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filler@godaddy.com
Signed in as:
filler@godaddy.com
Welcome to our Finance Recruitment Guide, where we will walk you through each step of securing your place in a Graduate Scheme, Summer Internship or Spring Week with the UK’s top Finance firms!
This guide will provide you with resources and advice on when and how to apply, as well as top tips and tricks from experienced people in the industry.
Given how competitive these recruitment processes are, the sooner the better! Many roles have already opened, and the remaining ones will open throughout September. Please see the links below for firm and sector-specific deadlines, categorised by recruitment type.
Submit your CV and Cover Letter, and our experienced professionals will provide a detailed, tailored review. Your materials will be matched to specialists in your chosen sector to ensure the most relevant advice.
CVs for Finance-related roles tend to be crisp and straightforward. Everything needs to be summarised in one page, with each bullet showcasing what you have achieved, how, and what skills/knowledge you’ve gained from the tasks you’ve undertaken.
As a starting point, please follow this link to our recommended Finance CV basic template: UKAP Finance Recruitment Guide - CV Template.
Please refer to the links below for guidance on what to include in your CV based on the sector you’re applying to.
To expand your understanding of each of these sectors and beyond, as well as get additional advice on how to approach the recruitment for each, we highly encourage you to leverage the website below, which provides many articles on:
(i) what each sector is about and
(ii) how each approaches its recruitment process: https://mergersandinquisitions.com/articles/
Don’t Forget! - ChatGPT is your best friend when applying to Finance-related roles. It can massively help you in every stage of the process, and we will guide you on how to leverage it in the most efficient way possible.
How to ChatGPT: Input your draft CV and give the following prompt: “Please carefully go through my draft CV when applying to (insert respective Finance sector) roles in London and (i) spot any text errors or content inconsistencies, (ii) make suggestions on how any of the bullet points can be improved, (iii) point out anything missing when compared to top (insert respective Finance sector) CVs.”
The aim is for the cover letter to spark the reviewer’s curiosity and showcase your motivation. Again, it needs to be crisp and one page maximum, with each paragraph walking the reviewer through (i) how you came across the firm and what motivates you to apply to the role and the firm (be as specific as possible), (ii) elaborating on the relevance of your experiences from your CV, (iii) what makes you stand out and what you plan to do to add value.
Please follow these links to our recommended Finance Cover Letter templates by process.
How to ChatGPT: Input your draft Cover Letter and give the following prompt: “Please carefully go through my draft Cover Letter when applying to (insert respective Finance sector) roles in London and (i) spot any text errors or content inconsistencies, (ii) make suggestions on how the structure or the content of any of the paragraphs can be improved, (iii) point out anything missing when compared to top (insert respective Finance sector) Cover Letters.”
Please refer to the links below for guidance on what to include in your Cover Letter based on the sector you’re applying to. Yet, we encourage you to ultimately have a look at all the resources, regardless of your sector of focus, as the advice they provide is predominantly applicable industry-wide.
Once you’ve given your CV and Cover Letter your best shot, we’re happy to allocate them to our experienced professionals for their detailed and tailored review. The materials will be distributed to them based on the sector you’ve applied to to ensure the provision of the most relevant advice. Please find the link to the application form at the top of this page.
Going the extra mile!:
We’ve been engaging with Albanian students applying to such roles for a while now! You can find some more advice from recruiters we spoke to at our Career Fair here: https://ukapfoundation.org/blog-1/f/careers-fair-recap-cv-and-interview-tips-from-recruiters
SEO London offers several training programmes you can apply to to further improve your application prep. Please use this link to explore the different programmes: https://www.seo-london.org/programmes-industries
Spring Week Guide from LSE SU: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jRi64iy4rxNJGVBr14gOYgQYJG_Lc3jq/view
Banking Careers Guide from eFinancialCareers (sign-up required): https://www.efinancialcareers.com/banking-careers-guide
General CV & Cover Letter Guide from LSE & Oxford University:
https://info.lse.ac.uk/current-students/careers/Assets/Documents/application-and-cv-brochure.pdf