Investment Banking Resume Keywords

By John / Stephanie

In the previous post, I highlighted my favorite action verbs for resumes that drastically improve the tone, personality and likeability of you as a candidate.

Let’s see how we can further customize it for the investment banking job.

Who Read Your Resume — Bankers or HR?

We have to understand who are going to read your investment banking resume, because they are the decision makers for the first round.

If you are applying to the standard investment banking analyst / associate program, you are screened and interviewed by investment bankers.

If you are hired outside of the program (e.g. a recent graduate, or a lateral hire from competitors or other firms), you will be screened first by HR.

For now, let’s assume that you are aiming for the investment banking analyst / associate program.

In a typical investment bank, a handful of analysts/associates are selected every year to take part in the recruiting program. Their task is to screen the thousands of incoming resumes and carry out the first interviews, either on-campus or at the office.

In short, the decision makers are just like you, only a few years older!

Tactics: Find the Common Ground

You have to find a common ground between you and these decision makers, because this is a subtle yet very effective way for them to like you and pick you for the interview.

An effective way to build this common ground is to shower your investment banking resume with relevant keywords, i.e. words that are familiar to these banking analysts / associates. The best choices would be words that are related to their everyday job: analysis & research, finance & business, and projects & deals.