Introducing Banking at Michigan

A new kind of banking club

About

Banking at Michigan (BAM) is a new, student-led project at the University of Michigan aimed at providing education, guidance and resources to any student interested in investment banking. It’s a new type of banking club with a community-driven set of guiding principles and philosophies.

Our mission is to help students navigate the recruitment process while making it more accessible and inclusive.

Why We’re Here

The quality of experience related to recruiting can vary tremendously between students. Although my experience was positive and contributed to my personal growth, this is not necessarily the case across the entire student population.

After completing the process and speaking with a few friends, here’s a non-comprehensive list of our observations:

• Many individuals simply have trouble navigating the process (e.g. knowing where to start, what resources to use, where to go for advice) — this year’s accelerated timeline exacerbated this
• There are a considerable number of misconceptions surrounding the recruitment process that tend to confuse and stress rather than enlighten (too many to list, but this one was huge)
• There are a limited number of avenues at Michigan through which students can a) learn more about IB/recruiting and b) actively demonstrate their interest in IB
• Preparation resources and materials are largely blocked off to specific organizations

Our hope as an organization is to make headway addressing the above challenges. As the process continues to accelerate, we must create an open system to help students identify career interests from an early stage.

Finally, the amount of mentorship and guidance I received throughout my process — both formally and informally — was really incredible. So, this is one way to pay it forward.

What We Plan to Do

• Publish internally-created recruitment resources and decks such as our “IB Interview Guide 1.0”, which can be viewed here (v 3.0 here)
• Share external resources and decks, which can be viewed on our “Resources” page here
• Push out original content on this publication to educate our community on investment banking (more on this below)
• Actively form relationships with organizations that represent groups & demographics historically underrepresented in banking
• Host open, “town-hall” style events to educate and engage with the broader University of Michigan community (e.g. investment banking overview sessions, behavioral workshops, technical workshops, Q&A sessions, coffee chats and fireside chats — all run by students who have successfully navigated the recruitment process)

Student engagement and education is central to our mission, so all of our events, resources and decks will be open and made available to the public.

There is plenty of room for new ideas, and by no means do we have this plan set in stone.

Team Structure

Applications will open in September 2018 for students interested in a more involved role within BAM. Applications will be open to all University of Michigan students interested in investment banking — regardless of year, background, primary school or major.

We expect our first “cohort” of analysts to be ~20 students (depending on the number of applications we receive) and will be weighted more heavily towards underclassmen (e.g. freshmen & sophomores). Students who have successfully completed the recruitment process may get in touch to take on a mentorship position or to be more actively involved in the organization.

Buddy/Mentorship System

We expect to have 1 mentor for every 2 analysts. We plan to pair each mentor with two analysts to serve as their main point-of-contact and mentor for all recruitment-related advice.

Content Creation

Analysts will be responsible for writing blog posts for our Medium page 1x/month on a topic of their choosing.

For example, an analyst may be responsible for writing posts on “M&A Deal of the Month” within the TMT sector (just an idea).

An example structure may be:

• Company Overview (e.g. overview of companies involved in transaction)
• Deal Information (e.g. purchase amount, date announced, date closed, advising parties)
• Financial Information (e.g. financing methods, why a certain mix of cash/stock/debt was used)
• Company Rationale (e.g. why did the buyer acquire the seller, what was the “strategic reasoning” in the company’s words)
• Personal Opinion (e.g. what do you think about the transaction, why you agree or disagree with the company rationale)

This gives underclassmen a hands-on opportunity to do their own research, learn relevant topics and then teach it to others.

Goals for Year 1

• Make the recruiting process more accessible and inclusive
• Achieve nearly equal gender distribution in the organization as we grow
• Engage groups and demographics that are historically underrepresented in banking

Get Involved

We probably don’t have this totally right at the moment, and it will almost certainly be an iterative process, but we’ll get there.

If you want to stay updated on:

• Our mass meeting
• When applications open for analyst or director positions
• When we host our open events for the community
• Job opportunities and postings come recruiting time

Sign up at our website here.