Worked my tail off for 4 years to make it into IB and six months in I can’t wait to gtfo. So bummed this is how it turned out. Life is a crazy ride.

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Damn I’m in a similar boat…. Leaving a REALLY cushy job making $110K a year … hoping not to regret it

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Have a brother who is in the exact same spot as you. He started last year in July and what I’ll tell you is that you aren’t alone in this feeling.

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People are dying to get in and dying to get out. I’m exiting after bonus so I get it

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I had a variety of IB roles over the course of 14 years at JPMorgan. Everything from back office at 16 years old(!), middle and front office and eventually landing in Tech. Worked my ass off and it definitely got easier but it was still tough and only looking back do I now realise how tough it was on me, my wife and kids.

I got fed up with the grind of IB which, frankly, nobody gave a damn about. You could redevelop the trading engine to process 20,000 trades a second, up from 200 a second and the response was more like ‘why not 200,000?!’. Well.. this is version one. No sense of achievement.

I moved into corporate banking origination at another BB in the UK, albeit with a tech slant, at 30 and enjoyed a much better pace of life but visible big impact across the bank, seeing the difference it makes to customers and colleagues alike which gave me far more satisfaction.

Then at 37 I moved to a technology firm, earning far far more than I ever did in banking, I’m 40 now and far more satisfied with my job, income and enjoying life.

Whilst I have strong marketable skills that would land me an MD role in banking, I don’t see myself moving into banking anytime again soon, I’m earning the same as an MD yet with a much slower pace of life and the family are happy.

The end result - banking isn’t the be-all and end-all of making money. You can make serious money in other industries (although, sure, tech is easier than others to do this in) and not working more than 40/50 hours a week.

I’m saying all this not to brag, but to enlighten. If I had known that this was possible when I was in my early 20s I’d have left banking 15 years sooner.

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This is awesome, and thank you for sharing.

Looks like everyone is trying to leave… Anyone willing to put in a word for me in this thread? Have FDD exp etc.

🥺👉👈

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Our firm is actually hiring lateral analysts. DM me!

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Why? Work life balance? Aren’t a lot of the negatives of IB well known before getting in?

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KPMG: Associate lifestyle maaay be better than analyst, but depends on firm. At mine, associates had just as bad hours as analysts

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SAME. I’m at 8 months and I’ve been trying to gtfo since the 4th month mark

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Can you go into a little detail ? Been applying for positions trying to get into IB. Wanna know what I’m getting into

The flexibility is by in large in the minority. If you’re on a live deal all bets are off. This career is a life suck. You made it to Vp obviously it’s bearable for you

likehelpful

Is it bc the banking culture is more toxic….
Same transition here, still trying to adapt myself in

Well creativity is def not for banking. Others I don’t really agree tho

You and so many people

Oh no, what's not working?

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