Harvey has demonstrated strong passion during his mentorship with SpringboardTM and has won our stock pitch competition in 2015 Season 4. He continued pursuing his dream into 2016 and finally landed a private equity analyst job despite a tough hiring market.
I would comment that he possessed the right skillset and meet the right people during networking, lacking of either would not result in his success. Let’s hear what Harvey said.

My journey with Springboard started with the Analyst Training Camp and subsequently the Advanced Programme. The Advanced commenced in July 2015 and ended in Jan 2016.

First of all, I would like to thank all my mentors who helped me tremendously in this journey. At the start I find it difficult to balance my time between work and the assignments as I have a full-time job with long working hours, It was an extremely tough period for me as I will have to end up sleeping past 1-2am daily so that I can complete my assignments given by my mentor. He has been instrumental in guiding me in building a financial model that is of institutional grade, as well as teaching me how to report an equity research report that is similar to the reports written by the professional analysts.

Despite the long working hours and staying up during the wee hours to hone my skills in financial modelling and report writing, it is the passion to succeed and the hunger to get into front office investment role that sustains me. On top of that, there is constant support from my other mentors, encouraging me to keep on learning and networking, while building my personal portfolio and branding to make myself more marketable to my prospective employers in the future. I am deeply grateful for all their effort putting in me despite their hectic schedule in the daily job.

We have also been given a chance to participate in stock pitching competition to allow us to market ourselves to prospective employers as well as honing our pitching/researching/presentation skills. After winning the stock pitch for the first time, I have been offered a couple of interviews with different investment firms. However, those didn’t turn out to fruition.

Now here comes the most important part –> networking and persistence. Despite not getting any job offer, my mentors continue to encourage me to keep on networking and persevere. Eventually, the effort paid off after a few months of networking and following ups. Someone I met during a networking event referred to a PE firm and landed me a job with them. This would not have happened without my mentors from Springboard.

I found the mentors to be extremely helpful and sincere. They are always there to help, be it a phone call, a text or an email away. At any point of time, they will be there to support you in developing both your technical and people skills – how to build a solid model and write a good report, as well as how to network and market yourself.

One of the best parts about Springboard is the quality of the mentors. Never can you find such good mentors who will not only give you critical and constructive feedback on both your assignments and soft skills but also introduce you to the people in their network that are willing to help you in interview preparation and jobs introduction.

If you’re someone who is passionate about investment and finance, or someone who wants to do a career switch into the finance industry, Springboard is definitely a platform that you should consider. I find the entire journey to be extremely invaluable and I am grateful for that.