9y
Thanks for sharing feedback on your interview experience with Morningstar’s Manager Research team. We thought it might be helpful to share some context around why we’ve designed the process to be very challenging.
The interview and qualification process is intended to mimic the experiences we live every day as Morningstar research analysts. Our job is to analyze fund portfolios and uncover interesting insights that explain why a fund is good or not so good. Our conclusions often face tough scrutiny from asset managers, clients and the media, so it’s critical that we listen carefully, answer questions thoughtfully, and keep our cool under pressure.
We use the fund presentation exercise in our recruiting process to assess a candidate’s analytic skills, gauge a candidate’s ability to present an investment thesis to an informed yet skeptical audience, and evaluate a candidate’s flexibility to think on their feet while under pressure. This step isn’t intended to be mean, but rather create a realistic job scenario that gives us insight into a candidate’s level of fit with our manager research role. It also provides candidates with a chance to “feel” what it’s like to be an analyst. Those who dislike this exercise probably wouldn’t enjoy the role.
As the world’s leader in independent investment research and analysis, we want our entrance process to be difficult so that those who ultimately are hired feel a great accomplishment in making the team, and so that we know we’ve hired the very best. We’ve been doing it this way for a while and even though some may find it frustrating, we know it succeeds as an effective match-making process.
We appreciate the effort you put into your candidacy and we’re sorry it didn’t work out with Morningstar. We truly wish you the very best.