Finance Industry Career Resource Guide

In the past 20 years, there has been a marked rise in investments that veer away from the mainstream investments of cash, bonds or public equities. The UBS 2005 Annual Reporting Handbook's article titled "Industry Trends" explains that "real estate and private equity [became] significant components of portfolios from the early 1980s, while hedge funds, once considered a fringe investment, continue to move into the mainstream across the globe." Hedge funds, which are lightly regulated pools of investment money that typically outperform mutual funds, in particular have recently exploded in the market. These funds have been growing in number by about 20 percent per year and have created a need for more financial analysts and portfolio managers.

Subsequently, the UBS handbook argues, the rising crops of hedge funds and other alternative investments have spurred the creation of even more types of investments and products. This has resulted in "services rang[ing] from IPOs and leveraged finance for private equity firms to prime brokerage and administrative services for hedge funds." Not surprisingly, the field's new diversity has made getting a finance degree even more crucial; with so many niche fields, the related niche knowledge is both required and lucratively rewarded.

Historically, finance has mostly been about numbers, but lately it has become a much more technology-dependent field. Entry-level professionals will likely have to work within the emerging eXtensible Business Reporting Language (XBRL), an XML-based financial reporting standard, and will have to be able to create reports using Microsoft SQL Server.

Finance has also become a more regulated field. The 2002 Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which holds company officers liable for misdeeds, has effectively chased away the "greed is good" philosophy of the 1980s and 1990s and instated an industry-wide focus on business ethics. This has both raised the profile of finance professionals in general and has created a distinct need for those who specialize in risk management and compliance.

Perhaps the most socially-progressive trend in finance recently has been the marked increase of women in the profession. The industry has historically been—and is largely still—predominately male, but women are beginning to fill all levels of company organizational charts. An article in the June 2007 issues of CFO Magazine titled "Gap Analysis" reports that "women CFOs in the Fortune 500 has risen steadily, from 24 in 2001 to 44 in 2010," and that women currently represent 16 percent of the controller and treasurer positions in these companies. Despite this progress, however, the finance industry has a long way to go to lose its old boys' club image; initiatives such as business school diversity programs are rising to the occasion and helping the industry become a more welcoming place for women.

_{Sources: Hedge Fund Association, UBS.com, CFO.com, Robert Half International 2007 Salary Guide}