Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

This course is for you if you want to become proficient in Excel for finance roles, such as investment banking, private equity, hedge funds, and real estate.

You do not need any knowledge or experience with Excel or VBA; just a working installation of Excel. There are no other prerequisites.

Through the course, you’ll learn how to navigate spreadsheets, format them, use functions and formulas, create graphs, and perform data analysis – and you’ll learn how to automate many of these tasks with VBA.

The course is geared toward finance roles, but parts of it may apply to non-finance jobs that use Excel as well.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 23 hours of training, but study plans are also available for 6, 12, and 15-20 hours.

You can learn the most important points in 6 hours, but if you want to master everything, it will take closer to 30 hours (about one hour per day over a month).

You can also skip the VBA segments and finish everything else in closer to 15 hours.

For more, please see the course outline.

Any modern version of Excel should work. The 365 version is best, but the 2021, 2019, 2016, or 2013 versions are also fine.

We cover the PC and Mac versions of Excel in separate lessons in the course, so you can complete it using Mac Excel. Once again, the 365 version is best, but any modern version should be fine.

If you’re using a much older version, such as Mac Excel 2008 or Mac Excel 2011, we don’t recommend completing the course because the shortcuts and features have changed significantly over time.

It is introductory-to-intermediate-level material. If you are already a VBA wizard, you will not learn anything new here.

If you do not know VBA or have not used it much, you will learn a lot and become more efficient at workflow automation.

The topics covered include the macro recorder, variable/constant declarations, IF/ELSE/ELSEIF statements, “For Each” loops, arrays, special cell selection, string functions, ranges, the Dictionary object, user-defined functions, ConvertFormula, links, and graph objects in VBA.

We also demonstrate how to import and export VBA macros into other files.

There are macros for creating input boxes for assumptions, color-coding financial models, setting up models for printing, cycling number formats, changing the number of decimal places, flipping numbers from positive to negative and back, and flash-filling right and down (i.e., copying and pasting to a boundary without selecting the area explicitly).

Additional macros are available for error-wrapping formulas, toggling absolute vs. relative references in formulas, jumping to the min and max of a range, inserting Tables of Contents, and inserting Price-Volume graphs.

These macros are useful, but not competitive with comprehensive paid packages with monthly or annual fees.

However, our solution is simple to install, covers the most useful macros, and is FREE with the Excel & VBA course with no additional support or subscription fees.

This course is for you if you want to prepare for interviews, internships, or full-time jobs in finance (investment banking, private equity, hedge funds, and related roles such as corporate development).

It is geared toward modeling entire companies rather than assets, so it is less relevant for roles such as real estate and project finance (beyond the core concepts such as the time value of money, the DCF analysis, etc.).

For more, please see the course outline.

The concepts covered are similar, but this course is 100% video-based, unlike the Interview Guide, which is mostly text with additional video case studies.

Also, this course goes into more depth on building financial models, such as sourcing the information, entering the data starting from a blank sheet, and presenting them to recommend deals or investments in real life.

The IB Interview Guide is better if:

• You have limited time to prepare (e.g., 10-20 hours) and want to practice or review fit/behavioral questions, deal/market-based questions, and technical questions.
• You would rather read guides than watch videos.
• You would rather practice with short/simple case studies and modeling tests, such as ones that take 30-90 minutes to complete.

The Core Financial Modeling course is better if:

• You have more time to prepare, such as 30-40 hours, and you already feel confident of the fit/behavioral and deal/market-based questions, so you’re looking for additional practice with technical questions and Excel-based modeling tests.
• You want something that will be useful for both interviews and the job.
• You want more complex case studies, such as ones that take 2-3 hours to finish.
• You want coverage of topics such as stock pitches and investment recommendations.

You should ideally have a solid knowledge of Excel, such as the key navigation and formatting shortcuts, and the ability to enter and modify formulas.

To get the Excel training included with this course, you can sign up for the BIWS Premium package.

You do not need to know anything about accounting or finance before starting, but if you know a bit about these topics, you can save time by skipping the first few modules of the course.

There are approximately 40 hours of training, and we provide study plans for 10, 20, and 30 hours, with options targeted at different fields, such as investment banking, private equity, and equity research.

