Picking Yourself Back Up

The world of Investment Banking is a cold and a hard world, and at some point in the process, everybody gets knocked down. It’s a fact of the matter. Some people get repeatedly knocked down and knocked back, and it’s hard.

But, to quote an ancient proverb, our greatest strength is not in never falling, but in rising each time we fall. Here’s some top tips to picking yourself back up, dusting off that CV, sorting out the applications, and going again.

Fix your CV

There’s very little room for manoeuvre when it comes to a banking CV. Whittle it down to no more than two pages, but one if you can, so that it’s not thrown away immediately.

Make sure the font is standard, there are no funny colours, it is spelt correctly, it looks neat, the grammar is correct, and that it details your experience in an easy way, showcasing the best of your abilities in a positive and active way.

Learn your CV

It’s all very well and good writing it on paper, but you need to be able to use everything you say on your CV as a starting point for further discussion further along the interview process.

You should be able to expand on anything written on there tenfold, and explain how it has propelled you in a positive direction on your quest towards a banking career. If you can’t do that, it shouldn’t be on your CV. Simple.

Be real

It’s easy, once you’ve been knocked back several times, to try and be someone you’re not in an interview situation or on an application. We promise you that they will see through this, and it’s not a good idea.

One of the things banks state every year is that they are looking for authentic candidates with engaging and natural flair for the industry. You won’t get through that test by pretending to be someone else, so find how that relates to you and utilise it as best you can.

Show some fight

There’s a knack to selling yourself in these situations, and it is born out of a genuine hunger for a job in that world. It’s not good enough to be vaguely interested in parts of a company or half of what a role entails.

In such a competitive world it is imperative that you demonstrate a burning desire to become a part of the industry and the company, which you can show by making it explicitly clear how much you want a particular role in a particular department in a particular bank. Specialisation shows exactly how interested you are, and that will shine through at interview.