Advice Column

This post is intended to give advice to individuals pursuing the same career path as I am. I wanted to give you my outlook on what I think is necessary to get a job in this economy. A general requirement for pursuing a career is to figure out what degree you need to acquire to be able to attain that job someday. Once you have figured this out, you map out all your classes and eventually get your degree and jump into your career, right?? To be honest that is what I used to think for quite some time. Just last month a thought came to mind, “why is a job going to want to pick me over everyone else that applies”? I am not the smartest person out of everyone else in my field, according to grades, I do not have much experience when it comes to finance, other than taking a few classes, and I do not have too much networking going on. Think about it, a degree in any major should indicate that you are very inclined with all material in your field. But how well does school really prepare us for our future careers? It is my belief that many jobs require you to learn the way they do things, and once you learn you are fit to do the job.

In this tough economy it is difficult to get a job. Many people do not like to believe in the saying, “it is all about who you know” but let’s face reality this is very true. Let’s say you do not know anyone in your field how would one get a job? First step is to take advantage, preferably while you are still at school, of all the internships available. This will be the creation of your network. An internship gives you experience needed to pursue a career right out of graduation. So many jobs we are interested in require 2 years of experience in a related field. So by interning you might be offered a job there, cross your fingers, or you can always just use 
it as a reference for experience.

I wanted to share with you the job requirements to become a financial analyst.  I found a general description of the requirements from Google. To become a junior financial analyst you need a bachelor’s degree in a business field, such as finance, accounting or economics. This webpage also stated that to become a junior financial analyst 2 years or less of experience is required. To become a senior financial analyst you need 3 to 5 years of financial planning and analysis.  Many analysts want to move up so they get their MBA, this allows them to become a senior analyst. Once you have become a financial analyst you want to strengthen your abilities. Many analysts take a series of tests, if you are lucky your employer will pay for them, including the Series 7 General Securities Representative Qualification, Series 63 Uniform Securities Agent State Law Examination, Series 65 & 66 Uniform Investment Adviser Law and State Law Examinations and the CFA exam. Now the purpose of these tests is for employers and clients to recognize the variation of knowledge you have attained.

I hope my post helps those of you considering a job in my future field. The main idea is that you need to figure out what you want to do in life. Lay on the table the requirements necessary to reach your goal. Once you have done that just follow the steps, and always try to network and get as much experience possible.

Communication

A Private Banking Relationship Manager is someone who provides personalized service to wealthy clients that is not available to typical customers. The job of my interviewee requires a moderate amount of reading and writing. A Private Banking Relationship Manager is required to stay in touch with their clients. She has found that the best way to do this is by email. Email is one of the most popular forms of communication; it is quick and effective. Emailing is not as simple as most people may think. When a professional sends an email, there are guidelines that must be followed. One must understand who their audience is, whether they must stay professional, or if they have the ability to be informal.

Some reading that my interviewee does throughout the day is Market Watch , Biz Journal and CNN Money. These readings give her an idea about the economy, market and business. With these readings she is able to gain information and knowledge that allows her the ability to further educate her clients. When it comes to reading articles, you need to make sure that they are from credible sources. This is important when you are speaking with clients and are referencing what you read. It is so easy for anyone to post information online, so when you become a professional you have to make sure you read and research credible sources. The basic idea behind this post is that when you start your career, you need to be professional and use professional resources. You are representing your company and ultimately yourself.

Career Choices

There are so many different types of jobs in our world. How does one figure what he or she wants to do? This is one of the toughest questions adults face today. People always say do what you love to do or do something fun. I definitely struggled with making a career decision, it took a lot of self exploration. I switched my major twice, and I changed my career outlook at least 20 times. Honestly I still haven’t chosen a career, but I have narrowed my choices down.

My interviewee is Angela, she is a Private Banking Relationship Manager at US Bank. She has a wide variety of education and experience. She has been in the banking industry since 1980. She has education in business management, accounting and finance. She has experience as a teller, manager, business banker, loan officer, and priority banker. A Private Banking Relationship Manager is an expert in understanding and helping clients achieve their financial needs and goals. This can vary from credit and deposit products to sophisticated financial planning. As you can see you cannot just jump into this job. It takes years of familiarizing yourself with products and knowing how to respond to clients. My main focus while I work at US Bank, as a teller, is doing just that. I try to understand all the jargon throughout the day. I am also tested weekly on my customer service skills. My job right now is hopefully preparing me to be a suitable Private Banking Relationship Manager.

An ordinary day for a PBRM consists of constantly checking your email and phone. Angela said, “you always have to be available to your clients”. If you are not close to your phone, you may take too long to respond and potentially miss out on sales, this business is all about being reactive and proactive. While waiting for calls, she works on her Loan Pipeline or makes calls from her lead’s list. As you can see there is a lot of phone activity involved in this job. When she does get a scheduled meeting she can meet at their place of business or at one of her assigned banks. This job requires you to be very people oriented and socially adaptive.

