How To Network Like An Investment Banker? Harsh Parikh, Ex-Director - IB, DSP Merrill Lynch - Part 3

Summary

In this video, industry experts discuss the importance of hard and soft skills in finance and investment banking. They emphasize the significance of diligence, accuracy, and stamina, highlighting the need for professionals to maintain quality work at all hours. Fundamentals of corporate finance are deemed crucial, along with the ability to read and analyze financial documents effectively. The conversation also touches on the evolving landscape of hiring in investment banking, where traditional qualifications like CFA are being challenged by other professional backgrounds. Additionally, the discussion explores the challenges of transitioning to a tech startup, the importance of networking, and the critical role of hiring the right talent for business scalability.

Takeaways

• 📈 Diligence is crucial in finance; delivering quality work at any hour is valued.
• 🔍 Double-checking work is emphasized; 'never hand out a piece of paper hot from the printer' suggests reviewing work after it's been set aside for a while.
• 📚 Fundamentals of corporate finance are essential, including cost of capital and financial analysis.
• 🏦 Investment banking jobs can be obtained without a CFA or MBA, but having these qualifications can increase chances of hiring.
• 💡 The importance of soft skills like communication and networking is highlighted, as they can significantly impact career progression.
• 🔐 In digital health, data security is a concern, but the benefits of cloud data often outweigh the risks with proper security measures.
• 📊 Engineers looking to transition into finance can leverage their ability to analyze and interpret financial data, such as balance sheets and annual reports.
• 👥 Networking is not just about making connections but also about making a positive impression that could lead to future opportunities.
• 🍷 Personal interests and knowledge, such as wine or cheese, can sometimes play a role in building rapport and networking in professional settings.
• 🌐 When scaling a business, hiring the right people is critical, as one bad hire can negatively impact the success of an entire office or region.

Q & A

What hard skills are important in investment banking or finance?

The key hard skills include diligence, being able to maintain high standards even under pressure, and mastering corporate finance fundamentals such as cost of capital and calculating beta. Proficiency in tools like Excel is also crucial.

Why is diligence important in investment banking?

Diligence is vital because investment banking often requires long hours and high attention to detail. Being able to produce work at 2 AM that matches the quality of work done at 2 PM demonstrates stamina and commitment.

Is it necessary to complete a CFA to secure a job in investment banking?

It is not mandatory to complete a CFA. While it can increase your chances, there are examples of Chartered Accountants and other professionals securing investment banking roles without a CFA, especially if they rank highly or have relevant skills.

What skills are important for someone transitioning into the finance sector?

For someone transitioning into finance, it is essential to build a strong understanding of corporate finance, advanced finance, and accounting principles. Learning to navigate annual reports and analyze financial data efficiently is also valuable.

How do you handle data security risks in digital health sectors?

Data security risks are inherent in digital health sectors, especially with data moving to the cloud. Companies take steps, such as implementing regular security updates from cloud providers like Amazon AWS, but there is always a risk of data being hacked.

What role does networking play in career advancement, and how can one stand out?

Networking is essential for career growth as it enables you to leverage relationships for favors and opportunities. To stand out, you need to carry yourself well, be knowledgeable about non-work-related topics, and make a positive impression at social events.

What challenges arise when transitioning from one sector to another, like investment banking to health tech?

The primary challenge is gaining knowledge of the new sector. However, if you're a fast learner, especially with a personal investment at stake, you can quickly adapt by picking up essential skills and collaborating with experts in the field.

What scalability challenges do startups face when expanding to new locations?

One major challenge is hiring the right people. The success of a new office can depend heavily on the first hires. A wrong hire can lead to significant setbacks, especially in startups where there is little room for error.

Why is reading financial statements quickly and accurately a valuable skill?

Being able to read and analyze financial statements quickly gives you an edge in efficiency, especially in investment banking. It allows you to navigate complex reports and spot crucial information faster than your peers.