Overall, you should plan to spend around 1 hour per day on the course over 1 month to get good results.

The main differences are that it is far more practical since everything is based on real companies and deals, and we have a global focus, meaning that the examples come from Europe, Asia, and Australia in addition to North America.

Put simply, this course teaches you how to download a company’s financial statements, input them into Excel, determine if the company is overvalued/undervalued, and make an investment recommendation.

You do not get that with the CFA, university classes, or other financial modeling training.

The knowledge you gain will definitely help in interviews, and listing the course on your resume or CV can make some difference, especially if you don’t have much work experience.

That said, no, this course is not the same as interning at Goldman Sachs or Blackstone (no course, even at a prestigious university, is equivalent to an internship at one of these firms).

To prove your knowledge, you can take and pass the certification quiz and list what you learned on your resume or CV:

• How to Add the BIWS Courses to Your Resume (Word)
• How to Add the BIWS Courses to Your Resume (PDF)

This course is for you if you want to gain a solid understanding of how to use PowerPoint to create presentations and pitch books for use in the finance industry. We cover not just the keyboard shortcuts, but also how to structure presentations and slides and even how to use VBA and macros.

The core lessons focus on creating a sell-side M&A / valuation pitch book for Jazz Pharmaceuticals, but they are generally applicable to presentations in private equity, hedge fund, and other finance roles.

For example, if you’re about to start an investment banking internship and you don’t know much about PowerPoint or how to turn your Excel files into actionable recommendations, this course would be a good fit for you.

You do not need to know anything about PowerPoint or VBA to complete this course, but basic Excel knowledge (e.g., the keyboard shortcuts for navigating a spreadsheet) will be helpful because some of the lessons reference Excel files.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 25 hours of training, but we also offer study plans for 5, 10, and 15 hours.

If you skip the VBA segments and optional practice exercises, it’s closer to a 10-15-hour completion time.

For more, please see the course outline.

You should ideally be using the 365 version of PowerPoint, but anything from 2013 or beyond (2016, 2019, 2021, etc.) should work. PowerPoint 2003 and 2007 are not supported.

The Mac versions of PowerPoint are not supported. We strongly recommend installing Parallels or another program that lets you use the PC/Windows versions of programs because Mac PowerPoint is very limited and does not support the required keyboard shortcuts.

One good option here is the Accelerator Keys service, which replicates the Alt-key shortcuts on Mac for a very low price. If you can use all the Windows shortcuts within Mac PowerPoint, you can plausibly finish this course.

It is quite detailed, starting with the basics and progressing up through complex code to create “Calendar” and “Harvey Ball” objects and manipulate tables.

If you have basic or intermediate knowledge of VBA, you will learn a lot from these lessons. If you are already an advanced VBA user, the course will probably be less useful (simply because you already know so much).

The topics covered include the macro recorder, variable/constant declarations, IF/ELSE/ELSEIF statements, “For Each” loops, arrays, object selection, sorting, user forms, shape formatting, drawing guides, VBA “tags,” language settings, “Select Case” syntax, and table and slide layout objects in VBA.

We also demonstrate how to import and export VBA macros into other files and how to add a “Macros” tab to the ribbon menu.

There are macros for swapping shapes, selecting all shapes with the same attributes on a slide, setting up “format cycles,” toggling the margins, stacking shapes horizontally and vertically, distributing shapes across wider/taller shapes, and automatically generating and deleting drawing guides and aligning/distributing shapes to them.

Other macros convert tables into shapes or shapes into tables, copy/paste table formats, and distribute and fit shapes to table cells. The last set of macros includes calendar and Harvey Ball insertion, an automatic Table of Contents, and a presentation-wide “Change Language” feature.

Some paid/subscription packages offer more than this, but our solution is simple to install, covers the most useful bits of automation, and is FREE with the PowerPoint course with no additional support or subscription fees.

It is for anyone interviewing for Investment Banking Analyst or Associate roles at boutique, mid-sized, and large banks.

You do not need to know anything about accounting or finance, but some knowledge will help you prepare more quickly.

This guide is NOT appropriate for senior-level interviews at the VP or MD levels.

