How You Can Become Famous in 2010

Let’s forget completely about investment banking, recruiting, networking, and interviews for a minute and focus on what you really want:

To become famous.

Or at least, kind of a big deal.

Breaking into finance and all is nice, but becoming famous is even better… so here’s how you can do it.

Background

I mentioned before how most new content on M&I in the future will be in the form of case studies and interviews – because the basics on networking, resumes, and interviews have been covered… sometimes dozens of times.

So rather than re-hashing those topics, everyone involved with the site would rather move into new territory by featuring interviews and case studies with readers instead.

If you’ve been following M&I since the beginning, you’ve already seen this shift: there were several interviews and case studies in 2009 as opposed to 0 in 2008, and 2010 will bring even more.

Only one small problem: we can’t do this alone, so that’s where you come in.

What We’re Looking For

The topics are pretty broad, but we’re looking for anyone who wants to share their story working in a certain group, a certain region, or breaking into finance in the first place.

Some of this has been covered already on M&I, so here are a couple ideas to get you thinking:

• Different Industries: Private Equity (all types of firms), Venture Capital, Corporate Development, Hedge Funds…
• Groups: Equity Capital Markets, Debt Capital Markets, Restructuring, Special Situations, FIG, Other Industry Groups, Wealth Management, Sales & Trading…
• Regions: Asia, Europe, South America, Middle East, South Africa, Canada…
• Interesting Stories: IT to IB, Insurance Salesman to PE, Traveling Bard to Hedge Fund Manager…

These are just suggestions – if you have an idea that’s not on this list, go right ahead.

The only requirement is that it hasn’t been covered on M&I before – so here’s a recap of what we already have:

• Investment Banking India
• Investment Banking Italy
• Investment Banking Australia
• Credit Derivatives in Tokyo
• On the Trading Floor
• What You Do in Fixed Income
• Mergers & Acquisitions

More “day in the life” or “week in the life” material would also be great, so that’s an option for you if it’s easier.

How It Works

If you want, we can just email you a set of questions and get your replies like that – but it’s usually faster to speak on the phone and “interview” you.

To conduct each interview, we’ll plan to speak for about 30 minutes and go over some key questions about your background and how you got to where you are.

In exchange, you can ask me (Brian) any questions you have directly and I’ll do my best to answer them.

The actual interviews will be conducted over the course of the next few weeks / months.

They’ll be published over the course of the next year, or maybe longer than that depending on the response we get.

Everything will be anonymous and your personal information will be deleted.

You’ll see everything before it gets published on the site, and you will be able to make changes or request deletion of anything you don’t feel comfortable sharing.

What to Do Now

If you have an interesting story you want to share, go ahead and send us an email via the contact form right here.

I’ll respond within a few days and we can set up a time to speak.

P.S. Also check out the new and expanded FAQ for M&I – it has been completely revamped to answer dozens of the most common questions received over the past 3 years. Even bigger FAQ for BIWS coming soon…

P.P.S. While you’re at it, also check out the massive changes to Breaking Into Wall Street over the past few months, including the brand-new advanced merger and LBO models. 5x as much content as 6 months ago, and still the same price.

Break Into Investment Banking