I’m a financial analyst, and my undergrad was as a finance major. So here’s my 2 cents if they decide they want to go the analyst route. You can definitely get a solid job pretty much anywhere in the country(especially with work from home being such a major thing) with just a finance degree from any state school.

Number 1 thing though is that Internships are incredibly important. I screwed around in college and did not have a great internship plus had an average GPA, so I struggled to find an analyst position off the bat. Had to go into a lower paying accounting type role first, and parlayed that into an analyst position after a couple years. That being said, I’ve felt that having a good understanding of accounting has been extremely helpful so far in my career as an analyst as well. So a few extra accounting courses here and there would probably be something they thank themselves for at their first job.

If they can become a bit of an excel nerd and get moderately comfortable in SQL/VBA, a lot of doors tend to open up at entry level positions, regardless of internships or experience. Data Science and manipulation is half if what analyst are doing now-a-days at any decent sized firm. Being comfortable and capable with those tools gives you a leg up on a lot of candidates and is a really valuable asset to companies and a highly marketable skill for yourself.

Finally, a lot of finance is about strategy/problem solving. So whatever kind of self study they can during college to get familiar with different business case studies, and familiarize themselves with some of the stories of companies out there right now would serve them well. For really passive self-study purposes, podcasts like Business Breakdowns, Capitol Allocators, and Masters in Business gives a lots of great insights into different companies and personalities in the finance world and helps you get a better understanding of how they think and operate without needing too much of a background to follow along.

This post was edited on 12/12/22 at 5:18 pm