinded & networked much better than targets this cycle, or some other reason having to do with making a more geographically diverse class that aren't just coastal students from elite colleges. But I have seen a bunch of targets switch over to consulting because of how shitty recruitment went for them in the spring (And these are competent students with 3.8+ GPAs and strong resumes), which is quite surprising compared to previous recruitment cycles not too long ago.
In the UK where there's a lot more focus on socioeconomic diversity, some firms have started to do CV blind or university blind recruitment i.e. only based on application questions, online tests, HVs and interviews. I know a lot of big law firms do this in the UK as well - I was looking at stats on the universities of where top law firms recruited from and the number from oxbridge has been decreasing year on year.
BofA has a tier system where they allocate spots to elite universities first. They have 4 pools that follow the traditional target, semi-target, etc.
Recruiting at? Kind of.
Recruiting from? Yes.
As someone who wants to be a non-target for a brief period, I was shocked to hear about the EBs and BBs' presence at target universities. You can get a job at a bank from a non-target, but they are less likely to go to your school and roll out the red carpet for you. Our only "networking" events were mostly from MM's, and the ones from BB's or EB's were recently graduated alums.
TLDR: If you really want it you can have it.
Non-target going to an EB. I had super days with almost every EB and BB. I would say the stereotype against non-targets is fading away.
Was at an ivy and can concur with a point on people shifting away from IB. The most impressive folks in my class all went straight to the top VCs, PE analyst programs, MBB, or in-house corp dev analyst roles at F50s. Knew a couple who declined their IB returns and went to get their masters (these kids majored in like STEM/non-business majors).
why would they go into corp dev over IB? pays less
it's probably bc they going to the top-top companies where they'd still be making a good amount while having WLB. Change of priorities ig fwiw
Corp dev/M&A at F50s not F500s. Literally some of the largest companies in the world. Skipped the intermediary step of IB to get there because they were good enough to get there straight.
Considering earnings for MDs have stagnated for over a decade, I’m not surprised
The recent Fordham placements have been no joke. Way more OCR there from top banks, especially for diversity recruiting. I've been told that another factor is that the top 10-15% of the business school gets special treatment via "honors" programs which are basically just inv-only OCR and professors (that still work in high-up positions in NYC banks/PE) passing the top students' resumes up. Alumni network is also strong from what I've seen. If you are diversity or getting a hefty scholarship, I would probably tell say to go there rather than ____ private school.
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