7 Simple Steps to Avoiding Investment Banking Burnout
How do you avoid burning out when you work 80-100 hours per week and are constantly in the office, “on call” and sometimes even sleeping under your desk?
This question came up the other day with a reader who had recently completed a banking internship – and I realized that avoiding burnout might interest both prospective and current bankers.
Many of these tips apply to anyone who spends the majority of their time in an office – regardless of whether or not you’re staring at Excel/PowerPoint all day.
1. Take Vacations
You might wonder how you can take a vacation if you have to work 80-100 hours every week.
Although you do work a lot, senior bankers understand that you need some time off – especially once you’ve been there for awhile and have proven yourself. It’s common for Analysts to take a week off after their first year ends, for example.
If you’re coming in at a more senior level, I would suggest timing your vacation to coincide with the conclusion of major deals or projects – this gets easier to figure out once you have a feel for what people do in your office.
I took a vacation after several of my deals had been announced and there was some downtime (before anyone noticed that I wasn’t doing anything).
2. Exercise – Don’t Watch TV (Or Surf the Web)
Since you get home late at night (or sometimes not at all), there’s always a temptation to watch TV or surf the web when you have free time. No one else is awake, right?
As you can probably tell from some recent articles, I’m a huge fan of movies and TV shows. But in banking, I avoided them as much as possible and instead went to the gym whenever I had a spare moment.
There are plenty of 24/7 gyms in major cities, so I would encourage you to look into one of them – forget anything that closes at 9 PM.
If you’re concerned about getting urgent Blackberry messages at 3 AM, do what I did and check it every 15 minutes – if you keep your sessions to an hour or less, this isn’t much of a problem.
3. Take Mini-Vacations
So maybe you can’t afford to take a week off and go on a cruise in the Greek islands. But you probably can afford a few hours at the spa.
Sometimes if it’s slow enough you can also take a Saturday off and go on a “retreat” instead.
I get a lot of questions on money – on whether there’s pressure to spend money to fit in and how much you can really save, for example.
If you spend money on a day off rather than on a plasma TV or new apartment, you can save quite a bit and avoid burnout.
4. Live with Friends
Take it from Logan’s introduction to Damn, It Feels Good to Be a Banker:
“This fall, I moved into an apartment in one of TriBeCa’s most exclusive areas with seven guys from school. Five guys ended up living in an apartment upstairs and three of us took a place directly below them.”
Living with friends helps you avoid burning out – even if you get home late there’s usually at least 1 other person awake and you can stay away from TV/web surfing.
I know some of you might actually want to spend $5,000/month on rent in New York, but it’s worth pointing out that living with friends can often save you money as well.
5. Spend Time with Non-Bankers
I wrote that one of the untold benefits of banking is developing good relationships with friends at your bank. When you spend 80 hours a week with someone, it’s hard not to get to know him or her well.
But there’s a downside as well: you can find yourself spending time only with your friends in finance – and you forget that not everyone stares at Excel for most of their waking hours.
Much of the time when you’re with banker friends, everyone complains about the same topics: how bad bonuses will be this year, how awful their latest pitch is, and whether the MD is having an affair.
It’s good to know what’s going on elsewhere in the industry, but it also helps to get away and realize there’s more to life than work.
6. Minimize Unimportant Work
This is a tough one, especially if you’re new. We saw how spending too much time on the wrong type of work can ruin Friday nights, but that’s just one example of this phenomenon.
Other examples: spending time formatting PowerPoint when you should send it to Presentations instead; spending days writing a first draft when it’s going to be revised endlessly anyway; going back and forth over email when a quick phone call would settle things instantly.
Some people, like the Associate I wrote about, like to spend time on pointless work and there’s not much you can do about it. But after you learn who’s reasonable, try to gravitate toward those who don’t make you waste weekends by screening for companies with blue headquarter buildings.
7. Learn to Say “No.”
Wait, don’t you have to say “yes” to everyone as a junior banker?
No, not really.
If you have other looming deadlines that are more important, “I can’t do that right now – I have to finish all these other projects by tomorrow” is an excuse that works well (you can’t do this right away – you need to have been there awhile and established yourself).
In the beginning you’ll overestimate how much you can accomplish. And for summer interns and other “newbies,” that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
But there are diminishing returns to how much you learn with each new project, and you’ll learn that putting in 20% more hours for a 5% higher bonus is often not worth it – especially if you don’t plan to stay in the industry for the long-term.
In private equity interviews and most other “post-banking” type interviews, all you need are 2-3 good projects to discuss. So if you already have 5 deals under your belt, will the 6th one make a difference?
I would say no, and so should you if you want to avoid investment banking burnout.
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Tags: apartment rent, co-workers, investment banking, investment banking fitness, understanding investment banking, vacation
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No BS, straight to the point I could not agree more about these life saving tips. Sometimes thinking before jumping on the gas pedal is a good idea and you’ll be better at your job.
Yup, people spend far too much time worrying about irrelevant things and not enough time making sure they stay alive…
[...] From Mergers & Inquisitions: Seven tips to avoiding investment-banking burnout. [...]
I remember those days well. A few other points: eating well and avoiding too much caffeine. Learning to meditate – a good way to switch off and help you get better quality sleep.
Learning the art of sneaking out of the office when its not too busy yet appearing to be somewhere around.
I loved sneaking out of the office, especially once I stopped caring…