I’ve seen both stories: analysts who grind 90–100 hours and jump early to great seats, and others who run that pace, burn out, and miss recruiting windows. Hours correlate with deal reps and references, but only if the output is visible and relationships hold. The risk is spending all your energy on emergency turns and never carving time for modeling reps you can speak to, or for the disciplined networking that gets you on shortlists.
If your goal is better balance post-IB, how did you balance high-hour sprints with targeted prep for exits without dropping the ball on your team?
Long hours don’t buy exits; good reps do. If you’re a ghost in the room, 100 hours just makes you tired. Pick 1–2 artifacts you’ll own end-to-end—model tabs, a key exhibit—and make those bulletproof. Use dead time to log deal stories. And schedule networking like a meeting, not a vibe. If your hours crush that, ask for coverage on one nothingburger task and free up 45 minutes. No one hands you time; you steal it cleanly.
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when do you fit recruiting chats? mornings? lunch? i keep missing folks after 9pm.
Intensity creates opportunity if you channel it. I advise analysts to identify “resume-defining” responsibilities each quarter—something you can authentically discuss in depth. Then ring-fence two recurring slots weekly for outreach, ideally mornings when the desk is quieter. Share your bandwidth with your associate; most are reasonable if you’re proactive and deliver. During peak weeks, pause outreach but continue light maintenance (a short follow-up or two). Finally, maintain a concise deal log. In interviews, clarity beats volume; they want what you owned, not that you were busy.
My first year I chased hours and had nothing coherent to say in interviews. Second year I picked two things to own: the LBO drivers and a tricky working capital build. I booked two morning chats a week, 8:15–8:45, and stopped pretending I could network after 9pm. Funny thing—my associate started looping me in more because my pieces were tight. I exited to corp dev with fewer hours but better stories.
From our alumni group, the analysts who secured preferred exits typically logged similar total hours but reported higher “ownership density”—more weeks where they owned a critical workstream. They also maintained consistent, short outreach blocks (2×30 minutes/week). Peak periods didn’t kill outcomes; inconsistent preparation did. The actionable lever is calendar design: fixed AM slots for recruiting during non-earnings weeks, plus a minimum viable pipeline (e.g., 5 active conversations). Track ownership weeks and outreach cadence; both correlate with interview traction.