ROAD TO BECOMING A MANAGING DIRECTOR

It takes a bachelor’s degree, a two-year internship, an MBA program, and at least an excellent work experience to become a managing director in a bank. An average investment banker works between 90 and 119 hours a week, equivalent to more than 16.5 hours a day for six consecutive weeks. If you maintained that level over the next 16 years, it is tantamount to 13,866.67 hours on the job. By comparison, it would take almost 29 years of 40-hour workweeks to reach 13,866 hours.

Do you want to become your bank’s next managing director? Here’s what banks are looking for.

Potential managing directors need to prove you can help them make money, as well as exhibit mastery to each level of bank operations and its clients inside and outside. And most importantly, they have to show how to cultivate and balance personal relationships. Investment banks seek profits, and so managing directors have to look for and secure deals. Remember, clients are the ones who pay their huge salaries, not their employers.

How to become a managing director?

As much as you can, study in Ivy league business schools such as Columbia University in the City of New York, Harvard University, and Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania to get investment banking jobs. Target internships along the process, create a network of seasoned professionals, and take classes to get enrolled in a master’s program. It is advisable to work as an analyst because banks are looking for people who can build active schedules and work long hours with stellar results.

Ask every investment banker you know and they will tell you their job has never been easy though rewarding. Bankers are expected to render longer working hours. To advance your career, you have no other choice but to embrace challenges.

Investment banking has a difficult, cut-throat environment where the management considers neophytes as commodities, saying they can be easily replaced. The institutions do not place much importance on holding hands or trainings. For junior bankers, their career advancement takes a backseat and they are expected to work, not to learn. In simplest terms, self-study.

One of the best ways to overcome the gruesome workplace is to establish a camaraderie among your fellow workers. From an interpersonal point of view, developing strong relationships helps you survive the first few years in the company.

But it does not end there. Most managing directors were senior vice presidents or directors at the same firm for many years. Majority of senior vice presidents held that post for three to four years. And vice presidents served as investment banking associates first.

This industry has somewhat a default schedule for promotions, normally three to four years. Banks want to find out if an analyst or an associate can keep up with the pace and produce consistent results.