Rob Smith graduated in 2005. He is now an investment banker with Merrill Lynch. We caught up with him to find out more about banking in the credit crunch age, and more....

What is the mood like at your bank at the moment?

I've recently moved from the now-defunct Lehman Brothers to Merrill Lynch. The mood isn't necessarily gloomy - most people are happy to still be employed and taking each day as it comes.

Backtracking, what did you study at university, and why?

I studied classics, because I was interested in it at school.

When did you decide to go into banking? Were you concerned at not having a quantitative degree?

In my penultimate year I did an internship at Baillie Gifford (Edinburgh based asset management firm) and found (to my surprise) working in finance was both interesting and closely related to the day-to-day news.

Initially I was worried, until I realised that I learned the only pure mathematics you need to know in investment banking at primary school. You have to be reasonably numerate, but it's the conceptual issues relating to the numbers that are most important.

How did you find the application and interview procedure to work at Lehman in London?

Lehman had fewer online application forms / case studies & more one on one interviews than some of its competitors - which gives you more exposure to the firm's "culture"

You worked in london and now work in Hong Kong. Which do you prefer and why?

Work wise, Hong Kong is the place to be at the moment. Lifestyle isn't bad either as most expats live within a few hundred yards of each other.

What do you do right now - which department do you work in and what do you do in a typical day?

I work in Power & Natural Resources M&A - advising corporates and private equity firms around buying and selling companies (or parts of companies) in the power and natural resources sectors. The majority of this work is building financial models to value these companies and this takes up most of any given day. In the HK office we also spend a lot of time travelling - I've been flying almost weekly to either to either Beijing or Kuala Lumpur for the last year or so.

What in your views are the main pros and cons of life as an investment banker?

Pros - frequent foreign travel, genuinely interesting subject matter, an opportunity to work on and around headline-making deals (these days the headline-making deals generally involve your own employer)

Cons - ridiculous hours (you won't realise how bad until you've experienced it), stress

Lastly, any advice for wannabe bankers in these troubled times?

Firstly, don’t despair - no doubt it will be harder to get hired than two years ago, but demand for e.g. M&A advisory work will remain (although firms have reduced access to capital, their acquisition targets have become cheaper). For those beginning to consider their employment options now, the global economy may have turned a corner before you even start your new job.

To make your CV distinctive, try to get as much practical experience of the financial world as possible - whether it's doing internships (formal or informal), work shadowing or anything else. Doing as many interviews as possible drastically improves your technique (if only just because you will remember previous answers - the Sarah Palin effect).