How can soft skills, like networking and communication, impact your professional growth?

Soft skills such as networking and communication are critical as they help you build relationships and stand out in social settings. These skills are often the key to accessing future opportunities, favors, and mentorship.

Outlines

00:00

💼 Importance of Hard Skills in Finance

The speaker, Mohawk, emphasizes the significance of hard skills in finance, particularly diligence and attention to detail. He stresses the importance of delivering high-quality work at any hour, not just during regular working hours. Mohawk also highlights the necessity of double-checking work before submitting it, comparing it to the saying 'never hand out a piece of paper when it's hot from the printer.' Fundamental knowledge of corporate finance, including advanced topics, is deemed essential. The conversation shifts to the possibility of securing an investment banking job without a CFA or equivalent qualification, suggesting that while it was unlikely in the past, the industry's changing dynamics may make it more feasible today due to cost considerations and a potential collapse in the supply side of investment banking.

05:01

📈 Balancing Engineering and Finance

Mano, who will be joining SP Jen, inquires about the courses needed to transition into the finance sector from engineering. The response highlights the advantage of being able to read balance sheets and understand financial analysis, which can significantly improve efficiency in finance roles. The speaker suggests that while an accounting course might be part of an engineering curriculum, having a deeper understanding of financial statements and their structure, as governed by regulations like the Companies Act, can provide a competitive edge. The paragraph also touches on the importance of networking, explaining how to make a good impression and stand out in social settings, which can be crucial for career advancement.

10:02

🚀 Transitioning to Health Tech and Scaling Challenges

Shawn Dubie discusses his transition from investment banking to a health tech startup, emphasizing the importance of learning on the job and the challenges of scaling a business. He mentions the loss of a technical co-founder early on and the necessity to learn quickly to guide the development of the tech product. The speaker also addresses the difficulty of hiring the right people, especially when expanding to new locations, and the impact of poor hiring decisions on the success of a startup. The ability to assess a candidate's fit for a role within a short period is highlighted as a critical skill for scaling a business effectively.

Keywords

💡Investment Banking

Investment banking refers to a division of a bank that helps individuals, corporations, and governments in raising capital by underwriting or acting as the client's agent in the issuance of securities. In the video, the importance of hard skills for someone looking to enter this field is discussed, highlighting the need for proficiency in tools like Excel and understanding of corporate finance.

💡Hard Skills

Hard skills are specific, teachable abilities that can be defined and measured, such as computer programming, project management, or foreign languages. The video emphasizes the necessity of hard skills like diligence and accuracy in delivering work, regardless of the time, which is crucial in fields like investment banking.

💡Corporate Finance

Corporate finance involves the financial decisions that managers make to increase the value of their firm to its shareholders, and thus includes capital raising and governance. The script mentions that a strong foundation in corporate finance is a prerequisite for anyone looking to enter investment banking or finance.

💡Excel

Excel is a widely used spreadsheet program that is essential in finance for tasks such as financial modeling, data analysis, and reporting. The video script refers to Excel as a 'God' in the finance industry, indicating its critical role in the daily tasks of finance professionals.

💡CFA

CFA stands for Chartered Financial Analyst, a globally recognized professional credential in the investment industry. The discussion in the video suggests that while a CFA was traditionally a requirement for investment banking, the industry is now more open to hiring candidates with other qualifications due to changes in the market.

💡Networking

Networking is the process of building relationships with others in a specific area or industry to gain access to their knowledge, influence, or resources. The video script describes the importance of networking in a professional context, particularly in standing out at office events and making a positive impression on superiors.

💡Digital Health

Digital health refers to the use of digital technologies to improve health outcomes, enhance the efficiency of health systems, and empower individuals to take better care of their health. The video script touches on the challenges of transitioning from investment banking to a health tech startup, emphasizing the need to quickly acquire knowledge in a new sector.