It may also be useful for closely related fields, such as private equity and corporate development; the guide is relevant if you work on deals involving single companies, such as mergers and acquisitions.

For more, please see the Interview Guide outline.

The concepts covered are similar, but the Interview Guide is mostly text and written guides, with some example Excel files and videos, while the Core Financial Modeling course is 100% video-based.

Also, the “Core” course goes into more depth on building financial models, such as sourcing the information, entering the data starting from a blank sheet, and presenting them to recommend deals or investments in real life.

The IB Interview Guide is better if:

• You have limited time to prepare (e.g., 10-20 hours) and want to practice or review fit/behavioral questions, deal/market-based questions, and technical questions.
• You would rather read guides than watch videos.
• You would rather practice with short/simple case studies and modeling tests, such as ones that take 30-90 minutes to complete.

The Core Financial Modeling course is better if:

• You have more time to prepare, such as 30-40 hours, and you already feel confident of the fit/behavioral and deal/market-based questions, so you’re looking for additional practice with technical questions and Excel-based modeling tests.
• You want something that will be useful for both interviews and the job.
• You want more complex case studies, such as ones that take 2-3 hours to finish.
• You want coverage of topics such as stock pitches and investment recommendations.

There are no official prerequisites, but some basic accounting and finance knowledge (e.g., an understanding of the 3 financial statements) helps and will make it faster and easier to read the guides and test yourself with the quiz questions.

We answer these questions in the Interview Guide outline.

The guides are quite long and detailed (450+ pages of “core” content and over twice that if you include the optional sections), and there are ~10 hours of videos covering simple case studies.

The completion time varies, but there are study plans for as little as 4 hours up to 1-2 weeks or more.

It is useful for interview questions and case studies in these regions, such as the ones given at assessment centers in the U.K.

However, the processes in these regions often include other evaluations, such as online math and logic tests. We do not cover these types of standardized tests since they are typically conducted before interviews begin.

You can find many providers that offer practice tests for these assessments (both free versions and paid).

The guide is useful for the following fields:

• Private Equity
• Long/Short Equity and “Fundamental” Hedge Funds (e.g., merger arbitrage and special situations, but not quant or global macro)
• Equity Research
• Corporate Development
• Corporate Banking
• Big 4 Transaction Services (and related groups)

The guide is NOT useful for sales & trading, macro/quant hedge funds, and anything that’s less about specific companies and more about “the big picture,” such as private wealth management or private banking.

It is useful for any roles that involve accounting, valuation/DCF analysis, and analysis of transactions such as M&A deals and leveraged buyouts.

Most students say that our Interview Guide is far more comprehensive than anything else on the market since it includes hundreds of pages of explanations, questions/answers, “story” templates, and practice case studies.

We also offer personalized feedback on your fit/behavioral questions and assistance with technical questions and case studies (within reason).

So, if you are looking for in-depth preparation and support, you are unlikely to find anything more detailed in this price range.

That said, if you want a 2-hour prep plan, this is not the Interview Guide for you. Being more comprehensive also means completing the material and testing yourself takes more time.

For more, please see the Interview Guide outline.

This Networking Toolkit is useful for anyone targeting entry-level roles in investment banking – either internships or full-time jobs.

It is most useful for undergraduate students, recent graduates, incoming MBAs, and career changers who want to move into the field.

It is not relevant if you have many years of full-time work experience, as you should be familiar with networking strategies and email etiquette by then.

For more, please see the IB Networking Toolkit course outline.

Each module of the course takes 1-2 hours to complete, so if you finish the main course, you can expect to spend 5-10 hours on the videos.

The optional bonus modules at the end, the practice quizzes, and a full review of the email and call templates will add several hours to that.

Executing the strategies taught in the course will take significantly more time, as you’ll be emailing dozens of bankers, setting up informational interviews (coffee chats), and following up frequently.

We created the content by conducting 100+ interviews with customers who successfully broke into investment banking from a variety of different backgrounds (at both the Analyst and Associate levels).

We compiled all the strategies they used, aggregated the actual emails they sent and the conversations they had, and synthesized them into the instructional videos and templates in the course.

Click here to review all the success stories from this course to learn more.

This course is most useful for students and career changers. If you are an experienced professional in the finance industry, you will not learn much here.

