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Also what are you doing currently?
Life set hai.
The reasoning behind my decision to pursue the Charter was three-fold.
1. There is an abundance of corp lawyers in the market at present.The amount of naive freshers I see applying to
my Tier 1 firm that dream of breaking into Big Law is increasing YoY at a staggering rate. The easiest path that I
saw for myself to maintain relevancy and remain afloat in this sea of legal talent, is to nurture a deep
understanding of Industry functions.
2. I work in a practice area closely associated with core corp finance. After listening to your legal jargon, when the
reps of clients are discussing the industry risks faced, and implied opportunities available for the business side of
things, being able to offer a cogent observation carries one far in the eyes of the client.Clients trust me far more today, and my relationships are deeper with them due to them trusting my financial acumen and not just my
legal experience.
3. The last reason is quite simple. OPTIONALITY.
Corp Laywers miss the big picture to focus on the minute details. That's our job after all.
But, if you go down the CFA Path, you will encounter the mental model of optionality used by Financial Analysts
in multiple subjects and chapters.
What we forget in this race is that the world is bigger, far more interesting, far more creative, and far more
lucrative than the embarrassingly small world of a tiny number of respectable law firms in our fledgling country.
Ask yourself, if you were not an individual and rather were a business entity, would it be wise for the biz to
depend entirely on one potential source of revenue?
Market conditions will change, maybe AI replaces us, maybe not (most probably not). Maybe you hate the firm
life down the road. Maybe you want to make decisions and not do the paperwork for the decisions.
What then? No options left but to continue due to sunk cost in your career and no other marketable skills.
CFA will be an extremely arduous undertaking if you wish to study while working at a Tier - 1 like me. My dreams keep me awake - Build some capital here. Finish L3 by then. Get the Charter. Write the GMAT/GRE to get that MBA. Use my diverse experience to build my own niche and offer more to the industry than my peers. There is no question that this will be rewarded for there aren't many that can offer the same.
Hope this perspective helps you.
I also know of a partner in my firm who has an MBA. His promotion to PA and Partner was actually slower than normal. So, I don't understand why he got an MBA in the first place if he wanted to work in an Indian law firm which actively discourages you to do higher education/learning.
So, yes - this thread is important. Please think WHY exactly you want to do an MBA or CFA.