“Think we have everyone on the line,” says a senior banker from the financial sponsors group. “Everyone except the one guy we need. Someone in Industrials, would you mind looping in Masters?”
“On it,” I say. As I scan the MD contact list pinned to my cube, my other line rings. “Think he might actually be calling me. I’ll patch him in.” I transfer lines and answer my second line.
“Hello?” I say.
“Hello, Mister Keenan. This is Brendan from American Express regarding your corpor—”
Click.
I redirect my attention to the MD contact list, where I spot Masters’s cell number and dial it. One ring, two rings, three rings…
“Hello?” says a booming voice.
“Hi, Rick. It’s Bill Keenan. Can I—”
“Bill who?”
“Keenan—from Deutsche Bank…the associate on Project Liberty. We have the rest of the DB team on the other line. Can I patch you into the call?”
“What call?” he asks.
I can’t tell if he’s fucking with me or what. “The call you scheduled today regarding Project Liberty.”
In the background, I hear a young girl’s voice. “Enough, Natalia!” hollers Masters. “Give it a rest!”
“Should I—” I begin to say.
“I need ten minutes. Tell them to wait,” he says.
“Okay. I can resend the dial-in info if you’d like. Or do you want me to call you back and loop you in?”
“Call me and patch me in,” he demands. Senior bankers have an uncanny ability to refuse to dial into conference calls, instead choosing to have junior bankers call them first, then merge their call with the conference call. Aside from being inconvenient, I only have three lines and already have four seniors who want me to call them first, then loop them into the conference call. And if that’s not enough, I have to adjust the volume on my phone mid-conversation, since the MDs on cell phones sound like they’re talking in a bunker in Afghanistan, while the individuals in the building sound like their speaking through a megaphone.
After hanging up with Masters, I relay the news to a disgruntled group of bankers, who place the blame on me. When the conference-call participants reconvene in ten minutes, I call Masters back. He doesn’t answer. Still doesn’t answer after twenty minutes. Forty-seven minutes after originally scheduled, he answers, and the call finally begins.
“What are the exact goddamn words in the RFP?” barks Masters on the other line, an hour and a half into our call.
I flip to the fourth page of the “request for proposal” document, which is covered as much in the tomato sauce from my dinner as it is in yellow highlighter and red pen. “Discuss acceptable ranges for post-IPO PF leverage, assuming EBITDA and FCF growth,” I say into my headset, reading the third bullet of the “valuation, capital structure, and dividend policy” section. “And again, we don’t have estimates for growth so we assumed—”
“So why the hell am I looking at a page that shows pre-IPO leverage?” says Masters.
“Honestly, I’m not sure what page of the deck you’re looking at,” I say. “Assume page thirt—”
“Page thirty-one. I’m looking at page thirty-one!”
“Okay, so page thirty-one we set the stage by showing pre-IPO leverage relative to peers, then if you flip to thirty-two and thirty-three, you’ll see we did the post-IPO leverage analysis and suggested de-leveraging timeline,” I say.
“’EBITDA and free cash-flow generation will offset any concerns around PF leverage,’” says Masters barely audibly over the phone line, reading the title of page thirty-two. “Okay, fine…fine…and where the hell are we getting these top-line growth figures?”
“Right, so like I was saying, since the company didn’t provide anything, we normalized what we have of historicals, and then, given the aggressive M&A strategy they outlined, we assumed first two projected years are in line with historicals, then outsized growth in outer years when synergies are realized.”24
“Yeah, fine. Okay. Fine! ‘De-leveraging target eighteen to twenty-four months post-IPO better aligns capital structure,’” reads Masters, again barely audibly, as I try to figure out what he’s looking at now. “Alright, fine. Look, a lotta wood to chop, and everything, every number, needs to be right,” he says.
I eye the electronic display on my desk phone: 10:13 p.m., the last two hours of which were spent on this call, accumulating comments.
“Will do,” I say.
“And needs to be right before our 10:00 a.m. call tomorrow with the broader team. Get the analyst to resend the planner for the call, and make sure the entire ECM and sponsors team is on it.”
“Sure thing,” I say.
“Okay,” he says.
Click.
My phone rings before I even take off my headset. I read the caller ID: Steve, the VP on the project.