There are a few email templates for “on the job” tasks, such as staying in touch with co-workers, but the lessons focus on winning offers in the first place.

If we added a service like this, it would have to include a monthly subscription fee to reflect the cost of ongoing research and updates, and most people are not willing to pay a monthly fee to get up-to-date contact information for bankers.

Also, it is relatively easy to find names, phone numbers, and email addresses for most boutiques and local firms by searching Google and LinkedIn.

This Networking Toolkit is far more comprehensive and mostly video-based. It includes dozens of templates, examples, and quizzes (far more than the examples in the free material).

Also, with this course, you can request personalized assistance in your networking efforts (e.g., checking/reviewing your emails or getting feedback on your overall strategy and timing).

Our free material is useful for getting started with your initial networking efforts, but it doesn’t come close to the depth and personalized service offered here.

This course is for you if you have a solid background in Excel and financial modeling for “normal companies” and you now want to specialize in asset-level modeling for project finance and infrastructure (e.g., for solar/wind plants, natural gas plants, nuclear, mining, and transportation assets such as toll roads and airports).

It is most appropriate for project finance roles at banks and infrastructure private equity roles, and it includes 4 short case studies, 4 in-depth case studies, and study plans for different amounts of time.

It does NOT cover the type of financial modeling you will use when analyzing large companies in investment banking or M&A roles because everything is based on individual assets, not companies.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 20 hours of training, but study plans are also available for 3, 8, 12, and 16 hours.

For more, please see the course outline.

You must have at least intermediate knowledge of Excel and financial modeling (e.g., accounting, basic 3-statement modeling, and valuation/DCF analysis).

Here’s a quick test:

a) Would you feel comfortable building a simple DCF (100 rows or less) based on a company’s annual report?

b) Do you understand what this Excel function does? =XLOOKUP(E3, C3:C17, D3:D17,0,0)

c) Can you navigate around an Excel spreadsheet and add rows and columns without using the mouse?

If you can do all these, you can complete the course. If not, we recommend our Excel or Core Financial Modeling training first.

You do not need to know VBA to complete the short/simple case studies in Module 1 of the course.

However, the more advanced case studies do use VBA for the debt sculpting/sizing and back-solving for various assumptions, and if you want to reach an advanced level of Project Finance knowledge, you need to use basic VBA to get around circular references.

Most of the VBA usage in the course is fairly simple and does not require outside training or explanations.

The final case study (the lithium mining development) does use VBA more extensively, but even with that one, you can follow along if you know the basics.

Most other Project Finance training tends to be extremely complicated (models that take 30 hours to explain) or extremely simple.

We aim for a “middle of the road” approach, where the models are complex enough to be useful, but not so complicated that you get lost in the details.

You can complete each simplified case study in 30 – 90 minutes, while the more advanced case studies each require 3 – 4 hours.

The goal is to get you up to speed quickly for interviews and case studies and provide you with useful references for your upcoming internship or full-time job.

This course is for you if you have a solid background in Excel and financial modeling for “normal companies” and you now want to specialize in financial modeling for VC-backed startups and growth companies (e.g., software-as-a-service or SaaS, internet of things, direct-to-consumer, and biotech).

It is most appropriate for Analyst and Associate roles at venture capital and growth equity firms, but it’s also relevant for tech/TMT groups and for banks and advisory firms that focus on startups.

It includes 5 short case studies based on Seed through Series D funding rounds, 4 in-depth case studies, a 72-page written guide, and study plans for different amounts of time.

It does NOT cover the type of financial modeling you will use when analyzing large companies in investment banking or M&A roles because all the companies covered here are smaller and growth-oriented.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 18 hours of training, but study plans are also available for 3 – 4 hours and 8 – 10 hours, including separate plans for technology and life sciences (biotech).

For more, please see the course outline.

You must have at least intermediate knowledge of Excel and financial modeling (e.g., accounting, basic 3-statement modeling, and valuation/DCF analysis).

Here’s a quick test:

a) Would you feel comfortable building a simple DCF (100 rows or less) based on a company’s annual report?

b) Do you understand what this Excel function does? =XLOOKUP(E3, C3:C17, D3:D17,0,0)

c) Can you navigate around an Excel spreadsheet and add rows and columns without using the mouse?

