So, presumably you’re familiar with companies like Vanguard, Wealthfront, and Betterment, which are much more customer-aligned than the rest of the financial services industry. But part of that is spending much less attention on individual clients—and, consequently, employing considerably fewer people, and different sorts of people. (I would expect that Wealthfront needs more web programmers than economists, for example.) You might consider applying at those places, but my suspicion is you’ll end up in another field entirely.
Yep, I’ve actually already applied to all three of those places. Vanguard would be my first choice of the three because I could do more outside of focusing strictly on investments, and actually have an advisor type relationship with people. You’re right though in that I do have hesitations about being in this industry at all, because:
I am too anti-fee (e.g. why pay a fee on an IRA account at Wealthfront/Betterment? Yes, it’s better than what most people would do on their own, but it’s still not the optimal… I go back and forth on this one, because I do put a high value on the simplicity of it).
The business is based on meeting with lots of people and selling to them, and the people I would get along with the best are probably doing this stuff themselves
There’s tension between what this would be focused on (manage money effectively, accumulate wealth) vs. my desire to be more EA and act on the knowledge that I have enough, and many others do not.
I haven’t heard back from any of the applications, so it’s a moot point right now.
Welcome!
So, presumably you’re familiar with companies like Vanguard, Wealthfront, and Betterment, which are much more customer-aligned than the rest of the financial services industry. But part of that is spending much less attention on individual clients—and, consequently, employing considerably fewer people, and different sorts of people. (I would expect that Wealthfront needs more web programmers than economists, for example.) You might consider applying at those places, but my suspicion is you’ll end up in another field entirely.
Yep, I’ve actually already applied to all three of those places. Vanguard would be my first choice of the three because I could do more outside of focusing strictly on investments, and actually have an advisor type relationship with people. You’re right though in that I do have hesitations about being in this industry at all, because:
I am too anti-fee (e.g. why pay a fee on an IRA account at Wealthfront/Betterment? Yes, it’s better than what most people would do on their own, but it’s still not the optimal… I go back and forth on this one, because I do put a high value on the simplicity of it).
The business is based on meeting with lots of people and selling to them, and the people I would get along with the best are probably doing this stuff themselves
There’s tension between what this would be focused on (manage money effectively, accumulate wealth) vs. my desire to be more EA and act on the knowledge that I have enough, and many others do not.
I haven’t heard back from any of the applications, so it’s a moot point right now.