Banks in London favour graduates from Continental Europe

Many investment banks in London are likely to recruit more non-UK graduate trainees in 2002 than ever before.

The overseas recruitment drive has been given a triple boost. Efforts to build a presence across Europe are encouraging Continental hires websites now enable banks to broadcast graduate recruitment schemes to students in far flung places and more lenient work permit rules introduced in October 2000 are starting to take effect.

The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is among those branching out into Europe this year, as it seeks to increase the number of non-UK Europeans among the 140 graduate entrants to its corporate finance and financial markets functions.

It made its first presentation at a European school in mid-January, and was pleasantly surprised.

&quotWe had a very positive response,&quot says Karen McKinley, head of graduate recruitment at RBS for financial markets. &quotWe plan to have a big push at recruiting Europeans to work in the UK.. As we widen our European base, we need graduates who can reflect our clients' culture.&quot

Morgan Stanley, which has been recruiting in Europe for several years, is also looking at the continent anew. &quotThere is a much more firm-wide approach to targeting Continental Europe,&quot says Rebecca Neale, head of graduate recruitment. &quotWe now recruit there for IT and sales and trading, instead of just investment banking.&quot

Universities confirm this. &quotBanks are now searching for people for all functions,&quot says a spokesperson at Bocconi University in Milan.

Reflecting their growing interest, banks increasingly visit continental European institutions during the milk round. Presentations at schools such as Icade in Spain, Bocconi in Italy, and the European School of Management in Berlin top the agenda.

In 1997, 12 banks presented at Bocconi University. By 2001 the number had increased to 17.

The internet is also widening the pool of potential applicants. &quotA web-based recruitment system means that we can now reach a global audience more easily than ever before,&quot said Amanda Whiteford, head of graduate recruitment at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein. (DrKW).

&quotSome 30% of our graduate hires into London were non UK-nationals last year,&quot she said.

It is not only European recruiting that is on the up the number of successful applicants from outside Europe is also rising.

Changes to the UK's work permit rules in October 2000 have made it easier for banks to recruit graduates from overseas. Foreign graduates seeking work are no longer required to have one or two years' relevant postgraduate work experience, which was previously a stalling point for many.

This means that banks can consider applicants from anywhere. &quotWe can now hire from areas like South America,&quot says Neale at Morgan Stanley. &quotWe are able to get the best people that we can, from all over the world.&quot

The new rules have already had an effect. DrKW, for example, got all the graduate work permits that it applied for last year. However, after a trial run in 2001, recruiters say that the true impact of the change is likely to become apparent from this year.

Nevertheless, recruits from far-flung locations are unlikely to fill many places on graduate programmes. &quotThere is not a real need for Russian language skills or Latin American business contacts at a graduate level,&quot says Neale. &quotThat kind of specific knowledge is more valuable in an associate.&quot

Case study

Lucia Arienti has just finished a four-year undergraduate course in business administration at Bocconi University. She is about to start a graduate traineeship in equities at Goldman Sachs in London.

&quotOne day last year I received an invitation from Bocconi to attend a female cocktail evening run by Goldman Sachs. I went, mostly out of curiosity, and was pleasantly surprised.

I'd undertaken a previous internship with an Italian investment bank, and my perception was of an industry where everyone was very serious and a bit uptight. But over cocktails, the people from Goldman Sachs seemed quite the opposite.

They were enthusiastic, and emphasised that working for the bank was a great career opportunity. They also said that it was possible to have a balanced life: a lot of the women there were very young and had children.

I didn't really want to work for an Italian firm. Bocconi encourages you to explore different cultures and think on an international scale. So I applied to Goldman Sachs as an intern.

I was accepted, and spent ten weeks with the firm last summer. When I left, I was asked to come back as a graduate trainee. I start in the second half of February, 2002.

I think that the big banks like recruiting students from Bocconi because we are so well prepared. Courses typically last for four years and most people have done a few internships by the end. Students are also multilingual: I speak English, French and Italian.&quot