If you can do all these, you can complete the course. If not, we recommend our Excel or Core Financial Modeling training first.

It depends on your goals. If you are trying to learn how to complete Excel-based analysis of startups, venture capital deals, and growth equity deals, yes, the course is appropriate.

However, this course does not focus on qualitative analysis of companies/deals or points like researching a market, products, or competitors.

Some of the investment recommendation presentations touch on these points, but the course itself is very much Excel-based and geared toward financial analysis.

So, it is not appropriate if you are using it to learn the qualitative side of VC/startup analysis; you’d be better off reading a book to learn that.

Our course focuses on financial analysis in Excel and investment recommendations.

Every single case study concludes with some type of Yes/No decision related to a startup deal, as it’s critical to link the analytical skills to real-world outcomes.

By contrast, most other VC courses focus on points like cap tables and term sheets, and the financial modeling is quite simple.

Also, they do not necessarily explain how to evaluate startup investments from a financial perspective (e.g., can we achieve an annualized return of X% by investing today?).

To be clear, our course does cover capitalization table (cap table) modeling; it’s just that we go beyond that and explain how cap tables relate to real-world investment decisions as well.

This course is for you if you have a solid background in Excel and financial modeling and you now want to learn more advanced, on-the-job skills, such as retrieving data from the filings, conducting market research, and crafting client and investment recommendations.

It is most appropriate for experienced investment bankers, such as Year 2-3 Analysts, Associates, and beyond. The course also targets private equity and hedge fund professionals who want to improve their technical skills and individuals who want to move into these fields.

The course includes 8 major case studies, supplemental material on topics such as advanced accounting, and hundreds of pages of written guides.

This is NOT the course for you if you are new to Excel or financial modeling. It is for seasoned veterans with at least several years of experience.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 40 hours of training, but most students follow one 10 or 15-hour “study plan” based on an area such as investment banking, private equity, hedge funds, or credit modeling.

For more, please see the course outline.

You must have at least intermediate knowledge of Excel and financial modeling (e.g., accounting, basic 3-statement modeling, and valuation/DCF analysis).

Here’s a quick test:

a) Would you feel comfortable building a simple DCF (100 rows or less) based on a company’s annual report?

b) Do you understand what this Excel function does? =XLOOKUP(E3, C3:C17, D3:D17,0,0)

c) Can you navigate around an Excel spreadsheet and add rows and columns without using the mouse?

If you can do all these, you can complete the course. If not, we recommend our Excel or Core Financial Modeling training first.

Currently, we do not offer this option, but we are planning to split up this course into separate components in the future.

So, if you only care about the private equity case studies, or you only care about the credit modeling examples, you’ll be able to get just those.

We do not have a firm time frame for this yet but will post an announcement when it is determined.

This course is for you if you have a solid background in Excel, accounting, valuation, and M&A and LBO modeling, and you want to learn how to analyze property acquisitions, renovations, and developments and then make investment recommendations based on these analyses.

It’s ideal preparation for real estate private equity, real estate development, real estate lending, and brokerage roles, and it includes 11 practice case studies, a 200-page written guide, study plans, and an end-of-course certification quiz.

The course is partially relevant for investment banking roles, but since you do not work with individual properties much in real estate IB, the REIT Modeling course is more appropriate.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 25 hours of training, but there are study plans available for 5, 10, 15, and 20 hours as well.

For more, please see the course outline.

You must have at least intermediate knowledge of Excel and financial modeling (e.g., accounting, basic 3-statement modeling, and valuation/DCF analysis).

Here’s a quick test:

a) Would you feel comfortable building a simple DCF (100 rows or less) based on a company’s annual report?

b) Do you understand what this Excel function does? =XLOOKUP(E3, C3:C17, D3:D17,0,0)

c) Can you navigate around an Excel spreadsheet and add rows and columns without using the mouse?

If you can do all these, you can complete the course. If not, we recommend our Excel or Core Financial Modeling training first.

