I studied until my eyes burned, joined study groups with smarter classmates, and visited professors during office hours to clarify concepts I couldn’t grasp. It was during one of these office-hour visits that I met Professor Harrison, the first person who seemed to see potential in me that had nothing to do with my sister—a former investment banker with a no-nonsense teaching style. Harrison intimidated most students.
But when I showed up at his office with specific, well-researched questions about portfolio diversification strategies, something changed in his demeanor. “You know, Hayes,” he said. He never used first names.
“You think differently than most of the robots I teach. You’re actually considering the human element behind the numbers. That’s rare.”
That single comment did more for my confidence than 18 years of living with my family.
Harrison became my mentor, recommending me for an internship at a local financial advisory firm the summer after my sophomore year. That internship changed everything. I discovered I had a talent for explaining complex financial concepts in simple terms that clients could understand.
I wasn’t just good with numbers. I was good with people. And that combination made me valuable.
The firm offered me a part-time position during my junior and senior years, and I graduated with actual experience on my resume. My first full-time job after college wasn’t glamorous. I worked at a small firm where the owner, Walter, took credit for my ideas and paid me barely enough to cover rent and student loan payments.
I lived in a run-down apartment with two roommates, ate ramen noodles more often than I’d like to admit, and wondered if I had made a terrible career choice. Eight months in, during a company restructuring, I was laid off. Walter called it a strategic reduction in workforce, but I later learned he’d kept his nephew, who had just graduated with a communications degree and no finance experience.
I spent a week in a depression, barely leaving my room, ignoring calls from my roommates and friends. My parents didn’t know. I hadn’t told them about the job loss, knowing it would just confirm their low expectations of me.
On the eighth day, I got angry. Not the explosive anger of my father, but a cold, focused rage that propelled me out of bed and into action. I updated my resume, reached out to Professor Harrison for a reference, and applied to 23 positions in 48 hours.
Two weeks later, I interviewed at Davidson and Muro, a prestigious investment firm that normally wouldn’t look twice at someone with my limited experience. But Harrison had called in a favor with a former colleague, and I had spent days preparing for the interview, researching the company’s recent projects and developing ideas specific to their client base. The hiring manager, Sophia Williams, was clearly skeptical when I walked in.
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