"I'm 66-years old and have impeccable credentials. I'm looking for a new job in finance"
I am 66 years old and I am ready for my next job in finance. I am fit, I am healthy and I have impeccable experience and a long list of contacts.
Who, though, will hire me?
I graduated from Cambridge University in 1979. I have 15 years' experience in bond sales at Lehman Brothers, Bear Stearns and Credit Lyonnais. I was a very good bond salesman, but I stopped in 1995 to set up an investment trust investing in media and content firms.
As the market has changed, I endlessly reinvented myself. In the years running up to the financial crisis, for example, I was a headhunter with a staff of six, but when hiring dried up our revenues fell 90%. We had £400k in the bank; when that dropped to £40k, we called it a day.
Immediately after the financial crisis, when liquidity was thin, I set up a bond sales team for WH Ireland. When liquidity roared back, I became an equity research analyst. When I was laid off three years later, I decided to something completely different.
I've spent the past decade running a hotel and a firm of mountain guides in the Spanish Pyrenees and the Western Alps around Chamonix. It's been excellent fun and one of the best jobs I've ever had, but I am now ready to move back into finance. I'm already discovering that it may not be easy.
I have an unblemished record. I am very fit and very healthy. I have a huge Rolodex - my past decade has been spent taking elite professionals hiking and off-piste skiing; people know me and trust me. But when I apply for jobs in finance, people see only my age, and my time out of the market.
This shouldn't be the case. I have a huge amount to offer. If anyone has any suggestions or has had a similar experience, please let me know in the comments box below.
Have a confidential story, tip, or comment you’d like to share? Contact: sbutcher@efinancialcareers.com in the first instance. Whatsapp/Signal/Telegram also available (Telegram: @SarahButcher)
Bear with us if you leave a comment at the bottom of this article: all our comments are moderated by human beings. Sometimes these humans might be asleep, or away from their desks, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. Eventually it will – unless it’s offensive or libelous (in which case it won’t.)