No. We don’t teach it because it is fairly complicated and expensive software that not everyone has access to, and teaching it would require a whole separate course.REIT Financial Modeling

We focus on Excel-based financial modeling, so we teach you how to replicate much of the functionality of ARGUS in Excel and VBA – such as tenant lease modeling and different assumptions for rent, rental escalations, absorption & turnover vacancy, concessions and free rent, tenant improvements, leasing commissions, expense reimbursements, and more.

This course is for you if you have a solid background in Excel, accounting, valuation, and M&A and LBO modeling, and you want to learn how to analyze real estate investment trusts (REITs), including M&A deals and leveraged buyouts involving REITs, and then make investment recommendations based on these analyses.

It’s ideal preparation for real estate investment banking and buy-side roles that are related to REITs. It includes 6 practice case studies, a 150-page written guide, study plans, and a certification quiz.

This course is NOT relevant if you’ll be investing in individual properties, such as in real estate private equity or real estate lending; for those, our Real Estate Modeling course is more appropriate.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are around 20 hours of training, but there are study plans available for 5, 10, and 15 hours as well.

For more, please see the course outline.

You must have at least intermediate knowledge of Excel and financial modeling (e.g., accounting, basic 3-statement modeling, and valuation/DCF analysis).

Here’s a quick test:

a) Would you feel comfortable building a simple DCF (100 rows or less) based on a company’s annual report?

b) Do you understand what this Excel function does? =XLOOKUP(E3, C3:C17, D3:D17,0,0)

c) Can you navigate around an Excel spreadsheet and add rows and columns without using the mouse?

If you can do all these, you can complete the course. If not, we recommend our Excel or Core Financial Modeling training first.

This course is for you if you have a solid background in Excel, accounting, valuation, and M&A/LBO modeling, and you want to learn how to analyze and value commercial banks and insurance companies. Most of the lessons are related to commercial banks.

For example, if you’ve worked as a generalist or in another industry group in investment banking and you’re now moving into the financial institutions group, this course would be an excellent way to get a crash course on the material.

If you already have advanced knowledge of commercial banks and insurance firms (e.g., you’ve advised them on deals for 20+ years), this course is NOT for you unless you need to review the fundamentals.

For more, please see the course outline.

There are about 45 hours of training total, but we also have study plans for 10-15 hours and several options in between.

For more, please see the course outline.

You must have at least intermediate knowledge of Excel and financial modeling (e.g., accounting, basic 3-statement modeling, and valuation/DCF analysis).

Here’s a quick test:

a) Would you feel comfortable building a simple DCF (100 rows or less) based on a company’s annual report?

b) Do you understand what this Excel function does? =XLOOKUP(E3, C3:C17, D3:D17,0,0)

c) Can you navigate around an Excel spreadsheet and add rows and columns without using the mouse?

If you can do all these, you can complete the course. If not, we recommend our Excel or Core Financial Modeling training first.

There is a short section on insurance, but it is more of an “interview prep” overview than a full course.

We don’t currently feature wealth management, fintech, specialty finance, or other areas, as the focus is commercial banks. We may add some of this in the future, and we hope to expand the insurance training eventually.

You can ask questions and receive answers by doing one of the following:

1. Go directly to the lesson you have questions on and ask your questions there. We will then respond to your question and you can track our responses over time.
2. Go to the Contact Form and email us with your questions.

We will answer detailed questions about the course materials for up to 5 years after you have signed up (or 10 years for the Platinum package).

After this 5 or 10-year period ends, we will still respond to administrative questions and simple queries and send you the course files if you need them, but we will not respond to detailed technical questions.

We respond to emails and questions left on the site within one (1) business day, and often more quickly than that.

We cannot offer instantaneous responses to all questions because doing so would substantially increase the course prices, given the additional employees required to support those response times.

On balance, we have found that most customers prefer to pay less and accept responses within 1 business day rather than paying additional fees for quicker responses.

We can answer questions related to the course content as well as general career-related questions.

For example, if you have a question about how to present your story in an interview, or you’re confused about a calculation in one of the models on the site, we can answer those questions.

We cannot complete homework assignments or case studies for you, nor can we respond to last-minute requests to fix Excel problems at 3 AM when you have a 6 AM deadline.

At this time, all technical support (e.g., if you have a question on valuation or LBO models) is provided via email or via the question & answer system within the site itself.