“Hey, buddy. Just landed. Sorry I wasn’t on the call. Assume everything is clear as mud?” he says.
“Pretty much. Got a bunch of comments from Masters.”
“He left me six voicemails while I was on the flight. Last three are incomprehensible, but just did a similar bake-off with him, so got a good idea of what he wants final product to look like. Just will take some time.”
“We got about eleven hours—said he wants deck ready for 10:00 a.m. call tomorrow,” I say.
“If you can get working on comments he gave you, I’ll draft up the executive summary and the pros-and-cons list for section four. When you get the updated valuation pages, send ’em across, and I’ll take a look and get you comments right away so we’re not wasting time.”
“That works. Thanks,” I say. It’s the first time a VP has offered to contribute to helping create a deck.
“Kwame still alive?” says Steve.
“Will check when I get off phone.”
“Alright, buddy. I’ll log in when I get home—probably forty minutes, plane’s just pulling into gate. In meantime, call, email, tweet, Facebook me…whatever you want if you or Kwame have questions. Just don’t Snapchat me, okay? Still don’t get that shit.”
“Appreciate it. We’ll get going.” I remove the headset and walk down the hall to Kwame’s cubicle. Like most first-year analysts, Kwame is in his cube each morning when I walk into work and still there each night when I leave, regardless of what time that is. While he’s learned a lot in the past year, he has yet to learn to throw his dinner away in the trashcan of whichever neighboring cube-mate has already left—the pungent odor of dumplings and soy sauce consumes his space. Pinned to his wall divider is a picture of the Nigerian national soccer team celebrating what appears to be a historic victory. It then dawns on me I have no idea how tall Kwame is—can’t even remember seeing him walk down the hall to go to the bathroom. My only image of Kwame is him sitting at his desk.
“How’s it going, man?” I say.
“Still having some issue with the FX-adjusted numbers. I don’t see how they tie with what the company sent us. Will keep trying to reconcile them though,” he says.
“You hear back from ECM or sponsors on their pages?” I ask.
“Nothing. Sent follow-up emails to both junior teams,” he says.
“Alright, I’ll give them a call. You were on the full call with Masters, right?”
“Yeah, on mute. He sounded pissed.”
“Can you just make sure you take care of all the valuation and benchmarking comments he had? Flag anything that doesn’t make sense, and I’ll take a look before we send to Steve. I’m going to work on the section three comments…also, can you resend the call invite for tomorrow at 10:00 a.m.?”
“Okay. But I sent it already twice. Does Masters even look at his email?”
“I think he’s too big-time to scroll through his inbox to look for an email. Just resend it so we can at least say we did.”
“Will do,” he says. Kwame opens up the original email he sent. It’s littered with rogue semicolons. One of the drawbacks of only studying finance and accounting in college is there’s a tendency to think semicolons are a formal version of commas.
The floor’s air conditioner shuts off as I return to my cube, pick up my headset, and dial the associate from the financial sponsors group who covers the private equity company that owns the client.
“This is Jessica,” says the voice on the other line.
“Hey, Jessica. It’s Bill Keenan from Industrials…on Project Liberty with you,” I say to the girl I’ve never met aside from a couple email exchanges.
“Yes, what’s up?”
“Was curious if you have any update on timing for your pages. Masters wants to see a consolidated deck for the 10:00 a.m. call tomorrow morning,” I say.
“Bill, right?” she says.
“Yeah.”
“Sorry, just didn’t recognize your name. First-year associate?”
“Yes.”
“Assume MBA, not analyst promote, right?”
“Correct.”
“Okay,” she says, all drawn out like she’s about to tell me how square pegs don’t go into round holes. “So I have four live deals right now. I can understand you’re still getting used to the role, but I will get you the pages when I can.”
“Any idea on when? Like ballpark? Just trying to manage expectations, given Industrials is holding the pen on the master, and the tight timing since Masters wants to see full deck by 10:00 a.m.”
“No idea on timing. Will send across when I get to it.”
John Bukowski: I feel like I’m digging a hole all day then filling it up
John Bukowski: And sometimes I just wanna get in the hole
John Bukowski: you alive?
John Bukowski: I miss us.
The ECM associate doesn’t even answer my call, which I chalk up as a better outcome than my conversation with Jessica.
