Comment by spiredigital | Hacker News Reader

Comment by spiredigital | Hacker News Reader

Right out of college I took an investment banking job, and it didn't take me too long to realize it definitely was NOT what I wanted to be doing for the next 10 to 20 years of my life.

I had it relatively easy - working for a small firm, our hours were more in 50 to 80 hour range - so not nearly as stressful as many. But it was still pretty brutal, especially when things got busy.

I worked with good people and it's not true that all bankers are insanely greedy and immoral. I met some of the best people I've ever known in the banking world, and also some real scumbbags. But one stereoype is true: just about everyone I worked with was insanely driven and incrediblely competitive.

Already a skinny guy, I dropped at least another 10 to 15 pounds due to the long hours and no lunch hour. Most of the guys simply ate soup at their desk so they could get more work done. I remember my out-of-town girlfriend coming into town for a rare weekend visit and I spent 8 hours at the office on a Sunday. That might have been the day I vowed to quit.

So I started saving my money like a miser, and after a few years had enough in the bank to quit cold turkey. Had no idea what I was going to do, but just let them know I was done at the end of my two-year commitment.

At my going away party, the wives of my co-workers secretly told my girlfriend she was incredibley lucky I was getting out and were happy for her.

I ended up starting an eCommerce business and have been doing that - and loving it - for the last 5+ years. Apart from marrying that incredible woman who stuck with me when I was in banking, leaving to pursue a more balanced life was the best decision I've ever made.

If anyone is interested in the full story, I wrote a blog post about it here:

http://www.ecommercefuel.com/my-corporate-escape-story/

Another question for you:

Sorry for my ignorance, but what exactly did your work as an investment banker consist of? I see below that you mention "cranking out loads of monotonous pitch books that didn't require too much mental energy". Is there any reason work like this couldn't be delegated to a separate person? I guess my larger question is whether or not the 50+ hours of work you needed to do could trivially be split across multiple people, and if these people would have to be highly skilled.

I'm asking this because it seems to me that a lot of investment banking falls into either building models (could you clarify exactly what that means in the i-banking context) or making presentations to clients/other investment bankers. I could imagine these 2 things being split up in a way similar to what product managers and software engineers often do.

Do the math on salaries vs. hours worked and you have your answer.

Some of that work is being offshored to India, but I there is an advantage of being able to scribble directly on something in front of someone to explain the changes you want made.

Question for you - how much more productive were you on your 80th hour than on your zero-th? I ask because I typically work 50 hour weeks. I've pushed to 80 when projects are wrapping up but I find that the extra hours are mostly only useful for rote work like writing/running tests, fixing simple bugs, and not for creative work. In fact most of the most difficult problems I solved in my off hours rather than at my desk. So I've always wondered what the net benefit is of working crazy hours like that in the long term, especially when there's always the option of hiring two employees and paying them 1/2 of the salary (I know I prefer x for 40/wk rather than 2x for 80/wk, the marginal cost of that 80th hour is huge!)

I'd say I was much less productive. Usually when we were pushing 80 hours weeks, we were getting ready for a big conference that our bank put on - and cranking out loads of monotonous pitch books that didn't require too much mental energy. At least, not too much if you'd done similar ones 100 times before!

If I had had to create a financial model from scratch - or put together something really complex at hour 80 - that would have been a MUCH harder task.

Makes sense! This I can understand. Analogously, at the end of a software project you tend to have to take care of all of the little things - re-run all of the tests, figure out the packaging script, fill out paperwork, make sure the website is ready, etc. This sort of stuff can be done on relatively little sleep with few breaks. I was imagining the interns putting together models and doing lots of calculations in that 80th hour - seems like sooner or later this would be disastrous.

Thanks for answering the question :)

Every single time I hear a story of a banker leaving the industry, they never wind up being destitute...

Say what you want about the industry, most people who leave it leave it with cash in their bank account.

They aren't destitute, sure, but they really aren't paid that well either--judging from the other comments in this thread, a junior banker gets $150k for 100 hrs/wk of work. That's equivalent to making 60k at a 40 hrs/wk job; entry-level software engineers can (they certainly don't always, but can) clear twice that.

Although, working 100 hour weeks definitely helps you save the money you do earn--since you never have time to spend it.

How much did you manage to save up in just 2 years? They must have been paying you quite a bankroll to achieve your freedom like that.

I made good money for my region, but it wasn't extrodinary given the hours I worked. By the end of the my two years I had enough to live (without any income) for at least 2 years as a single guy - so a good little nut. :-)

But I really didn't need that much to start my business - time to work was what was most important. I started my business (drop shipping eCommerce) with $1,500 and did sweat equity for the rest. I wanted to save that money to live on so I had maximum time to invest in bootstrapping.

With a pretty lavish college student lifestyle you can live on $20K a year. If you're pulling down $100K+ (reasonable for an engineer or an IB, I imagine) that's at least 2 years of off time you buy with each year you work. Not that crazy, if you can control your spending :)

$20k/yr? In some cities, you could use 3/4 of that in rent. Perhaps a typo on "slavish"? :)

> $20k/yr? In some cities, you could use 3/4 of that in rent.

Each month..

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