On Thursday evening I attended a presentation about several fields related to financial investment. Four MSU alums described their experience in investment banking, private equity, asset management, and private wealth management. It was largely aimed at undergraduates, but I still found the presentation to be beneficial, as I was not familiar with all of the ins and outs of the investment field. My main interest is in venture capital, but I understand it is virtually impossible to get into. From the four descriptions, I-banking is really the only one that interests me. It sounds like an intellectually challenging, financially rewarding job, and it can lead into a venture capital job. However, I am not particularly interested in the insane work hours; I would like to have time in my life for a girlfriend and personal travel. And while I have realized that I expect to earn a higher income with an MBA, money is not my prime motivator.
Yesterday I was browsing the job listings for NSHMBA, and one that looked especially cool was IBM’s Extreme Blue internship. It sounds exciting and fits with my previously stated interest in project management or some sort of Internet start-up. On second thought, it looks similar to where I would be after a promotion at Consumers Energy. Possibly worse because I would have college interns working on my team instead of professionals with degrees. But IBM claims this is very entrepreneurial (which Consumers is not) and they recruit the technical interns from MIT, Stanford, and Carnegie Mellon (which Consumers does not). Separate from the work experience, it could be a great networking opportunity for a future start-up. However, it is worth noting that an Extreme Blue internship would have nothing to do with my finance concentration. Hmm…