💡Scalability

Scalability in a business context refers to the ability of a system, network, or process to handle a growing amount of work, or its potential to be enlarged to accommodate that growth. The video discusses scalability challenges, particularly in hiring the right people to ensure the success of new branches or offices.

💡Soft Skills

Soft skills are personal attributes that enable someone to interact effectively and harmoniously with other people. The video script mentions soft skills in the context of hiring, emphasizing the importance of being able to assess a candidate's fit for a role within a short period.

💡Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing services, including servers, storage, databases, networking, software, analytics, and intelligence, over the Internet (the cloud) to offer faster innovation, flexible resources, and economies of scale. The video script discusses the advantages and risks associated with moving data to the cloud, particularly in the context of digital health.

Highlights

The importance of hard skills in finance, such as diligence and attention to detail, is emphasized.

The necessity of delivering quality work under pressure and at any time is highlighted.

The value of checking work multiple times before submission is stressed.

The difference between reading on screen and paper is discussed, with a recommendation to review on paper.

Fundamentals of corporate finance are identified as a crucial hard skill for investment banking.

The ability to work with financial tools and calculators for cost of capital and other analyses is mentioned.

Networking is discussed as a vital skill, with tips on how to make a good impression.

The possibility of getting an investment banking job without a CFA or equivalent is explored.

The changing landscape of hiring in investment banking and the value of a CA or CFA are discussed.

The importance of being able to read and analyze financial statements, such as balance sheets, is highlighted.

The risk of data moving to the cloud and the importance of security in digital health are discussed.

The need for continuous learning and adaptation when moving to a new sector is emphasized.

The challenges of hiring and scalability in a startup environment are explored.

The importance of soft skills in hiring and the impact of the first hire on a new office's success are discussed.

The video concludes with a call to action for viewers to subscribe and engage with the content.

Transcripts

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[Music]

