Goldman Sachs

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Hi all, there will be a Goldman Sachs Asia Internship Information Session coming up.

Here are the details:
Date: 30 September (Sat)
Time: 9:00am - 10:30am (Firmwide Information Session) & 10:30am - 11:00am (Global Investment Research Session)
Location: GS London Office (Goldman Sachs River Court - 120 Fleet Street, London EC4A 2BE)

As space is limited, please refer to the attached flyers and register through the steps below by 11:59 pm, 17 September 2017. 

1. Go to My GS Events portal
2. Select “Register for Events”
3. Choose United Kingdom for country and filter
4. Select “2018 ASIA SUMMER ANALYST & ASSOCIATE INTERNSHIP OPPORTUNITIES | LONDON” and/or “2018 GLOBAL INVESTMENT RESEARCH | ART INFORMATION SESSION | LONDON” and register
5. Select “Back to dashboard” and ensure you complete any outstanding tasks in your event inbox
 
If you have any questions, please email: aejcampusrecruiting@gs.com

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Nomura

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Nomura is an Asia-based financial services group with an integrated global network spanning over 30 countries.

Nomura will be holding an Asia-Pacific information and networking event in London. Details are as follows:

Date: 3 October 2017 (Tues)
Time: 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Venue: Nomura, 1 Angel Lane, London EC4R 3AB, UK
 

Please register at  www.nomura.com/asia/careers/

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Citi

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Citi will be hosting a Global Consumer Banking Information and Networking Session. This event will be hosted in the Citi Singapore office but we welcome overseas participants to join us via live stream. Details are as follows:

Date: 28 Septemper 2017 (Thurs)
Time: 11:00am - 1:00pm (7:00pm - 9:00pm Singapore time)

Find more information here.

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Deutsche Bank

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If you have the passion, dedication and speed of thought to succeed in the financial services, we invite you to apply for one of our Graduate or Internships Programme Opportunities in Singapore or Hong Kong. 

To find out more about our Graduate and Internships Opportunities, visit db.com/careers/asiaopps. 

Applications close:
· Singapore Graduate Programme: 1 October 2017
· Hong Kong Graduate Programme: 8 October 2017
· Singapore Internship Programme: 29 October 2017
· Hong Kong Internship Programme: 5 November 2017

Grow your potential. Make an impact. Discover a career to look forward to at db.com/careers.

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The LSESU Singapore Society and Asia Careers Society (ACS) will be collaborating once again to host Springboard Singapore 2017. This year, participants will be able to visit leading investment banks and financial institutions. The selectivity of the event means you will be able to closely network with firm representatives in their offices. Looking at past events, you can expect to participate in office tours, networking dinners, case workshops and talks by senior members of the firms. Springboard Singapore provides you with the platform to impress firm representatives and has been highly successful in helping past participants secure internship offers from prestigious institutions.

Participating firms last year:
J.P. Morgan, Oliver Wyman, Goldman Sachs, Standard Chartered, Nomura and more

Confirmed firms include:
J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Barclays, Deutsche Bank, BNP Paribas, Nomura and KPMG

Date: 11th - 14th September 2017

Cost: £40 (early bird by 8th July) / £50 (standard) + £75 Deposit* 
*Deposits are only refunded upon full participation. This means punctual arrival and full attendance unless absent with a valid reason.

Eligibility: Penultimate Year Students from UK Universities (Graduating in 2019)

Full Program details will be released closer to the date.

Do Sign up at https://form.jotform.me/71701719017452

Please contact Brandon.seah@lsesu-acs.com or g.s.lim@lse.ac.uk should you have any enquiries.

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Q1. Tell us a little bit about yourself!

I graduated recently from LSE with a degree in Accounting and Finance, and have just started work at Strategy& in the PwC Deals Strategy team. During my time at LSE, I was quite heavily involved in careers societies, particularly in the Consultancy Society, where I served as President. As for my internships, I completed two investment banking internships, first at KPMG Corporate Finance and then at Credit Suisse, both of which were in Singapore. Outside of careers stuff, I travelled a lot, played floorball and football, and spent a lot of time either making new friends or hanging out with old ones.

