Turning adversity to opportunity

The market is rallying. Finally. Were you timely and lucky enough to capture this opportunity?

When a good friend of mine decided to leave his investment banking job to join a start-up hedge fund last winter, I felt dizzy. I almost thought “starting a hedge fund” at such turbulent times sounded a bit like an oxymoron. Unlike many, he was one of a few friends managed to get an offer in London with an investment bank that still exists today. Who is brave enough to let go of a job that pays bill when everybody is struggling to secure any job possible and when employers are looking to sack people because of poor businesses and uncertain economic outlook? To me, his fundraising plan also seemed mission impossible.

But my friend made a bold bet. He simply said this: The market just sucks. No deal. He gets no work to do. Everyone is just stressed out. No bonus but he will have to keep slaving. He is just not happy.

So he left. In December last year, he became a fourth member of this new hedge fund as a junior partner. The fund uses equities and derivatives, especially to invest in commodity and energy companies. Following a handsome gain in Q1, his fund saw a 13 percent return only in April, riding on the wave of stock market rally.

More importantly, he is a lot happier. Since the firm is so small, he has a huge amount of responsibility but he creates his own work. He gets time to do yoga after work. I guess he is safe at the moment as the market has been on his side since last winter, although long term outlook is still a big question mark. But he looks very happy – he says that he feels grateful because he thinks he is just at the right place at the right time and that he gained control over his life.

A fairly tale with a happy ending? The lesson I got here was not just that you should be a contrarian to make money. What I learned from him was that he was smart enough to know what he wanted in life and this was followed up by a bold action.

When I first started MBA in 2006, pretty much everyone thought of only these four career options: Banks, consulting, industry and others. Those were the happy and greedy days that we thought we would all end up securing high-paying banking or consulting jobs.

But good times are bad times, and vice versa. Thanks to the financial crisis and economic downturn, the class of 2008 (and also 2009) has been definitely pushed to think outside of the box. Now I don’t think MBAs will only look into these four options. They are now (forced to be) entrepreneurial in many ways. I already saw many starting their own businesses. Well, I don’t want to sound too idealistic and I am not saying you should quit your job right away.

I am saying that this is a perfect chance to really look at what you have now and figure out what you want from your life. Then you can turn adversity into opportunity, just as my friend did.