Skills for landing a finance job in 2025?

Question

I'm about to finish my finance degree (end of the month to be exact), and I'm trying to figure out what skills I really need to focus on to get my first job (preferably at the beginning of next year). There are so many things people talk about – Excel, financial modeling, soft skills – but I'm not sure what's actually important right now. What are the top skills that employers are looking for in 2025, and how can I start building them?

Answer 1

Great question! Finance interviews are challenging and intense and require a dozen different skills from Excel to business judgment to mental math. Realistically, to be a top-tier candidate, you'll need to spend 200+ hours building these skills, and they fall in three main buckets:

Networking (80 hours): Before the interview even starts, make sure that you've reached out to and talked with as many people as possible at the firm. Learn about what they care about and what they're learning for in a candidate. Build advocates. Flex your cold emailing and "coffee chat" muscles.
Behaviorals (30 hours): Then, get started on your behavioral prep. Work on your behaviorals "trifecta"--tell me about yourself, why banking, why this bank, and then create a stories-based approach for other behavioral questions. Do practice mock interviews and write everything out. Build your ability to talk effectively about yourself and deals.
Technicals (100 hours): Finally, once you get past the first round (usually behavioral) it's time to really hone in on technicals. Start with the 400 Question Guide and then it gets more advanced from there across modeling tests, paper LBOs, and online courseware like Wall Street Oasis's courses. This will build your skills in Excel, accounting, modeling, and more.

There are 10,000 other things we need to discuss on each of these pieces--please reach out for a free intro session and let's talk about how to get you into the industry!