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Q2. How did you know that you wanted to do consulting, especially when you had completed two investment banking internships?

I would say that I might be an anomaly because I knew, more or less, that I wanted to do consulting since I was about 17. There are many things I could point at to explain my interest in consulting. Firstly, my dad was an entrepreneur and I always enjoyed discussing business issues with him – one of our conversations, for example, was about why some products are more expensive than others. Secondly, I completed (and really enjoyed) a year-long Business@School project with The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) in Secondary 4, and was exposed to consulting as an industry. Thirdly, and while this may seem frivolous, my favourite computer games were usually strategy games like Football Manager, where I had to manage my resources and to carefully consider my decisions. Somehow, playing these games made me feel like analysing situations and solving problems could be really fun, which seemed like what consultants did!

However, I remember going into Freshers’ Fair looking for the Consultancy Society booth before a senior told me to forget it as LSE was not a target school for consulting. Instead of being disheartened, I hunted down the society and having served in the committee, I can now definitely say that LSE is in fact a target school, and that there are plenty of opportunities to break into consulting from here.

That said, the opportunities for investment banking internships are arguably greater, and given that I also had an interest in that, I found myself applying to banking internships with greater success. Given the intensity, selectiveness and prestige of investment banking, I would still suggest them as great internships which will be looked upon favourably by most employers, including consulting firms.

During my internships, I found that I was much more interested in understanding the business, which included reviewing business plans and preparing information memorandums. Yet I had to spend most of my time with financial analysis and valuations, which were less interesting to me. In fact, I could work on a project for months without understanding how the business worked and why it was doing well or poorly. Loosely put, you could say that I was sick of Excel and yearning for more PowerPoint.

Other than the work being different, I would also say that the hours, culture and pay are differentiating factors as well. It is safe to say that compared to investment banking, consulting has generally better hours but worse pay, and the culture is more chill and friendly (though this can be quite firm specific).

Q3. It seems like you had quite personal reasons for pursuing consulting, but why should others consider it as a career?

Being a consultant, I feel the need to structure my answer clearly. Thus, these are the reasons I feel make consulting an attractive career choice:

1. Diversity
   While consulting is great if you know that it is exactly what you want, it is also great if you have no idea what you want. It has, perhaps, the greatest diversity of work, as you can be staffed on projects of any size, in any sector and of any type. In addition, you get to work with diverse clients and colleagues as well, who come from different backgrounds and nationalities.

2. Intensity/ Responsibility
   Consultants can face clients from day one, and are expected to produce great work to justify the high fees that clients pay. This means greater responsibility that translates to higher intensity in terms of either having to work longer than 9-6, or placing more thought into whatever you do.

3. Prestige/ exit options
   Consulting is also prestigious and pays fairly well, both of which make the job quite selective. You may think that only snobby people care about prestige, but employers do too. Combined with the fact that consulting skill sets and experiences are highly transferable into the corporate world, this means that consulting can serve as a very good platform for you to transit into another industry later on in your career.

4. Culture
   Different people like different cultures, but in general, consulting firms are ranked very highly in terms of being good places to work and develop. Most firms invest a lot into their people and carie about their developments and interests. In addition, hierarchies tend to be flatter and the workplace is also very collaborative and collegial.

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Q4. What do consultants do?

This, to me as a student, was a question I had great difficulty finding the answer to. In the broadest terms, consultants are hired by clients to solve their problems. This includes questions like how to cut costs, how to improve profitability, which market to enter, what do customers want, and how to price a new product, amongst others.

On a day to day basis, this means that a consultant would usually work intimately with the client, communicating with C-suite executives and business managers. Projects can last between a few weeks to a few months, usually within teams of four to ten. On a day to day basis, consultants can expect to spend the first phase of the project understanding the issue and collecting data (meetings, interviews, research, surveys), the second phase doing the analysis (analysing the data mostly through Excel, and generating ideas driven by the data), and the third phase delivering the findings (through reports delivered mostly in PowerPoint).

