Speakers, Networking, and Tiny Crab Cakes: Just a Normal Day During Bank Week

Chicago Booth is a major recruiting target for Wall Street investment banks. For most of the recruiting process, banks come to Chicago for networking events, but right after finals, we make a trip to New York to visit them on their turf. This trip is known as "Bank Week". This year, about 80 first-year students from Chicago Booth's Investment Banking Group (IBG) made the Bank Week trek to visit potential employers and make a final recruiting push before interviews for investment banking summer internships. The trek is meant not only for those pursuing a career in New York, but also those who are recruiting for Chicago, West Coast, or even global offices of NYC-based firms.

First-year Booth MBA Jason Arican just finished up his trek, and offers a glimpse into his experience with a “day-in-the-life” diary of Bank Week. As Jason shows, recruiting is a tough process for anyone, but the key to Booth students’ success in landing investment banking internships comes from a combination of strong relationships with an active alumni base in banking, a supportive and collaborative environment among the first-years (as well as between the first-year and second-year classes), and great support from Booth’s Career Services.
--Matt Richman

7:50 a.m.: The alarm on my phone goes off. I have an informational interview with a firm at 9 a.m. and figure that I can eke out a ten minute snooze and still make it on time. The nights during Bank Week are late (with some events that are scheduled by banks and others that... are not), so right now ten minutes seems like an eternity.

8:54 a.m.: After a brisk twelve minute walk, I arrive to the building. All of the banks are in skyscrapers that require you to show ID when you arrive and I am stuck waiting in line at the security desk. I did not budget enough time for this and am starting to sweat knowing that I might be a few minutes late.