Hella

Last week I up and decided I’d join the Houston Trek and see what sort of employers were looking to hire summers and full-timers out of Wharton. With interview invitations rolling in, I realized that I’d be able ot visit at least one office I’d be meeting later this month during the Dedicated Interview Period (DIP). In short, I figured it was a good investment for both this year and long term since I’d like to end up back in Texas.

Well the trek is officially over now. We visited with many banks and a couple consulting firms (I ended up not making the visit to the last consulting firm’s office) and I had a great time. It was *VERY* interesting to see the dramatically distinct cultures of the offices down here compared with the people I’d met from New York. Suffice it to say it would be hard to even think the offices were part of the same firm. This is not really a bad thing in my eyes as I liked this distinctiveness at more than a couple of firms.

Thursday we met first with AIM Investments followed by UBS. We then had a lunch in the conference room with Morgan Stanley. In the afternoon, we met Lehman and finished up with Merrill Lynch. The Wharton Houston Alumni club treated us to drinks and appetizers at Zula.

Today we hit Booz Allen Hamilton first thing followed by McKinsey and then headed over to Goldman Sachs for lunch. I took particularly interest in McKinsey since I have been invited to interview with the Southern Office (which now includes Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Miami, and Charlotte). I have an interview with Booz, also, but it’s for the Dallas office specifically.

Overall I’m very happy with my experience. I had a good time with the 5 classmates that were along with me and it was great to meet some potential employers and people I might be working with. However, it is very clear that it can really be hard to get a foot in the door at the banks since they really don’t recruit as heavily from Wharton as they do from UT Austin and Rice. That was a bit disheartening but I guess I expected it to some extent. Some firms, like Goldman, don’t really take any summers and instead like for associates to spend the summer in NYC and if a full-time offer is made, then take them into the regional office. It’s just frustrating that the spots through on-campus recruiting are taken up by people who very rarely wish to work in Houston (for the summer or full-time) and it can be hard to compete just for an interview invite.

Filed under: B-School