As a career, this can mean a lot of interaction with the clients. This can be in the form of client-facing work, meetings and calls, and often just working off-site at the client’s office. Many consultants end up working Monday-Thursday at the client’s office, and spend Friday back at their home office. You work very closely with your case team throughout the duration of the project, and dive deep into the business and sector with every project.

Q5. What is the consulting landscape like?

Within the consulting industry, there are many firms with slightly different personalities, and different types of work. Broadly, I would categorise them into three groups, namely MBB, the Big 4+1, and everything in between.

MBB (real industry term) stands for McKinsey, BCG and Bain, which are the three most prestigious consulting firms. Other than being the most selective, they also tend to provide more strategy consulting, tackling higher level issues. They charge the highest fees to their clients, so standards are also more demanding.

The “Big 4+1” (term I made up myself) refers to the four big accounting firms, PwC, Deloitte, KPMG and EY, as well as Accenture. They hire a lot more people in their Management Consulting departments and are hence less selective, and also focus more on operational or technology consulting.

Many firms lie in between, including Strategy&, Monitor, Parthenon, Oliver Wyman, OC&C, Roland Berger, LEK Consulting and many more. Interestingly, the former three firms are under Big Four ownership, though this consolidation is not unusual in consulting. These firms are more varied, but generally lie in between MBB and the Big 4+1 in terms of selectiveness and type of work.

Generally, the landscape is quite competitive, with MBB feeling the pressure to become more operational, and the Big Four acquiring more strategic houses to improve what they can offer. Yet, most firms have been able to find areas to specialise and excel in. For example, Oliver Wyman has developed its forte in the financial services, Parthenon is especially strong in Education, Accenture is largely focused on technology consulting, and my team in Strategy& consults mainly on mergers and acquisitions.

As an applicant, the landscape can be quite daunting as it is not easy to get into MBB and some of the “In-Between” firms. Many of these firms are small in Singapore, so there might be limited headcounts, whereas teams in London are not much bigger and are highly competitive. Because some teams are especially small, they may also have a defined culture or specific needs and hence be more selective about not just the calibre but also the profile of the people they hire. Therefore, I would definitely advise that you do your research before applying. A wise thing to do may be for you to apply to all of them and find out for yourself.

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Q6. Having secured two summer internships for IB, a spring week with McKinsey, and a full time job with Strategy&, what would be a piece of advice you have for applications?

LSE allows you to have so many opportunities to improve your employability, so I would not have to go through all the tips. If I could reiterate one piece of advice, it would be to befriend your seniors! My seniors have helped me with CV reviews, interview practice, insights about firms/industries and even pulled my CV out to their HR. The SingSoc community is great as long as you are proactive and friendly, and I definitely have much to thank my seniors for. I certainly hope the batches below mine are just as helpful, but juniors have to play their part too and not just ask questions without bothering to know your seniors.

Specifically for consulting, the most important tip would be to practice your case interviews, which was something LSE students were not focussing on in the past. I would suggest that you attend case study events and case workshops in school, and find others to practice case interviews with. I actually set up the LSE Case Club last year, and it has since grown to over 700 members. Use it to find diverse partners to practice with, and meet up to do in-person practice case interviews. A good number to aim for would be around 20, but even doing just five would make a big difference.

Another important tip for London applications in particular would be to be comfortable with chatting to your interviewers. They definitely place more emphasis on getting to know you in the interviews here, and it is not always easy to chat to a middle aged, non-Asian, working professional I have few common interests with. That said, they are usually very friendly so just be sociable and not awkward, and be willing to share more about yourself while engaging in a two-way conversation. After all, if you cannot do that you would probably struggle even after getting the job.

Q7. Could you share a bit more about these case interviews that you mentioned? How should we prepare for them?