I check the electronic display on my phone as I place my headset back on the cubicle divider: 1:27 a.m. Time has a way of speeding up at the office after midnight.
By 3:17 a.m., Kwame and I are halfway through the substantive comments we received from Masters and send them off to Steve to review. Steve provides comments within thirty minutes; I turn those as Kwame continues working on the original Masters comments.
“Kwame!” I yell as the clock hits 4:00 a.m. on my computer. The floor is dark and silent. I throw the Nerf football I keep in my drawer across a couple rows of cubes, knocking a deal toy off one of the cube dividers—not the one I was aiming for, but still. As planned, the movement activates the overhead fluorescent lights. “Kwame!” I yell again, our side of the floor now illuminated.
“Yo!” he yells from his cube across the floor. “What’s up?”
“You good?”
“I guess,” he says.
“Good.”
At 4:39 a.m., Kwame and I send Steve the updated deck.
At 5:17 a.m., Steve responds with comments. We turn them.
At 6:38 a.m., I save the updated version of the deck before my computer reads:
At 6:39 a.m., I say a prayer. It’s answered at 6:40 a.m.
At 6:46 a.m., Kwame and I send Steve the updated deck.
At 7:17 a.m., Steve provides his “final” comments. We turn them.
At 7:39 a.m., Steve provides a couple “clean-up” comments. We clean them up.
At 7:45 a.m., Kwame finds a bust in the model. We high-five after he fixes it. Then he saves it after which his computer displays:
At 7:47 a.m., we realize there wasn’t a bust in the model, so we revert to the prior version, nullifying the latest Excel crash. More high-fives.
At 8:18 a.m., the first admin arrives and greets me with a “good morning,” to which I don’t respond. Instead, I walk to the nearest conference room and cry.
At 9:00 a.m., I make a subpar joke to Kwame. It’s not funny but allows us to do this thing where we mask our crying with laughter.
At 9:13 a.m., my roommate texts me: “U alive?” I don’t answer—feel dead inside.
At 9:22 a.m., the sponsors junior-team sends their pages. I consolidate them into the deck.
At 9:57 a.m., the ECM junior-team sends their pages. I consolidate those as well.
At 9:59 a.m., I send out the deck to the broader team as Kwame opens the call.
“Have to drop daughter off at camp. Push call hour,” reads Masters’s email at 10:04 a.m.
Back to the conference room for another sob-fest, but this session is cut short by the arrival of my fellow junior bankers, who cast quizzical glances into the conference room as they arrive with coffees in hand. Phuc, his tie flung over his shoulder, peers into the room and flashes me a thumbs-up, thumbs-down question maneuver through the glass window. I give him the finger, then back to my desk I go.
John Bukowski: how bad was last night?
John Bukowski: ?
John Bukowski: you alive?
John Bukowski: Lets do dinner in conference room tngt if you can
* * *
“What if we do volume year-to-date?” says Masters, about two hours into the 11:00 a.m. phone call.
“Global or US?” asks the ECM junior.
“Global,” says Masters.
“DB is number three,” says the girl from ECM.
“What about US?”
“DB is number two.”
“Forget volume. How about number of issues in past three years?”
“DB is fourth.”
“Kill those two Chinese IPOs we show at bottom of page. If you remove them, where are we?”
“DB is first if we remove them,” says the ECM girl after some typing.
“Good. Rename the table to say Deutsche Bank is leading underwriter of marquee transactions. And footnote we exclude those Asian ones.”
“Will do,” says the ECM girl.
“Alright, let’s get these comments turned today, and I’ll have one last look tomorrow.”
“One quick thing before everyone drops,” I say. “We sent out four options for custom cover for the deck. Usually takes a little lead time to get them printed, so any thoughts?”
The line goes silent as there’s discussion about when the email was sent. Kwame sent two emails in the last hour with images of all four covers attached.
“First one is no good—too sterile looking,” says one of the senior sponsors bankers, his first contribution to the entire project.
“Agreed,” says Masters. “Too much black, and the test-tubes are off-putting…who designed these?”
“Industrials team,” I say. “We sent out an email a couple days ago to the team asking for ideas but never heard back, so Kwame and I tried to use images from the company website to—”
“Second one is no good either,” says Masters amidst grunts of agreement from other senior bankers on the line. “Looks like the guy is holding something that says ‘toxic.’”