we have a question here I asked my name

is Mohawk and I will be joining I am

Cody called next month my question to

you is you've just spoken about

communication and how important it is

and there were speakers who have talked

about a number of different soft skills

that are extremely crucial but when it

comes to investment banking or finance

or the broader sense what are the hard

skills that you think someone should

develop because in terms of tools we've

heard you know Excel is God you work on

Excel and things should be fine for you

but what are the hard skills that go

into it

firstly diligence see it is one thing to

make a profile of TCS at 2:00 p.m. it's

another to make it at 2:00 a.m. so I

agree that's morning when the senior

boss whoever looks at the profile and

finds Katy CSK chaga TPS Livadia guy and

he'll be ok with it because he

understands you've done it at 2 o'clock

but if he instead of that if you can do

have that stamina to deliver what you

can what you do at 2:00 p.m. deliver it

at 2:00 a.m. that is very very important

the people keep telling us all the time

check your work check your work read it

once you read it again the the saying on

the shop floor is never hand out a piece

of paper when it's hot from the printer

the idea being use the time for it to

cool down to read through it again after

you printed was reading it on a screen

and reading it on paper is very

different that is the most important

part second obviously your fundamentals

corporate finance whatever your

requirements for investment banking or

corporate finance fundamentals advanced

corporate finance do all of it cost of

capital ko-nach a kiss a calculator on

say a beta k on achaya concha beta use

on i all of that you need to know that

the fundamentals of it those are the two

things that are frankly required to

start with and then as I said the sales

part then start kicking in managing your

team starts kicking in all of that

my name is mano and I'll be joining SP

Jen so my question is that is it

possible to get an investment banking

job without doing a CFA or a CFA or any

other equivalent course frankly I don't

know

today's DNA and I will tell you from why

I'm saying that back in 2006 I would

have said the answer is no or you'll

probably get at a end of the hirez

today's day and age I know Chartered

Accountants for example who are who've

joined the JM financial CLS a and ambit

who rankers have joined Merrill Lynch so

this is the CA

so I'm guessing someone who's done very

well at CFA might even be hired because

one of the reasons why the supply side

on investment banking has collapses

they're looking at costs so if afresh I

am grad the total all-in cost at the end

of the year is $100,000 they would

realize Canada can hire a CA for

probably less than half of that and I'm

assuming added to applies to a CFA as

well so the what I had experienced was

2006 today is a different day in age it

works for CS those who cleared for short

those who got ranks I am NOT

to conversant on CFA yet but a CFA plus

MBA for what you are asking I'm sure the

chances are high myself I am joining I

mean so part of my first question was

the diet only what and the engineer

pressure right now you joining I am in

Doha and I am interested in final so

what course a source killed would I need

to plunge into the finance sector and

second is you are currently working in

digital health sector which is quite a

sensitive area we can say we have seen

the cases of Terrenas and Elizabeth

Holmes over there so how do you handle

that see solidarity the second question

first we are increasingly moving to a

world where data is moving to cloud

there are advantages to being on cloud

you without doubt you can't have uber

that's a fact right so is there a risk

of course there is a risk if data moves

to cloud it becomes is lot more

accessible for anybody to hack into that

system when we talk to our clients this

is a question that comes all the time

metadata of Chioggia kohake a hacker

gâteau my answer to you is anything is

hackable

that is a risk you want to be able to

access that ECG in the middle of the

night to avoid the hospitalization you

gotta take a risk that it could be

hacked

now what interest does anybody have in

hacking that ECG as again is a different

story but yeah it is it is a risk that

remains I cannot wish that away you take

steps you have every few months Amazon

servers are over the AWS so every few

months

Amazon keeps coming up with newer and

newer security updates which hopefully

will handle those kind of threats what

kind of courses you should take a

finance corporate finance advanced

corporate finance for sure an aspect

that is often where when I was a

chartered accountant I had that

advantage against my co-workers when who

were engineers what helped me greatly

was the ability to read balance sheets

kqe

as an analyst you are evaluated on the

fact okay I got my profile banannie and

the profile it's important and a profile

to cover these these things I knew

exactly kea data consequent analysis in

a military can email type is

depreciation a line item and the segment

analysis any chartered accountant but

his money should be able to offer other

quantitative production data a year to

Camp ami lega Khan said you'll may who

got hoga ki nahi hoga that kind of stuff

I was able to navigate a 200-page annual

report significantly faster than an

engineer which improve my efficiency

relatively in front of my boss so as an

engineer that is a skill something that

you can think of you will have an

accounting course in your first term but

that is very obvious within mine MA I

mean you can't compare to someone to

partial accounting secret you can't

compare to three in three months but

that is something by reading annual

reports by knowing what the because the

layout of an annual report is governed

by the Companies Act it has to be

followed to the teeth but nobody tells

you that but stuff like that hi all this

is sovath I'll be joining accelerate my

question with you is you mentioned the

importance of networking and we have

been hearing this term a lot but since

like we will be joining me could we

haven't experienced what it is like so I

already rested today

um yeah our networking so but I wanted

to know from some of your personal

