I’ve gotten a job offer from every final-round interview I’ve had in my adult life. Many of which were for jobs for some of the most competitive finance roles in the world. Here are some of my responses to a few of the most common interview questions I got.
Important Note: My dad didn’t play golf with anyone I was interviewing with.
Your Finance Brother’s First HireVue Circa 2016
Tell Me About Yourself
This is the first question to 95% of interviews and arguably the most important one to get right. From the interviewer’s perspective, this is always a strange one because you’ve probably had a phone screen, a resume that shows all your educational & work experience, and possibly a cover letter where you literally talk about yourself & your interest in the job. But, the thing you will learn sooner or later is that most people are incredibly disorganized and flying by the seat of their pants. Your interviewer probably forgot to print out a copy of your resume that HR sent them (which is why you should always bring copies to an interview) and almost certainly didn’t read it, so they do genuinely need you to tell them about yourself.
The key to answering this question is to take roughly 45 - 90 seconds to employ what I like to call the “Funnel Method” which is essentially talking through your educational / work background and why it has funneled you into wanting to interview for this job today. Here are a few example answers:
Experienced Professional
I’m [Jonathan], I’m currently an [Analyst] at [XYZ Firm] in the [123 Group]. Coming out of college I knew I wanted to work in finance, but wasn’t exactly sure in what capacity. I went into a product group because I thought it would allow me to see a number of different companies across different industries and better develop an understanding of what interested me the most. I’ve really enjoyed the breadth of experience that Investment Banking offers, and I recently learned that I would be receiving the Associate promotion which I am very excited about. I’ve used this as an opportunity to do some thinking about what I want to do long term, and while I would be happy staying - I’ve realized that I would like to work in a deeper capacity with a subset of companies as opposed to with many like I currently do. This past year, I worked on a transaction in [Specific Industry] and really enjoyed it, which sparked my interest in Private Equity, specifically a firm like yours that focuses on [Specific Industry]. I like that you get to take a deeper dive on a handful of companies, and get to work with those companies and their management teams after the transaction closes. In my currently role, I often immediately shift my focus to the next deal as opposed to working in depth with the portfolio company and management like I would in this seat. That opportunity to work with a smaller number of companies & management teams in depth, in an industry that I know interests me, and see a different part of the transactions I currently work on & enjoy really excites me, and is why I’m interested.
Student
I’m [Jonathan], I’m currently a [Sophomore] at [Duke] studying [Economics]. Coming into [Duke] I had always enjoyed math and found myself to be quite analytical. But, I didn’t know exactly how I wanted to apply this interest, so I decided to study [Economics] given how broad the major is. Early on, I joined the [Finance Club] where I am now the [Leadership Role] which really sparked my interest in applying my analytical interest in math through a finance lens. This past summer, I was very fortunate to be able to intern at [XYZ Firm] in their finance department where I got to apply this interest in a real world setting. I really enjoyed getting to use some of the concepts I learned in my finance elective classes and [Finance Club], but found the scope of how I was applying these concepts to be quite narrow, and that’s one of the main reasons I’m interested in [Investment Banking]. After speaking to [Person #1] and [Person #2] at [Interviewing Firm], I was really excited to hear how even at the analyst level you are extremely involved in analysis that may go to the management & c-suite level of the companies you work with. My projects at [XYZ Firm] often went to my direct manager and would help inform very specific decisions, but the opportunity to see my work have a much larger impact across not just one, but multiple firms I would potentially work with is incredibly exciting and why I’m very interested in the analyst role.
Why Should We Hire You?
Don’t get overly offended by this question, they ask it all the time - they’re just trying to make you flustered and see if you can advocate for yourself in a calm and collected manner. Bonus points if your interviewer follows it up with something along the lines of “I just interviewed someone from Harvard, 4.0 GPA - Phi Beta Kappa, and captain of the rowing team and an Olympic medalist. Why you should I hire you instead of them?”. This one’s a fun one because it also eliminates your ability to point to your credentials - tough to beat someone on paper who won an Olympic medal.
The way that I always approached this question, which I got asked many times - is to focus less on my stats and more on my intangibles. I grew up in North Carolina, I didn’t really know anyone working in finance, my parents didn’t have any connections, I was swimming on the deep end all on my own - so yeah it was impressive that this guy was able to row his way to an Olympic medal… but I swam to the same spot in life.
Example Answer
“I think they sound like a very impressive candidate on paper, and while I’m proud of my accomplishments as well - I think you should hire me because I think I can contribute a lot more than what is just on my resume. I’m very intrinsically motivated to want to work here, and I think that will help me a lot on the desk. I took on a significant amount of student loans to attend Duke, and as part of that I’ve worked a number of jobs to help pay for my student contribution each semester. I take all the same classes as my peers and score near the top of my class while also going to sometimes multiple jobs afterwards. One of the ways I support myself on the side is buying and reselling Supreme to my classmates. I work incredibly hard at this, and make significantly more on an hourly basis than any on-campus job I could have gotten. I’ve quickly developed a reputation as the guy on campus who does this, and I think it shows ingenuity and grit that doesn’t necessarily come across on a resume and could help me on the job. I’m a self-starter that’s very good at thinking outside of the box and understanding the bigger picture - I’m originally from North Carolina and don’t have any connections to the finance industry. I got here by figuring this all out on my own, and while I’m sure there are many equally as qualified candidates as me - I don’t think there are many that also have the same drive that I do.”
Tell Me About A Time You Failed
Let me start out by saying this is stupidest question of all time, and I am honestly shocked how often this gets asked in interviews. I’ve personally conducted somewhere in the ball park of dozens of interviews over the course of my professional career, and never once asked someone this question. But alas, you must play the game - so here’s how I approached this question…
I’m not saying you want to lie, but I would personally omit a time that you really f*cked something up. Your answer to this question should show that you’re human, and are self-aware enough to know that you make mistakes, but that you’re able to quickly adapt to make yourself better.
Example Answer
At my [Internship / Current Role] I recently had to put together a client presentation on a tight timeline. We had gotten the information we needed at the beginning of the day, and needed to share it with the client the following morning. I took inventory of all the data, coordinated with my Managing Director & VP to make sure we were aligned on the presentation lay-out, and began pulling together the presentation. By about 10pm I had a first draft pulled together and shared it with my team. My VP asked if I had run this by the legal team yet to get sign off, and realized I had forgotten about this step - and that our legal team usually goes home at 5pm. This was an oversight on my part to not take into account other teams’ schedules and only considered what me and my team had to do, to get this done. Luckily, I was able to get in touch with our internal on-call counsel to review the deck that evening. But, because I got it to them so late, it turned a late night into an all-nighter. I was luckily able to incorporate everything in time and get it to the client the following morning - but I learned I needed to take other folks’ schedules and limitations into account when meeting deadlines - and now reaching out to our legal team to coordinate on these things like this is one of the first things I do in all of these processes now.
I hope you found some of these answers helpful! This is what worked for me, but may not work for you - it’s important to tell a story when you interview and your story and voice may sound different from mine.
As always, thank you to all the paid subscribers who support my Substack and make posting content like this possible - you are appreciated!
Best,
Your Finance Brother
Note: these answers do not constitute advice or recommendations of any kind. These are simply recounts of similar answers to what I would have said in interviews, and is meant to be purely educational in nature.
I think what you’re doing to educate the masses on your experience and advice is really great. Hope they keep coming.
Always delivering comprehensive advices!