“Believe it says ‘non-toxic,’” I say. “But I understand—”
“Last two are fine,” says Masters. “Let’s do fourth. All good with that?” He’s met with a series of yeses.
“Good. Fourth one it is…one with the globe,” says Masters.
“Just to confirm,” I say. “Since we sent out two emails with different ordering, you’re talking about the one with the globe that’s sitting on the grass with the windmill in the background?”
“No…no windmill,” says Masters. “One with the smiling Asian guy holding the globe.”
“Got it,” I say. “We’ll get it printed.”
I haven’t been home in thirty hours. And aside from nodding off a few times at my desk, I haven’t slept.
But there are comments to turn. After reconvening with Kwame and getting clarification from Steve, I do my best to steady my shaking hands and spend the next six hours buried in Excel and PowerPoint. Around 6:00 p.m., I hear someone yawn, then mutter, “Fuck my life.” It takes me a second to realize my headset is on and it’s Kwame’s voice on the other line. He called me a few hours ago, but evidently neither of us remembered to hang up.
“You hangin’ in there?” I say into my headset.
“Kind of. Can I go get some lunch?” asks Kwame. I check the time on my phone—6:05 p.m.
“Yeah, Kwame. Go get some lunch.”
* * *
“Dude, you look like shit,” says Jack as I enter the small conference room with my bag of dinner.
“Haven’t slept in forty fuckin’ hours,” I say, slinging the bag of food onto the table. “Why do you always wear that stupid thing?” I say.
“What thing?”
“That bullshit Barbalu vest. You’re becoming one of them.”
“Barbalu? That’s the Italian place that blacklisted you ’cause you complained about the number of meatballs. This is Barbour.” He runs his hand down the front of his dark-blue quilted vest.
“You look like a real banker douche,” I say.
“I got news for you. I am, and so are you, so might as well dress the part.”
“Your call,” I say tearing open the stapled brown bag containing my dinner. “All I know is I didn’t eat lunch today, and I’ve been fantasizing about this meal since this morning.”
In the first year, dinners at the office with other junior bankers were a forum for us to discuss what the job appeared to look like from the outside. We’d reassure ourselves we were in a great position, the best position, and thus collectively we could take pity on everyone else. Viewing ourselves from an outsider’s perspective was the only one that mattered. Looking within was too daunting. By year two, the charade is over.
I reach into the bag and pull out a plastic bottle of Poland Spring water. My jaw clenches and a rush of uncomfortable heat cascades down my body. Then I remove the pasta dish and see red tomato sauce plastered on the plastic cover.
“You gotta be fist fucking me!” I yell. I drop the container of pasta back in the brown bag and fire it across the room at the wall.
“Jesus!” says Jack. “What the hell is wrong?”
“I ordered a sparkling water, not this bullshit Poland Spring. And Alfredo sauce on my pasta. It’s a simple fuckin’ thing and they can’t get it right!” I slam my fist on the table.
A stream of red tomato sauce slides down the far wall as I swipe my right arm across the table, sending the bottle of water flying.
The room goes silent.
“I think I have a couple Pellegrinos at my desk,” says Jack. “You can have ’em.”
I sit down in the chair across from him and put my head in my hands. I can feel the tears coming. Then I feel Jack gently place his hand on my back.
“You just need some sleep, man,” says Jack after a minute. I lean up, removing my hands from my face.
“Gonna be here all night again,” I say, leaning back in the chair and taking a deep breath.
“But it’ll be over after that. You’ll recharge, and it’ll be fine.”
My BlackBerry buzzes. The red dot blinks. I leave the room and return to my cube.
“Call me now,” reads the subject of the email from Masters to me—no one cc’d. I dial his cell.
“This is Rick,” he says after two rings.
“Hi Rick. Bill Keenan. Just saw your email,” I say. I can feel my hand holding the receiver shaking.
“The forty-fourth floor needs to get engaged in this process. You hear me?” Unlike the earlier call, which was punctuated by shouting and barking, his voice is now measured and sinister.
“Understood,” I say.
“This is a simple fuckin’ exercise. You’re disorganized. The call today was a catastrophe. Your incompetence reflects poorly on me.”
“I apologize if I wasn’t—”
“I don’t need an apology. Just get it done.”