If you have a billing or administrative question, you will receive a phone number to call once you sign up for a course and join the site.

The Excel and PowerPoint files and PDFs are downloadable within the site itself, so you will still be able to access everything even if the ownership of the site changes in the future.

Should this happen, we would post an announcement well in advance of any changes and everything would be available for download over an extended period.

We normally do not make bulk video downloads available, but if the site shuts down in the future, we will enable this option and post links to all the videos in the courses.

All the modeling courses and guides come with a 90-day 100% money-back guarantee. If you’re unsatisfied with anything, you can simply email us and ask for your money back within 90 days of signing up.

Note that this refund policy does NOT apply to the resume editing and coaching services, because they are intensive, 1-on-1 services where we work with you in-depth over several weeks (or more).

As a result, we do not offer refunds on resume editing and coaching (whether purchased individually or as part of a package).

No. Everything is a normal file and we do not use any DRM technology within the site.

You can download all the Excel/PowerPoint/PDF files and use them on multiple computers or other devices.

You can download the Excel, PowerPoint, and PDF files, but not the videos.

If you have a special requirement and need access to the videos offline due to travel, a slow connection, limited bandwidth, or some other issue, we may make limited exceptions to this policy and allow downloads of the videos.

You will be able to watch the videos, listen to the audio files, read the documents, and edit and complete all the Excel files on the Mac.

Additionally, the Excel course includes a quick reference guide for Mac Excel shortcuts, and we cover the PC and Mac versions of Excel in separate tutorials (where applicable).

Note that the PowerPoint course is NOT designed for the Mac version of PowerPoint, and we do not cover Mac-specific shortcuts there. Parts of the course will still be relevant, but we cannot guarantee that everything will work properly, particularly in older versions of PowerPoint.

The models work in the 365 version of Excel, as well as all modern desktop versions of Excel: 2013, 2016, 2019, and 2021.

All models work in Mac Excel 2011 and beyond (including in 365 for the Mac).

Yes. Once you have a username and password, you can log in from anywhere you want.

It’s based on two things: 1) The number of students or professionals in your organization who sign up, and 2) The specific course(s) you purchase.

We offer two methods of signing up for group licenses:

1. Let us know in advance how many members will sign up for and use the courses, and we will send you a single invoice that reflects a volume discount. Then, we’ll distribute account login information and instructions to everyone in your organization once you have submitted payment.
2. If you cannot pay for the courses as an organization or you do not know the exact number of users in advance, we can create a coupon code for your organization that reflects a lower discount than the option above and which allows your members to sign up individually.

Option #1 gives you the best deal because we can offer a better rate when we know in advance how many users will sign up, but we’re open to either possibility.

Please see our pricing page here.

We offer a 10% discount for group licenses with 3 to 9 users, a 25% discount for 10 to 14 users, and 35%+ discounts for more than 15 users.

Contact us with the course(s) you are interested in and how many users you have and we’ll provide an exact quote.

We accept wire transfers, credit card payment, or PayPal.

We do NOT accept checks or money orders sent in the mail due to the higher administrative costs of processing these payments.

Once you have submitted payment, send us each user’s name and email address, and we will create all the accounts and send each user his/her login information and instructions to get started.

Sure – please email us and tell us something about your group, your requirements, the number of users you have, and the courses you’re interested in, and we can set up a trial account.

We work with a limited number of clients each month to improve their resumes/CVs and cover letters, and we provide 1-on-1 assistance with the entire recruiting, networking, and interview process.

To qualify, you must be: 1) A student with significant internship experience (e.g., at least 2 solid finance-related internships); 2) A current investment banker or other finance professional who’s seeking to move to another company or field in finance; or 3) A career changer at the MBA-level or above who wants to get into the finance industry.

We do NOT work with university students who do not yet have real work experience because our services would not be helpful for them.

After you sign up you will receive further instructions on how to proceed, including the documents and information we need from you. We will also schedule a time for our initial diagnostic call.

Click here to view all the packages and sign-up options we offer.

It is because they are significantly more comprehensive than other services, and because we focus on working with a smaller number of clients and doing more substantive work for them.

