A couple days ago, my new-to-America, Irish bro-in-law William was shocked and appalled to hear the Seattle Mariners were playing their 37th game in 38 days. He couldn't believe it.
But if he thinks that's crazy, then he should read
this email that a banking analyst at Barclays just sent his summer interns. Trust me, it's worth a read.
Incoming Intern Class of 2015,
Welcome to Power! I am sure you are all busy at training, but in the interest of helping your transition into the summer, and hopefully helping some of you secure Full-Time offers, I wanted to introduce you to the 10 Power Commandments. Respect them, love them, live them. You may have heard different stories about Barclays Power – go on WSO and you’ll see us called the “frattiest group”, “top Power group on the street”, or the group with the “best PE placement” – needless to say we are a unique group at Barclays. And with that come unique rules.
For 9 weeks you will live and die by these:
1. Our group dresses very conservatively. Given that it is summer, no socks is accepted and, in fact, encouraged. (Men: On your first day at the desk, it is customary to wear a bowtie and/or suspenders).
2. Remember: this is a summer internship for a full-time offer. It won’t be easy. If you can’t handle the heat, get out of the kitchen.
3. We expect you to be the last ones to leave every night…no matter what. That’s what good summer analysts do. (Also getting in earlier than me would be a power move – You should enjoy your casual 9:15AM PT arrival time this Friday, but I wouldn’t get used to it).
4. During your first few weeks we ask that you direct all of your questions to Michael Lomio. Tell the other summers too, Michael is industry agnostic. If you ask me a question it will be noted.
5. Never take your jacket off at work. This is investment banking, ladies and gentlemen. Other groups may be more liberal when it comes to summer dress code, unfortunately were not
6. You will be assigned junior “mentors”. It is much appreciated if you would bring breakfast in for your respective “mentor.” Some people are more particular about this than others.
7. I recommend bringing a pillow to the office (yoga mat works as well). It makes sleeping under your desk alot more comfortable, in the very likely scenario that you have to do that.
8. You are expected to allocate at least half your seamless web order for group appetizers/snacks for the month of June. No questions asked. Once the 2nd years leave, you can enjoy your $25 allocations.
9. Have a spare tie/scarf or two around. You never know when your associate will run out of napkins.
10. When you need to leave your desk there will be a sign out sheet outside your cubes. Please fill it out including where you went and for how long. This is important come the end of your internship.
I hope it is clear from the rules above that the internship really is a 9-week commitment at the desk. You are here with the sole goal to impress the group enough to receive a FT offer. During my summer in the group an intern asked our staffer for a weekend off for a family reunion – he was told he could go. He was also asked to hand in his blackberry and pack up his desk.
Some of you have asked for training materials to study up on before you start. Love the enthusiasm. First, I would recommend reading the GS Elevator twitter feed for some social cues. It might be seen as a joke to some people, but around here I think many people find it insightful. Below is a link to a great read for any dress questions.
Dress Rules: http://www.businessinsider.com/how-to-dress-the-part-on-wall-street-2013-8
Second, I have attached a fairly simple LBO for Staples. Understand this will be a bit tough for some of you without a Finance / UG business degree, but we believe in you. There’s a reason each of you was picked for the group. We expect you to give this your best shot and send us a completed LBO model with a short write up by Friday end of day. None of you will have this 100% correct, that’s expected. We also still expect you to complete a significant portion of it.
Welcome to the big leagues, boys and girls. Play time is over and it’s time to buckle up. Once you hit the desk, your lives will be your work for 9 weeks. Please respond promptly to acknowledge you’ve received this e-mail (anytime in the next half hour would be fine) and to confirm that you are onboard for the summer. We know you have access to e-mail, so there’s no way to avoid this. If I remember correctly, you are probably doing training with Sean Clovey from IT, or Market Mark from TTS.
Other than that, I look forward to meeting you all, and I hope you’re excited to join the group! We sure are looking forward to having you here!
Yours Truly,
Justin
P.S. There are a number of typos in place in the email above. These are on purpose. First person to email me back with at least 3 highlighted typos is off to a GREAT start!
Yeah. I know. It's so bad. It's cartoonishly douchey.
The email was leaked to the Wall Street Journal a couple days ago. The guy has since been fired.
My question: who is the person who receives this email and responds well to it? Who is that poor soul who reads it and thinks, "Man, this is so inspiring. I'm going to work extra hard this summer"?
I actually feel kind of bad for the guy who wrote it. He's clearly just an ugly example of a certain corporate culture where this sort of thing is seen as OK and normal. I'm fairly certain this dude is just repeating the stuff that he was told when he was a lowly intern. That said, Hitler wasn't able to do the Holocaust on his own. He needed brainwashed, power-hungry middle managers like this guy to buy into his crazy ideas. So, I take it back. I don't feel bad for this guy.
Yikes, did I just make a Hitler comparison? I'm getting so lazy in my old age. Forgive me.
Peace be with you,
Margaret
P.S. I had a crack at the three typos, even though it's clear he just added that caveat to cover his arse for inevitable typos. 'On purpose' my ass!
- "and hopefully helping some of you secure Full-Time offers" — Don't capitalize 'full-time' because it's not a proper noun.
- "Tell the other summers too, Michael is industry agnostic." — Should be semicolon instead of a comma (in my opinion).
- "This is investment banking, ladies and gentlemen. Other groups may be more liberal when it comes to summer dress code, unfortunately were not" — Two typos here. "Were" should be "we're" and it's missing a period at the end of the sentence.
- "It makes sleeping under your desk alot more comfortable" — Should be 'a lot' not 'alot'.
- "When you need to leave your desk there will be a sign out sheet outside your cubes" — Should be 'sign-out sheet' with a hyphen.
- "He was also asked to hand in his blackberry and pack up his desk." — Blackberry should be capitalized.
- "to confirm that you are onboard for the summer." — It should be "on board" not "onboard".
That's seven. What do I win??
SOURCE: Wall Street Journal
