Ladies and gentlemen, get ready for Zach's First Business Trip!* I will be heading into the capital of commerce, New York, during the first week in December. However, although it sounds great, this poses a variety of problems for myself, the least of which is actually acquiring a new suit. One of the great parts of my job is that I can show up to work wearing just about anything, with the opposite effect being that my so-called "business wardrobe" hasn't been updated since the interview process. I'm now left with a suit from [name deleted*] that is a little worn at the seams and what can be called a classic power Zoot suit - a pin-striped double-breasted number with big shoulders and pants with pleats and cuffs. I guess that's what I get for going to the Men's Wearhouse with my dad when I was 19.
More importantly, I have this fear that I really don't know what I'm doing in my job. I'm supposed to be a manager, but there really isn't anything for me to manage. And, I'm an analyst, but I really don't feel like I know anything at all - like I'm sort of a pretend analyst - yet I'm a supposed "expert" on earnings quality (and pension accounting, if you can believe that).
I have zero credentials (even though I'm working toward a CFA designation and CFE) and only two or three years experience. I have never managed money or traded. Hell, I don't even invest my own money. Still, people pay me and my company for my research and make multi-million dollar decisions based on our findings. I just got off the phone with a portfolio manager - he knows nothing about me. However, I know that he has passed the CFA exam (a rigorous three-year certification process) and has a BA and a PhD from Harvard. Why is he depending on me for anything? While in New York, besides meeting clients and prospects, I'm having dinner with one of the most important hedge fund managers and short sellers on Wall Street. I've also talked with the guy credited for uncovering both Enron and Tyco years before the disasters. Somehow, amazingly, I am able to come up with some bullshit that they have never seen before, although I feel like I'm just making it up as I go along. I have this vision that someone will find out I'm 24 and call me out for not knowing what I'm doing. Because of this, I actually prefer the anonymity of the phone: if I don't look the part I can at least sound like I know what I'm talking about.
*Not counting the time I went to Napa when I worked for Kenneth Cole because, um, Kenneth Cole has mysteriously disappeared from my resume.
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1 comment:
i think yours is a common fear/anxiety. be glad you aren't a woman. then you wouldn't even be able to hide behind the phone.
also... the business world is entirely comprised of bullshit. so don't think that your bullshit is any more or less (depending on how you want to view this) shitty than anyone elses. just because someone's got some fandangled learnin' degree, don't mean nothin'!
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