Some of the challenges a PBRM face in this economy is getting loans approved due to low appraisal or income. This can hurt a PBRM’s income, because you can get a referral for a loan, but if it doesn’t get processed through the system than you will not get incentive. So obviously the economy has a major effect on a PBRM’s income. Angela stated, “Sometimes customers want better rates on their savings or CD and we are just not able to meet that”. This can have an effect on your clients that come to you for their business. The clients trust that you can give them the best rates and give them the biggest “bang for their buck”, sometimes they feel resentful that you are not doing your best.

In my opinion the toughest part of this job is first building you cliental and then keeping them all satisfied. But Angela said this takes time and practice, it soon becomes second nature. You have the chance to build real relationships with these customers, it takes a lot of time and hard work. Angela believes the biggest downfall to her job is being stuck in traffic when she has a scheduled meeting. I can imagine this can be frustrating for her and the client.

After the interview I felt good, I believed that I can really do this if given the opportunity. I know I can succeed in this field. I am building the knowledge of products and have great customer service skills. Angela recommended this job to anyone who has these basic qualifications. I think if I follow her steps and climb the job ladder that I too can become a PBRM in the near future.

Blogging Do's and Dont's

So I decided to critique a few blogs that are related to my blog. So I looked at top 10 investment and finance blogs. The main reason for doing this is because I want my blog to carry the attributes and characteristics that good blogs have. I also wanted to avoid using the techniques other bloggers use that I find to not be appealing.

The first blog I looked at was ZeroHedge, written by Tyler Durden. I enjoyed reading his blog, it was pretty amusing. His blog is very decorative and up to date. He uses a picture in almost every blog post. His posts are fairly short and to the point, which is another characteristic that I feel is necessary. When you have short and effective posts it allows the reader to read further and discover more of your blogs. When I came across his blog name, I was expecting to do a lot of reading related to hedge funds. Though I didn’t find much information on hedge funds, at least not in his latest works, I did find a lot of current information that is useful. He is a very active writer, he has 15 posts today, and if you follow his page I am sure this is a good blog trait for you. The weaknesses of his blog would have to be that he doesn’t take a stance on his blogs, it is summarized. It would be nice to see where he stands in regards to QE3, when he had mentioned Bernanke. I think this may be the downfall of having short blogs; yes the post is informative, but why read your post when I can get that information somewhere else. I want an opinion. Another weakness I would say is his passive voice, it sounds as though he is complaining on a lot of his posts, almost as if he whines about his topics.

The second blog I chose was InfectiousGreed, written by Paul Kedrosky. I do not understand why this was top 10 best finance and investment blogs. I reviewed his website and all I found were links to other readings. I did not see his blog posts anywhere. I did like the way he set up his page, it was different from many others. He had a scroll down menu to see all his links. His name and picture were on every reading. His page made me slightly upset. I visited his page because I was interested in seeing a blog, but all I could find were twitter links and other current readings. Many of the readings on his page were irrelevant to finance.

From this I have learned some new techniques to implement into my post, I have also figured out what to stay away from doing. I am just trying to keep my readers happy, if you have any suggestions let me know.

Genre of My Blog

Blogging is a rapidly growing medium. Bloggers have become our generation’s new authors. A blog can consist of a wide variety of different topics, from experiences to predictions. Since anyone can blog about anything, it is helpful for the readers to have an index, or a genre. Now a genre, according to Dictionary.com, is "a category of artistic endeavor having a particular form, content or technique". When we think of a genre we have ideas of romance, comedy, or science-fiction. These are some of the main and more standard genres, but I would like to focus on genres that pertain to blogs.

Blogs can be described as informative, pleasurable or comical. These are things that people enjoy spending their time reading. But as readers we are very different from each other, we do not like all the same things, nor do we all hate the same things. So how can I as a blogger have a genre that will keep your attention?

My idea of the genre of a blog is that genres have genres. Now you might be thinking, what is this guy talking about? Well I mean that within my genre, whether it be romance or comedy, there is another layer of genre I would call a constraint. A constraint is "a limitation or restriction". Is my comedy a punch line? Is there a story behind it or did I see it happen to someone yesterday? Am I a professional comedian or do I just blog for fun? These are the different types of constraints I am talking about.

I would call the genre of my blog Intro to finance/careers/investments. With this being said the majority of my blog posts will discuss the topic of finance with a concentration in investments and careers. Who will read my post? I figure people with the same questions that I have, and people who can answer my questions, as well as anyone just hoping to get a good read. This will most likely be people already involved in the field of finance, or people looking for a career in finance, like myself.

Now the genre within my genre I would refer to as having good quality, decent quantity, solid feedback and well lets be honest, a novice specialization. With this I put my best foot forward, I do not want to waste my readers’ time so every post will be strong, maybe short or long, depending on the topic. I will reply to every response. Over time I hope to expand my horizons and step past being just a novice.

http://csdl.computer.org/comp/proceedings/hicss/2004/2056/04/205640101b.pdf

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/genre?s=t

http://www.waggish.org/2005/thoughts-on-genre-blogs-and-genre/