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Research Proposal · December 2017

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Vikram Vennapusa

Jaimien Delp

English 325.006

15 October 2017

The Track

I glance back and forth from my notebook to my MacBook, flipping through pages of

notes and rigorously switching from tab to tab on the Chrome browser. The time on my laptop

shows 1:57 PM, and for most of my classmates it’s an ordinary weekday in September during

our Junior year at The University of Michigan. My roommates are strolling to their last classes of

the day and eagerly making dinner plans in our apartment group chat, a clear attempt to make the

most of the undeniably fleeting warm weather while it lasts. I hurriedly shift my phone to ‘Do

Not Disturb’ and set it back down on the table.

For the past hour and a half, I’ve been cooped up in a private study room in the newly

constructed Blau Building, incessantly reviewing my notes and exhausting every ounce of my

willpower to avoid all distraction. I’m now anticipating my phone to ring, my anxiety increasing

exponentially each passing second like steam ready to erupt in a pressure cooker. I’ve been

granted the opportunity of a 3rd round interview at Guggenheim Partners, an ‘elite boutique’

investment bank, what most would consider the final hurdle in scoring the coveted summer

internship position.

I triple check the Google Calendar invite sent by their recruitment team to verify that the

call is still scheduled for 2 PM EST, and although it is, I’m almost entirely certain from prior

experience that the guy isn’t going to be punctual. My guess is correct. At 2:09 my iPhone

begins vibrating furiously on the table and my caller ID displays an incoming call from an
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unfamiliar string of digits, the 212 Manhattan area code being its only recognizable element. I sit

up straight and inhale deeply to let the nerves flush out of me – it’s game time baby. The voice

on the other end of the line is precisely how I pictured it would be, eloquent yet bizarrely

energetic, and the 45 minutes of passive interrogation instantly kicks off.

I’m speaking with an associate named William and he starts out by giving me a concise

background about himself and an overview of his position at Guggenheim. I act equal parts

intrigued and impressed with his introduction, even though it’s essentially the same information

I’ve already found in a curious LinkedIn search, jotted down in my notebook and proactively

stored in my short-term memory. He transitions seamlessly into the next phase of our

conversation, probing into my professional background and inquiring about my general interests.

He pitches me question after question over the phone and I bat back each response with the exact

confidence and conviction that I’ve rehearsed thoroughly during the last few weeks through

similar interviews with similar interviewers.

“So why investment banking?” he asks in a chipper tone, pausing briefly to allow me a

chance to internalize his question. “What interests you the most about the work?”

I think for a second, but only to extract the pre-prepared and overly refined answer from

the depths of my brain. It hits me like second nature, and I shoot back the flawless combination

of buzz-words, industry knowledge, and banking enthusiasm that I knew William wanted to hear.

“I’m fascinated by the large-scale impact that investment banking transactions have

across global economies and I have a profound interest in advising major companies on the right

strategies to grow their businesses. I also believe that the steep learning curve prevalent in the

industry will allow me to gain a strong financial foundation as well as a significant level of

responsibility even at the entry level.”

I’d previously been asked the same question at least a dozen times throughout the past

month of the recruiting season and by the third time my response had been perfected to a science.

In fact, the question didn’t require thinking after all, there was only one correct answer – the one

located on page 45 of the Breaking into Wall Street interview prep guide. Anything besides what

was inscribed there was incorrect by default and would therefore result in an automatic ‘ding’ on

my interview critique.

I power through the remainder of the phone call mechanically, focusing solely on the

tone of my voice and the tone in William’s responses as opposed to the actual content of them.

Each inflection is consciously calculated, my pitch changing methodically every time I sense that

he may be getting the slightest bit bored of listening to me. At the end, he assures me that

Guggenheim will be in touch and politely thanks me for my time. I set my phone back down on

the table and dynamically stretch out each one of my limbs Vinyasa Yoga style. I’m beyond

relieved that I can now drop the veil of professionalism that I’ve been meticulously feigning and

can once again assume my normal persona. I take a large gulp from the Aquafina bottle in front

of me, my sweat glazed palms rendering my grip slippery. For the first time today, I reward

myself with a moment to relax.

Reflecting on each question that I had just been asked, I scanned through my notes to

ensure that I hadn’t messed up at all. I didn’t ask myself why these were my answers or if I was

even being entirely truthful when I stated them. I didn’t see the need to. I just checked for right

or wrong, if I had won or not. I never even questioned why I truly wanted to work in investment

banking. In all honesty, I didn’t know of an alternative I found nearly as attractive.

From as early as high school and throughout college, I was completely set on becoming a

banker. My first real interaction with a banker occurred during the formative first semester of my
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freshman year at the University of Michigan. Even before I knew anything about the nature of

the job or the effort it took to obtain one, I was already committed.

It was a weekday evening, about a month into my college experience, and I was attending

a meeting for a student-run investment fund that I’d recently been selected to join. The topic of

discussion was “Career Exploration and Opportunities in Finance,” and the executive board had

scheduled several guest speakers, primarily previous alumni of the club, to meet the current

members and share their post-graduation work experiences.

