Wall Street Oasis

In this episode, Ken Margolis, Partner of Castle Placement walks us through his 30-year finance career. We learn how he quickly moved from Audit at Arthur Anderson back in the 80s to structured finance with Soloman Brothers as his first client, how Credit Suisse (then First Boston) made him an offer he couldn't refuse to jump ship, how he survived multiple crises and layoffs and why he ended up transitioning to Merrill in 1999. Listen to hear about his long successful run there, all of the different groups he worked in, what he liked best and why right before the great financial crisis he decided to leave and set up his own business. 

In this episode, Sarah explains why she ended up at a non-target school, how her 4.0 GPA opened a lot of doors and how she ended up at a bulge bracket investment bank in New York. Learn how she dealt with private equity recruiting and when she realized that she was more interested in growth equity and the VC world. Finally, listen to how she got her big break and was able to make the jump, but only after 3 years in investment banking and an analyst to associate promotion.

In this episode, Jakub shares his winding path going to university in Prague and leveraging multiple internships including at KPMG and Accenture to get important experience. Learn why he went to Seoul, how he landed a full time offer at an investment bank in Vienna, why he transitioned to Munich and some sacrifices he made along the way for family.

In this episode, MilitaryMonkey shares his winding path from West Point to serving in the army for over 5 years. Hear what happened on his birthday when he was stationed in Afghanistan, when he thought an MBA might be a good idea and how he broke into a top bulge bracket bank as an associate with no previous technical background. Also, pay special attention to how he approached his role as a post-MBA associate in IB to be successful. 

In this episode, we learn how Joe used an extra year of school to get a masters in accounting in order to get another shot at recruiting and how he was able to land a relevant position to IB in Capital Markets Advisory at a Big 4 right out of school. Listen to hear how he was then able to make a successful transition to the healthcare group at Jefferies where he stayed for 2 years, what he learned in his short 7-month stint after lateraling to Rothschild's restructuring group and eventually, how he ended up working in corporate development making well into mid-6-figures in his early 30s. During this chat, Joe kept harping on one thing that helped him pave his own path, and I don't think it will surprise any of you... 

In this episode, Alex shares his winding path. This includes his stops at: a non-target university in London to an equity research internship in Moscow, to a target masters program in London, to a 6-month internship at SocGen where he was laid off, only to be re-hired into another group 2 months later, to his internal jump within SocGen to the TMT group from FIG, another lateral, this time externally to JP Morgan's TMT group and finally, his latest jump to a megafund in private equity. Listen to hear how he feels his path to private equity would have been much easier if he had just done this one thing...

In this episode, Elliott shares his winding path from majoring in Mechanical Engineering to breaking into management consulting at Accenture. Learn why he decided to go to Harvard Business School to break into private equity but made one important pivot before enrolling. Listen to how he hustled during school to make his dream a reality and why he ended up pivoting after a year to work in Sales and Strategy at Work Day. 

There are some very important lessons in this episode about independent sponsors as a model to get into private equity, so pay attention and learn why he eventually ended up setting up his own M&A advisory diligence business.

In this episode, ColoradoMonkey shares his path from a non-target undergraduate state school to an investment banking role at a top bank. We learn how he was able to suddenly unlock ten interviews AFTER striking out on his last superday early in his junior year.... as well as how he was able to take a similar mindset to help him land in private equity less than 2 years later.

In this episode, BoutiqueBananas shares his path from graduating near the top of his class at Wharton, why he ended up at Moelis for two years and why he decided to travel for a year after his analyst stint. Learn how he got back into investment banking only to be laid off soon after and how he is approaching his next search.

In this episode, CorpDevWestCoast shares his path experiencing several 6-month long internships during undergrad to landing in portfolio management at a firm that deals exclusively with ultra high net worth clients.  We learn about the investor allocation or fund of funds world, the ugly side of wealth management, how he showed a genuine passion for PWM to survive recruiting as well as what came out of over 300+ applications. Listen to why he decided on the MBA and the importance of optionality early in your career.