Why You Didn’t Land an Offer in Your Final Round Interviews at Morgan Stanley

“Help! I went to my final round interviews but the interviewer didn’t like me from the start and kept harassing me with irrelevant questions. I asked for feedback afterward and they said, “Improve your technical skills.” How can I do that? They didn’t even ask me any technical questions.”

Final rounds are over.

Banks are done giving out offers.

…and you came close, got a few Superdays (or assessment centers), but you didn’t walk away with any offers.

While most of the articles on this site teach you how to improve yourself and land offers, this one has a different message: interviews are random.

Sometimes it’s not your fault if you don’t get an offer.

How Investment Banking Interviews Have Changed in Recent Years – and How You Should Prepare

One of the most common questions I get goes like this:

“I’ve read all the usual interview advice. Every guide cover-to-cover. Message boards, Mergers & Inquisitions, and anything else I can find online. But I’m worried that interviews now (2009) are different and that the standard advice doesn’t apply.

How have investment banking interviews changed in recent years? And what can I do to prepare?“

Some of what you see in investment banking interviews doesn’t change much from year to year – but a lot does change in a recession.

And interviews today are definitely different than they were 5 years ago.

So here’s how you prepare:

Superday Zen: Why Less Is More When It Comes to Interview Preparation

“Help! I have an upcoming Superday at CS, how do I prepare? Should I try to learn LBO modeling in a day?”

“What should I focus on for my Superday at MS? Should I write out my entire ‘story’ in Word and memorize it along with all my other answers?”

“Should I stay up all night memorizing finance questions to prepare?”

No, no, and no.

With Superday interviews, less is more.

You might think this is shocking since selling interview guides is one of my core businesses.

To see why this counter-intuitive conclusion is true, let’s look at the differences between 1st round and Superday interviews at banks.