As always, the air in the Ross School of Business was crisp and sterile as though it were

captured from the Himalayas and then repeatedly HEPA filtered. The enormous ground floor

glowed radiantly, fluorescent lighting over-illuminating the entire space to create the “always

early enough to work” ambience. By this hour, I would have typically called it a day, and the

business professional dress code for the event had only further encouraged me to skip it

altogether. Nevertheless, being the go-getter boy scout that I was, I suited up and made sure to

arrive ten minutes early to snatch up a few easy brownie points from the execs. As I lounged in

the Robertson Auditorium waiting for the presentation to start, I indulged in some mild

entertainment from observing the other members in attendance. The older looking ones were

bouncing around in their seats, practically wetting themselves from nervousness at the mere

mention of the words “networking,” “career,” or “recruiting.”

The scene felt identical to the anticipation and frenzy of students assembling in their

testing room minutes before taking a final exam. The only difference was that the exam that was

being administered here tested on who could most impress everyone else, or more importantly,

who could land themselves a job.

Just as all this excitement seemed to be approaching a climax, it was stifled at once.

Everyone was forced to set aside their eagerness and behave calmly as the powerful halogen

lights in the auditorium dimmed into the dusky pigment synonymous with silence.

A tall, slim and superbly polished ‘boy’ rose from the first row of seats and strode to the

front of the room, subtly nodding in acknowledgement to a couple of familiar members. He

appeared to be in his early twenties and wore a two-button slate grey suit which molded to him

like armor. From his dignified posture, to his pomade lathered hair strands slicked back into a

jet-black wave, everything about him oozed prestige. He picked up the clicker on the podium and

flicked a PowerPoint on to the projector screen behind him as he faced his audience, all in one

fluid motion.

“Alright guys, let’s get started,” he announced, gazing across the room, feeling out his

crowd. Content that he had the undivided attention of his spectators, he began.

“For those of you who don’t already know me, I’m Nick and I’m a second-year analyst

at Barclays,” he said. I expected him to potentially elaborate on what exactly the words

“Barclays” or “analyst” meant, as opposed to just reciting the same words available on the

presentation slide. Instead, he adjusted his suit jacket and simply clicked to the next slide,

continuing without hesitation.

After about 20 more clicks, Nick’s presentation ended and an entire database of new

information had been dumped on me. Each slide that he presented introduced a handful of

complex terms and jargon that I had never heard of and an even larger handful of questions about

the significance of each one of these. “Buyside vs. sellside,” “exit opps,” “industry groups vs.

product groups.” The list of these was vast and encyclopedic, it was vocabulary that we weren’t

taught in school. My two initial questions from his first slide remained an abstract mystery,
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answered by only more abstraction and more mystery. Each layer that he peeled back off the

onion of his profession, trying to explain his job, revealed yet another layer more complicated

than the last.

At one point in the presentation Nick pulled up a slide which contained nothing on it

except for a process diagram and its corresponding title, “The Track”. “The Track” was his

career plan and he convincingly described it as the quintessential path for anyone working within

finance. The diagram started at one end, the first segment labeled “top performer in high

school,” then led to “attend a feeder university,” into “investment banking,” then “private

equity,” and finally concluded with a bold, one-word caption: “greatness.”

This was “The Track” and Nick informed us that we were technically already on it,

although completely unbeknownst to us. The choice we had while attending our “feeder

university” was whether we wanted to crank our asses off to earn a spot on the next segment, or

if we wanted to deviate from it. He also made it clear that the odds of getting back on “The

Track” after you fell off were only slightly more promising than hitting the jackpot in the Mega

Millions.

As Nick preached, progressing through his slide deck from one to the next, his audience’s

expressions progressed along with it, almost in synchrony. His brief introduction and confident

demeanor sparked looks of curiosity. When he described his experiences on Wall Street, our eyes

lit up with wonder. By the end of his 15-minute sermon, our faces had ultimately morphed into

personified projections of ravenous ambition. You could almost see the yachts in our eyes.

When I left the auditorium that evening, I really couldn’t explain to you what it was for

sure that Nick did for a living, at least not in my own words, although he did an exceptional job
 7

of making it sound elite. What I did know for certain was that Nick called himself an investment

banker and that he was the fucking MAN, a fact which everyone in the club surely agreed with.

From the day that Nick planted the initial seed into my impressionable Freshman mind,

through the long semesters that followed, my understanding of “The Track” rapidly matured

from an illusory perception of entitlement into a grueling mission in what could easily pass for

an indentured servant training camp. However, I, and many of the friends whom I made

throughout my quest to banking attainment, firmly believed in the end prize we had been

promised, and we worked tirelessly together to prevent one another from abandoning it and

succumbing to the horrifying notion of averageness. We were forced to endure brutal tradeoffs,

often sacrificing nights of sleep to memorize prep guides, foregoing countless social activities to

practice mock interviews, and surrendering our warm fall afternoons to the oppressive monarch

of recruitment season. Our dauntless journey fueled by the vitalizing oasis of Red Bull and the

vision of a heavenly light beaming on the other side of this hellish tunnel: “greatness.”

The biggest misconception I had about “The Track” was that it’s merely the quickest

avenue to the glorious land of models and bottles. As I continue to immerse myself further

within it though, I realize that it’s far more than just that. It’s a game, more-so a marathon, and

the “greatness” at the end of it all is the supreme thrill of finally crossing the finish line. It’s the

unparalleled sensation of surviving the cutthroat process, mastering a crucial set of skills, and

overcoming merciless obstacles along the way. Each segment on Nick’s process diagram that’s

achieved, and each successive round of Guggenheim interviews that’s conquered, whets my

insatiable appetite with another momentary taste of it - the divine feeling of being a winner.

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