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Resume & cover letter
A banker skims your resume in under a minute, looking for reasons to say no. Every bullet below is built for that reader: dense, quantified, and impossible to skim past.
Strong verb + what you did + how you did it + quantified result
Example: Built a 3-statement operating model for a $40M consumer brand, flexing 12 revenue drivers; identified $2.1M of working-capital savings adopted by management.
Responsible for financial analysis for the investment team.
AfterAnalyzed 15+ potential acquisitions using comparable-company and precedent-transaction methods; 3 advanced to LOI.
“Responsible for” is passive filler. The rewrite names the method (comps, precedents), the volume (15+), and the outcome (3 LOIs).
Helped with a DCF model for a client project.
AfterBuilt a DCF with WACC sensitivity tables for a $120M industrials target, presented valuation range to senior management.
“Helped with” hides your contribution. Claim the part you actually did, size the company, and show the output went somewhere.
Member of the university finance club.
AfterManaged a $250K sleeve of the student investment fund; pitched 4 long theses (2 initiated), returning 11% vs. 7% benchmark.
Membership is not an accomplishment. Numbers (AUM, pitches, performance vs. benchmark) turn a line-filler into an interview topic.
Worked on improving processes at my summer internship.
AfterAutomated weekly portfolio-reporting workflow in Excel/VBA, cutting preparation time from 6 hours to 45 minutes.
“Improving processes” is unfalsifiable. A before/after time metric is concrete, memorable, and invites follow-up questions you can win.
Participated in a case competition about a merger.
AfterLed 4-person team to 2nd of 40 in national M&A case competition; recommended a $2.3B stock-and-cash offer with accretion/dilution analysis.
Placement (2nd of 40), team size, and the actual technical content (accretion/dilution) prove depth — “participated” proves attendance.
Did research on market trends for my professor.
AfterCo-authored equity-research-style report on U.S. grocery consolidation; built market-sizing model cited in professor's published paper.
Name the deliverable and its afterlife. “Cited in a published paper” is a result; “did research” is a task.
Start every bullet with one of these — never “helped”, “assisted”, or “was responsible for”.
For valuation, research, and quantitative work — the core of an IB resume.
Show you shipped things end-to-end, not that you were 'involved in' them.
Use when you set direction or mobilized people — clubs, teams, projects.
For research output, presentations, and client-facing work.
One page. No exceptions.
Banks screen hundreds of resumes in minutes. A second page signals you can't prioritize — the core analyst skill.
Every bullet has a number
Deal size, % change, hours saved, team size, ranking. If a bullet has no metric, either find one or cut the bullet.
GPA on, always (if ≥ 3.5)
Omitting GPA reads as hiding it. Below 3.5, consider a major GPA if stronger, and be ready to address it in interviews.
Standard format — no design flourishes
Black text, one clean font (Garamond/Calibri/Times), clear section headers. No photos, colors, columns, or skill bars — this isn't a design job.
Reverse-chronological, most relevant first
Education up top while in school. Within experience, lead each entry's bullets with the most technical, most quantified item.
Interests line: specific beats generic
“Cooking regional Thai food, marathon training (3:20 PR)” starts conversations. “Travel, music, sports” starts nothing.
Zero typos — have two people proofread
Attention to detail is the #1 screened trait. One typo on a document you had unlimited time to perfect is disqualifying at some desks.
Every line survives the 'so what?' test
For each bullet ask: would an interviewer want to ask a follow-up about this? If not, it's dead weight — replace it.
Most banks barely weight cover letters — but a bad one can sink you, and boutiques and off-cycle applications often read them closely. Keep it to 3–4 short paragraphs on one page, and never let it repeat your resume line-for-line.
Name the role, your school/year, and ONE specific reason for this bank: a deal you followed, a conversation with a named person at the firm (with permission), or the group's franchise strength. Generic praise (“prestigious platform”) is a red flag.
One experience, told with numbers, that maps to the analyst job: a model you built, a deal or pitch you supported, a fund you helped run. Show the skill, don't claim the trait.
Two or three sentences connecting your path to IB specifically — the pace, the deal exposure, the analytical rigor. This should echo your interview “why banking” answer so your story is consistent everywhere.
One sentence: thank them, state availability, and stop. No “I will call your office next week.”
Resume gets you the interview — the technicals get you the offer.
Drill the question bank