experience how if you can tell any one

instance where your network like your

b-school network helped you know career

with there are two things about

networking firstly is how do you ensure

that you are noticed because when I when

I mentioned the importance of networking

obviously one part is right now after

1012 years for me to pick up the phone

to be able to the ability to talk to a

client or an ex-colleague

and say hey I need your help you GE

jaycara kiddo right at the end of the

day the lot a very very large part of

the world runs on favors behind the

scenes that's a fact

so for you to be able to pull those

favors out you should have network with

that person somewhere in the past more

importantly he should have been

impressed by you he should have found

care is even dikanka he let me do them

this favor caljic a moochick am la vega

how do you give someone that impression

so but this is something that is used to

you much much later when you are out

looking for business yourself initially

the networking is about so so if I have

to tell you there will be a lot of

office parties no matter where you go

whichever organisation finance non

finance marketing or nothing and they

will your bosses will be there because

they're supposed to be there how and

there will be lots of people who will be

out there trying to be in front of the

boss how do you get the boss to notice

you those kind of skills how you carry

yourself you can it's probably something

that you can pick up at a finishing

school

but maybe it is important the way you

carry your wineglass what are you

drinking doesn't necessarily have to be

what the boss says do you know what you

are drinking how many of you know your

wines

if you drink if you are into wine

drinking or is it just black or white or

red and that's the end of it stuff like

single malts I mean these are things

that could matter could not matter but

what is goat cheese

what is feta stuff so a lot of the

finishing matters and what what I mean

is how a lot of those things start

mattering because guess what it matters

to the boss he may have not known in

when he was just first year analyst but

now he does so if he meets a guy where

he can discuss those things

if you can discuss it matters so what I

meant by the networking early on is is

is in those office parties how do you

stand out from the crowd how are you

able to have a conversation outside of

work not but not discuss if you could

not suppose to discuss dealings in

public so how do you what do you talk if

you if your Asia head is visiting and

you are all out and gathering you should

be able to talk to the guy

firstly you activity Reggie because he

is Eurasia I heard you might as well not

over so that communication part where

how do you get over that kr he's just

another guy who's out there to have fun

he's had a long day it's stuff like that

we had of course this happened much much

much later but we were in the car once

moving from office to the venue of the

office party because my Asia had had was

in town and this guy was a turns out in

just we were just generally talking what

have you been doing what you like he was

going to spend a weekend in Bombay and

you what he's going to do and he ended

up saying oh I love the pickup and open

I'm going to watch her movie there's a

Japanese guy but he imagined right so we

tend to make up a lot but hey whatever a

go I can't go for what we think of me

but he just wants to have a good time

talking to you so that what will you

talk with him how getting preparing

yourself for that that is very important

because if you can notice their life is

my boss my name is Shawn Dubie

I have two questions for you the first

is that you shifted your career from IB

to a healthy health tech startup so it

might happen that you have some lack of

knowledge about the sector in which you

are moving so how to work on that and

the second is what are the major

scalability of a challenge that

challenges that you faced while you know

scaling or spreading around or briefcase

so in terms of skill sets it was a bit

of a rock and roll that we had we were

supposed to start with three co-founders

one of them being tech and

he left very early on and then we hired

people to get a tech done but you learn

you think if you were someone who's

managed to do well at cat and gotten to

the kind of institution that you guys

are act you will learn right you're an

engineer who's planning now to finance

how is it vastly different they maybe

have come commerce graduate' was looking

at a marketing career

those are my cyclopean Matheny wish in

health tech when it comes to that so you

learn you pick up you pick it up if he's

especially if you have a gun to your

head your money on the line you will

learn it's not rocket science there are

something that you may not learn I am

not very good at coding

I can't code for the love of God but

what I can do is I can tell a ninja

exactly what I want how the app should

look yeah but on the biotope yahan

Achaia or cassidy commercial you know

scalability your second question pay

attention when our HR teachers talk

trust me my biggest challenge and

scalability I know is hiring to be able

to figure out in a half an hour one hour

for our jitna builder whether this guy

is good for a job or not is just so

important because to do I mean I was in

charge of campus recruitment at Merrill

for a good number of years and it to be

able to do it is different at that time

because t Cana this analyst hey egg

hierarchy a crab Nick lot o TK it's okay

but when you're hiring your first sales

rep crab nicola which team a Giga so

pervasive today we're in Bombay but our

next probably will start with Pune or

Bangalore or M the but when you expand

out to set up a teen and Ahmedabad if

the first guy I hire is an idiot that

entire office is going to fail so that

part getting your soft skills right in

hiring is probably often what makes a

brick startups just the inability to

hire right kind of because you don't

have second chances you're not going to

like give him one year to try and set up

a business and M the bar then if he

doesn't fail now going high

another one we just shot the officer

named the bud after one year of failure

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