We take the time to understand your needs, and we ask you in-depth questions to make sure we have all the information we need to present your case in the best possible light.

You may or may not know that you possess certain strengths/advantages/experiences that are useful to interviewers, which is why we strongly favor a diagnostic call in the beginning of the process that allows us to get all the information we need from you.

And then you can leave the rest to us: We will help you present the most impressive points and achievements on your resume, in your cover letter, and in your pitch.

In addition to that, we also revamp your “story” so that it is more coherent and effective, and we help to point out any self-doubt or self-sabotaging beliefs that may be working against you – and then show you how to overcome these beliefs to achieve the results you desire.

We also suggest the best direction and role for your career – if, for example, we think you fit in better with trading than investment banking, or that you’d fit in better at a boutique rather than a bulge bracket bank, we will let you know.

In contrast to all the points above, most other services tend to use a “one size fits all” method where they aim for as many clients as possible and do not take the time to understand each one or provide in-depth feedback.

We take the opposite approach and choose to work with a smaller number of clients and offer more comprehensive services.

The other difference is that we provide more services within each package we offer: for example, a diagnostic phone call, a coaching call, or/and a customized Action Plan depending on the package you sign up for. These services are one-of-a-kind because they are tailored directly to your needs.

Because we work with you intensively 1-on-1 and spend a significant amount of time personally editing your documents and guiding you in the recruiting process.

If you sign up and we mutually decide that you would not benefit from the services, we will refund your money immediately before we begin to work with you.

Once we have accepted payment and we have decided to proceed with the work, however, there will be no refunds granted.

Nicole Lee leads our efforts and delivers these resume editing and coaching services.

She has worked in equity research, investment banking, institutional sales, and capital markets at bulge bracket banks.

Brian oversees the process and reviews documents as well to ensure consistency.

He generally does not offer 1-on-1 consulting due to time constraints. When he does offer consulting, he only makes it available for buy-side recruiting (e.g., investment banking to private equity and hedge funds) and/or advanced technical interviews.

Yes – feel free to review our investment banking resume editing page and/or investment banking coaching page to see comments from previous and current clients.

You’re free to ask any questions you want within the service period (click here to see the details for each package). It takes us 1-2 business days to respond, depending on the package you signed up for.

We do not strictly define exactly what you can or can’t ask for help with, but here are a few examples to illustrate what is included with the services, and what is not included with the services:

We Can Help With:

• Tips on how to tweak your “story” and position yourself in interviews.
• Tips on how to find names and contact information and execute your networking strategy.
• Feedback on responses to specific interview questions and/or networking strategies.
• Questions on how best to present experience on your resume/CV.
• How to handle tricky situations such as *not* receiving a return offer, being fired or let go, handling multiple offers, reneging on an offer, not getting along with your colleagues, or applying to multiple roles within the same bank.

We Cannot Help With:

• Entire case studies, modeling tests, or work projects. It’s beyond the scope of these services, and it is unethical for us to do the actual work for you.
• Additional drafts or versions of your resume/CV, or help for family members and friends and their resumes/CVs. We provide one draft of your resume/CV with multiple rounds of edits on that one draft, but no more than that.
• Meeting up in-person and/or flying to meet you to give you advice.
• Additional coaching or diagnostic calls beyond what is included in the package you sign up for.
• Providing information from other candidates or from the interviews they have been through. You are protected by confidentiality once you sign up for these services, and we never share other clients’ information.
• Last-minute requests, such as asking us to edit a new draft of your resume on a Friday night and return it to you on Saturday morning, or asking to speak on the phone immediately whenever a question comes up.

These requests are impossible for us to handle because our team works in different time zones around the world, and it is not possible to provide thoughtful responses on an extremely short time frame.

Please see our investment banking resume editing page, our investment banking coaching page, and our dedicated services and package deals page.

We do have an affiliate program, but it is currently closed to new sign-ups.

If it re-opens, we will post a notice about it here and describe the terms (commission rates, payment period, and so on).

No.

Paying commissions like this requires extra paperwork and tax filings in the U.S., and it is not economically viable unless you sell a significant volume of courses on an ongoing basis each month.

We are not currently hiring for dedicated sales rep roles, but we will post a notice here if anything changes.