There is honestly so much I could write about case interviews. In short, case interviews are exercises where the interviewer poses a case question to the interviewee, and a two-way conversation will occur in which the interviewee attempts to solve the case. A typical question would be something like “How can H&M address its falling profits?” or “How big is the car market in Singapore?” From there, the interviewee will need to extract further information and structure a way to approach the problem, before getting his ideas across.

There are many great resources out there, most notably Victor Cheng (best way to improve) but also Caseinpoint (good way to get started) and Management Consulted (most easy to learn from). Because of how much content there is, there can be quite a lot of inertia getting started. I would suggest powering through one or two case books, and then just learning as you practice. If you try to take in all the information out there, you might never get started on practice, which is the most important part.

Q8. So I heard you have some goodies to share… (Hint: Click His Photo!)

When I compare my application process for investment banking and consulting, the latter was definitely a lot more independent and challenging. I had much fewer seniors that could help me, and there were significantly fewer resources at LSE I could use. As a result, I had to do many things personally, including organising the type of society events I thought were more useful, learning about case interviews, finding practice cases, setting up a group of fellow applicants to practice cases with, and so on.

Having gathered that knowledge, I felt that it would be worthwhile to condense and structure some of the key tips, and created some material that I used to help some of my peers and juniors. I have attached a sample here, just to break down how to approach a case interview. While it may be difficult to understand fully especially if you are new, I do think they serve as a good summary.

For people that know me, I am actually far more candid and politically incorrect than this write-up may suggest, so if you approach me with questions I can definitely give you more subjective advice like which firms are better than others, how to pimp your CV, and how to get through interviews. That said, for more detailed help, I would definitely suggest approaching some of the Year 3s who have completed consulting internships. I know most of them will definitely be willing to help, and are probably more accessible as well.

That’s all I have for now - all the best with apps, but please also remember to enjoy LSE. Despite how shit its student satisfaction score is, you will still miss it once you graduate.

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This year, Springboard Singapore returns with a bang as the LSESU Singapore Society partners the LSESU Asia Careers Society!

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Springboard Singapore 2016 will be a prestigious 4-day financial career focused event in Singapore, including firm visits and networking sessions to provide the springboard and leverage for your career. Singapore is renowned for its dominant position as a developed economy and top financial hub in Asia-Pacific, which puts it in a strategic position to serve the emerging markets of South-East Asia, China and India. With increasing relevance and potential of the Asia markets, Singapore provides the perfect springboard and leverage point for one’s career.

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Last year, 25 students visited Bain, BAML, Barclays, Citibank, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, J.P. Morgan, KPMG, Morgan Stanley and Oliver Wyman. This year, we aim to have 40 students visit more firms here, and to date Bain, Barclays, BNP Paribas, Goldman Sachs, J.P. Morgan and KPMG have confirmed. The organising team is still in negotiation with many other firms, and is in the final stages of negotiation with a couple of them. Past years have seen delegates getting fast-tracked for summer internship interviews, so do take this as an opportunity to give yourself an edge! 

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Venue: Singapore

Dates: 13-16 September 2016

Cost: £40 (Early Bird - up till the 30th of June)/ £50 (Standard)

+ £50 (refundable deposit upon full attendance of all firm visits)

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Travel and food expenses are not included. As applications are highly competitive, we would expect 100% commitment for all 4 days should you be selected.

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To apply, please go to https://form.jotform.me/61708224025448

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Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis. Successful applicants’ CVs will be submitted to all participating firms for internships consideration! Do note that we would be selecting students based on availabilities, as well as on the level of interest shown in working in the above industry sectors. Priority will be given to Singaporeans/ PRs, 2nd-year and above students, and those that are studying in the UK. 

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I am a first year student reading Economics at LSE, and probably like most others, I did not have much clue as to which clubs and societies to join.

At Fresher’s Fair, I chanced upon the LSE SU Alternative Investment Conference flyer. Although my understanding about “alternative investments” was limited, I felt it would be an enriching experience to be part of the committee, as I previously have not had the opportunity to organise an event of this scale.

