Chapter 11: Paul & Dominic’s Guide to Getting a Quant Job 399
consultancies, building societies, and of course in the
case of P&D, for a headhunting firm. Thewilmott.com
website mentions any number of firms, and before you
approach anyone it’s good to do a few searches so that
you know the nature of the target.
If you’re still linked with your college then it has many
resources to help you. Most have a careers office with
directories of banks, and they will have some con-
tacts with banks in that country. The library will have
directories, and of course there is Google and Yahoo for
getting a list of targets. All large firms have entry-level
programmes of some form, and you can relatively easily
find a good number to apply for. At this stage numbers
are important, since the ratio of new entrants to the
market to jobs is quite high
Interviews
Be Prepared Before you go for the interview, find out the
names of the people you are seeing, and do a Google on
their name, as well as the bank/business unit you are
joining. Try to avoid the error made by one candidate
who could not understand why the interviewer was
so interested in one part of her thesis. The candidate
had quoted papers by the interviewer, but somehow
managed to fail connecting the interviewer’s name with
the paper.
Be Confident Almost no one at banks actually enjoys
interviewing people, some even see it as a form of pun-
ishment. That means they only interview you if there’s
a good chance they will want to hire you. Most people
who are considered for any job never even get a first
interview.
