<p>I second sakky. Why the brand name is so important in business & academic worlds? </p>
<p>1) I know a Harvard graduate (family friend) who majored in History, got picked up by Goldman Sachs. Hes been making some serious coins I heard. Considering a next move to B-school.
2) Another Harvard graduate (family friend) who majored in Math (a seriously bright kid since he finished a BS/MS combo degree in 4 years ), got multiple offers from ibank/consulting firms. He chose Mckinsy (sp?) and has been making some serious money and still, being constantly courted by other firms. He said moneys good but want to go graduate school after a few year stints.
3) A foreign-born top student who got his BA degree (economics) in his country. Came to HBS for his doctoral degree (DBA). He got offered from Columbia before the ink on his dissertation hasnt been dried. Now, working as an assistant professor at the Columbia Business School with starting pay over 160K+ with some serious perks including much subsidized Columbia-owned apt rent. But I made a joke at him that 160K+ in manhattan is like less than 100K+ in the Washington area after adjusting COA :)</p>
<p>I know a plural of anecdotal evidence is not a fact. Nevertheless, good examples of the power of the brand name.</p>
<p>You could argue that’s not the brand name at all, but the talented individuals themselves. If you’re good enough to get a MA in math in four years, you’re going to be successful whether you’re at Harvard or Rutgers.</p>
<p>The math guy was a bright kid, but not overly motivated. His mom said it was his overachieving roommate from CA (who took 10+AP in HS, and always took advanced courses including graduate level courses) who motivated him study hard in Harvard. They were roomies for four years and both graduated with double degrees (AB/MA) in four years. I guess competition breeds competition.</p>
<p>Well, I don’t know about that. That doesn’t account for what economists would call ‘sorting costs’. It doesn’t help to be very good, if people don’t * know * that you’re good, and in particular, are unable to sort you from the pile. </p>
<p>Take a look at my post above, where I showed that Blackstone only presents at 3 schools - Harvard, Wharton and Columbia. Why only there? Why not just present to really smart people everywhere, regardless of whether they went to these schools? Simple. It’s because the top students at these schools have already been pre-sorted by the schools by virtue of getting admitted to these schools. That means that the firms don’t have to pay the sorting costs of finding these people. There are certain elite funds that recruit at Harvard only. They’re taking advantage of Harvard’s presorting.</p>
<p>Now obviously that doesn’t mean that every Harvard student is good, or every student at a no-name school is bad. Firms still have to do their own sorting in the form of interviews and cutoffs and whatnot. But the point is, at the top schools, much of the initial sorting has been done for you, leaving you with less to do yourself. It is economically rational for firms to want to take advantage of this lowered sorting cost.</p>
<p>At PSU, about 2-3 kids out of 16 got internships/work for Blackstone now. Of course, you have to be one of the top members of the PSIA and/or the Nittany Lion Fund…</p>
<p>I think they’re looking for dashing, outgoing people. It’s very sales focused. The interview screens out idiots and people not blessed wonderful social personalities. So to get in you’ve got to be somewhat smart(top 25 college will do) and kind of a sexy dashing personality.</p>
<p>I have met many i-bankers through family connections and especially the entry-level ones for Goldman fit my description well.</p>
<p>I think for the more quantitative side jobs like trading,etc… they’ll respect the more intelligent persona and REALLY try to level with you on your personality.</p>
<p>huskem55’s list looks fishy. Cornell has more than Stanford and Dartmouth combined? Columbia has more than Yale, Dartmouth, and Stanford combined? Definitely fishy.</p>
<p>Speaking of Goldman Sachs, AlonzoJHU of this board, recent senior Johns Hopkins graduate said he was making 75K after taxes at Goldman Sachs after being offered an entry level position after he graduated. I don’t know how he did, but I can’t help to ask how he did it :)</p>
<p>For starters, Cornell is larger than Stanford and Dartmouth combined. Second, ~40% of Stanford grads are from CA; I doubt that many are trekking cross-country for work. It’s not like Cornell isn’t a good school in its own right. My IB analyst class had as many from Dartmouth, Princeton, Yale, Stanford as Williams, Bowdoin, Colgate, Hamilton. Is that fishy too? Especially not to me when you’re taking a randomly selected cross-section.</p>
<p>Gellino, Cornell CAS, Engineering, ILR and Hotel have 8,000 undergrads in total. Stanford has 7,000 undergrads and Dartmouth has 4,000 undergrads. On a per capita basis, I think it is fair to estimate that Cornell produces as many IBankers as Stanford or Dartmouth.</p>
<p>I think we can best answer the OP’s question by posting lists that are as close to the truth as possible. Let me clarify. I meant to point out the list doesn’t look like a good representation of the usual case. A list that shows Columbia has more than Yale, Dartmouth, and Stanford combined & Brown has more than the University of Michigan is pretty far from the usual case.</p>
<p>I thought Cornell had over 12,000 undergrads. Why would you not include CALS; especially since there are some business majors housed there? Otherwise, I would agree about Cornell.</p>
<p>investment banking is certainly not what it used to be.</p>
<p>the whole sub-prime fiasco has yet to fully play out. when the dust has settled, i think the black eye that the i-banking industry has taken will take a while to fade away. my industry sources tell me that this is only the beginning – there is going to be a whole lotta pain (e.g. continued massive write-downs across the financial sector, bank failures, restructuring, equity market downside, etc.) before all of this is said and done… basically its going to make the 80s S&L crisis look like a minor speed bump. what’s this mean for the economy at large? that’s the million dollar question. credit will certainly come at a premium and investment hurdles will take on additional burdens. </p>
<p>frankly, the capital markets IMO are in for a serious bear stretch – equities have certainly taking it on the chin this year and credit markets are, again, feeling the pain from the sub-prime mess. this has a huge spillover effect to every other major area that i-banks traditionally book revenue from including M&A… having spoken to a number of both sell and buy side analysts, I’m pretty convinced that we could be revisiting a 70s-style bear run – recall that period experienced two massive dips and recall that the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed out the year 1970 at around 838 and finished the decade in 1979 at exactly 838 –> basically trading sideways for a full decade (i.e. no capital appreciation! factor in your cost of capital / opportunity costs and it was really the lost decade in many ways).</p>
<p>what’s the point? IMO the i-banking industry is in for a painful stretch over the next 5 years. and with Bear Stearns going down and Lehman basically on the ropes, its difficult to see when the i-banking rebound is going to be in the near future. Most firms are retrenching, de-leveraging, selling assets – i.e. downsizing and getting leaner and meaner – not expanding. certainly pay / compensation will not be what it was in the good ole days.</p>
<p>in this regard, i fully agree with sakky the best place to be is over on the buy side (that is if you can get in). top talent has been defecting over to the hedge fund / PE side over the last couple of years, and i suspect that this will continue to accelerate now more than ever. having been on both the “sell” (i.e. i-banking) and “buy” (i.e. PE and hedge fund) sides, i can say without a doubt that the buy side is infinitely better. i’d never go back to the sell side unless some firm gave me a totally silly guaranteed contract.</p>