To tell you a little more about the conference, AIC is world’s largest student-run conference which spans over 2 days. This year, the conference saw 7780 students applying for 350 spaces and had an amazing line up of luminaries such as David Rubenstein and Paul Singer speaking. Being part of the organising team, I was in the marketing team and was responsible for promoting the conference to universities in Asia and Australia, and was exposed to the different tools and platforms used in marketing. One crucial factor in the success of the marketing team is through combining data analysis with our marketing strategy. In addition, having members from different countries enabled strategies to be tailored accordingly and also made communication with universities easier. High levels of commitment were required as there were weekly team meetings to discuss improvements and successes.

However, the actual conference was amazing. The two days were filled with enlightening keynote speeches and workshops, and personally, being able to interact with delegates from vastly different backgrounds was what made the event invaluable. It was indeed an enriching experience being a part of AIC, attending the conference and forging friendships that will last a long time beyond university.

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I am a third year student currently reading Economics at LSE, and here is a little background into my life at LSE. I joined the subcommittee of Finance Society (back then before the merger) and the Trading Society in my first year. However, after a year of participating in these societies, I felt that I was not really developing as a person, and so, I dropped them (I did, however, complete my term as the Head of Special Projects for the 2014 Asia Investment Banking Conference). As for my second year, I did not join any societies. Instead, I picked up volunteering and travelled quite extensively. So here is living proof that you don’t need to be the President or Vice President of a society to get an internship. That being said, I’m not going to downplay the role of work-related experiences - it’s good to have it on your CV but it’s not necessary. What you should be thinking about is whether you are investing your time in activities which develop you as a person, and ultimately, fulfill YOUR life.

Q1: How did you come to realise that Investment Banking (IB) was what you wanted to do in your career?

To be honest, I don’t think I’ve come to realize that Investment Banking is what I want to do as a career. To me, a career takes up a big portion of your life and I honestly don’t know what jobs are out there which interest and engage me. There are tonnes of jobs out there, but here in LSE you are just exposed to a minute fraction of jobs that exist out there in the world. For me, I really want to be engaged in something which I find meaning in (it’s up to you to decide what is important in the job), and right now, right here, I just don’t have enough information to say IB or working in an NGO in Africa is where I would find the most meaning in a job.

To that end, I believe that IB suits my indecisiveness. It gives you the most diverse experience across many industries (TMT, Healthcare, Industrials just to name a few), and allows you to pick and decide. I like to think of it this way: the world isn’t going to stop spinning while I decide. So I decided to be part of an organization which gives me the widest exposure possible, and which pays me quite a fair bit at the same time.

Anyway, perhaps that’s what you were expecting. So here is my “more legit” story on how I ended up in IB. It started a couple of years back when I came to LSE as a fresher. My first week of school wasn’t packed with 24/7 partying like most other freshers’ were. Instead, my version of fresher’s week went something like that: suit up, network, acquire name card, email, and repeat. I exaggerate but you get the point.

I guess what struck me most through my conversations with representatives from various banks was the responsibility given to analysts at an early stage of their career. I was particularly interested in “being the CEO’s trusted advisor” and ultimately influencing firms’ decisions. To that end I applied for the spring week programs, but I got nothing. To all who are worrying over spring week, don’t worry, it’s not the end all and be all.

Anyway, over the summer I interned at an Asset Management firm and learnt a great deal. However, even though I was working with firms by investing and providing capital, it did not really give me the hands on experience which I was looking for (I’m guessing this is the same across most buy-side institutions). Through that experience, I realized that I wanted to be more involved in problem solving, decision-making processes, and ultimately helping firms grow.

Hence, I decided on IB for the above reasons.

Q2: If we want to pursue IB as well, which banks should we apply to and how can we prepare for these applications?

Hahah please apply to as many as possible, unless your dad is worth a couple billions. The preparation process is a long and tedious one. I would advise that you speak to as many people as possible – bankers, seniors, friends, family. The one who possesses the most information (and has an opinion on it) usually comes out on top.

I am not going to give you a step by step guide on how to prepare, you’ll have to find that out on yourself! That’s the fun part! J

Q3: How important are networking events?

Networking events are important, period. This is finance, it’s all about building relationships. For me, my objective at every event (besides filling my tummy with as much food as possible) is to find one representative from the bank who I can connect with. Why just one you may ask? Here’s why.

There are two outcomes which can materialize from this: the good outcome, whereby you both have fruitful conversations and they either decide to help you or not. Either way, you’ve gotten to know someone for more than their title. The help is just an additional benefit. Or the bad outcome, whereby both of you do not manage to click. No further explanation needed.

To me, it’s all about the intent and mentality which you adopt. It can make networking a wonderful experience OR one that is impersonal and transaction-based. You decide.

Q4: Aside from networking events, what else should I be exposing myself to?

Everything and anything. Interviewers are looking for people who have a life, perspective and opinions (for London-based interviews at least). Go explore, experience and ultimately fail, because these things temper character, and that’s something important which interviewers lookout for. Or at least that’s what they share with me.

Q5: Is attending spring week important? What are banks looking for in an intern?

Nope, at least in my opinion. Most people do not have a spring week. In fact, what is more important is your first year summer internship. It is what banks will be looking out for when they decide to give you a phone call in your second year.

With regards to what banks are looking out for, I guess it’s a bit of everything (a well-balanced individual in my opinion). Work experiences, as mentioned above, counts. As long as something catches the eye, in a good way of course, there is a slightly higher chance that your CV will not end up in the bin.

Q6: What was your internship experience, and how do we get the most of our internship experience?

Last summer I completed a 10 week stint with BAML in the Investment Banking Division. It was a pooled system where we were allowed to voice our preferences and work with as many teams as we liked. So for example, I worked with Multi-industrials, TMT, Leveraged Finance, Real Estate, M&A and the Financial Institutions Group. Projects ranged from the mundane daily updating of share prices, to helping formulate the firm’s 2016 strategy in the Telecommunications space. I guess each sector is so distinctly different, that each project assigned to me was never the same as the previous. In that sense, there is never a typical day in my line of work. So, if I had to pick, the biggest advantage of this job is that the work never gets boring (maybe it does get boring after a couple of years but we’ll have to wait and see). On the other hand, the hours are a huge disincentive (for me at least). It’s not for the faint hearted.

Oh and also, I completed my internship here in the London office (though I really wanted to go back to Asia). I can’t really say how London is different from Asia since I’ve never done an Investment Banking internship in Asia before. But this is what I gather from friends who did internships in Asia. Firstly, I think you’re definitely thrown into the deepest end of the pool here in London. There are very few Asians in Investment Banking here in my Bank (think there are about 6 of us out of 200). Because of that, you kind of have to fight for what you want. Things aren’t going to magically fall on your plate. Secondly, I feel that people here value likability more than in Asia (that’s not to say they don’t value a good piece of work… I’m just saying this with respect to Asia). I really had to put myself out there to meet people for coffee (I averaged 4 coffees per week). And because I really sucked at small talk and lacked communication skills, it wasn’t really the most comfortable of situations. However, I took away more than just caffeine from these chats - I met an MD once and interestingly, we bonded over life stories and Masterchef. If you’re not fluent in small talk, London is probably going to be tougher for you.

To make the best of your internship, I suggest keeping an open mind (you never know…one thing could lead to another), be curious (learn as much as possible and push your limits), and most important of all, reflect as you go along (take note of the things you have learnt because you will be learning a tonne)!

Accenture, NBC Universal, GroupM, IBM and SAP

Greetings from Contact Singapore. If you are looking for an internship or a full-time job back in Singapore, here are some vacancies for you to check out. To find out more about the jobs, just click on the links and apply!

Internships

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Graduate Programmes

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After submitting your application, please note that shortlisted candidates will be contacted by the company directly. If you have any questions, please feel free to drop Nisha an email at Nisha_KAMAL@contactsingapore.sg.