Mapletree, a company of Temasek电面

HAN.B.

楼主两周之前面完电面，下午HR就发邮件说没问题了。但为了商量实习时间，又经历了漫长的拉锯战，昨天下午终于来了offer。楼主还在等另一家杳无音讯的电面，来怒攒一发人品。。。

楼主香港小本，暑假本来在一家asset mgnt firm做ops，但是觉得ops真是有点无聊，每天下班之后就开始刷隔壁学校的career center（自家的career center实在不太给力。。。）想找一个exit opportnity。然后就给我刷到了mapletree shanghai office portfolio management，居然还是七月开工。坦白说楼主在面试之前连Mapletree都没有听说过。。。问了几个朋友再wiki了一下才发现还是家蛮好的公司，淡马锡全资控股，asia based and focused, 在香港最有名的deal就是把又一城买了下来。

回到面试，约了上午电面，楼主本身电面经历并不多，所以还是有小小紧张，wiki开好了严正以待（事实上证明了这弥补了楼主因不学术酿成的恶果）。电话打过来发现对面居然是conference call=-=不是说好了manager interview的么。。。主面试官是一个snr porftolio manager，楼主Linkedin过他的background，在JP GS 和Citi都做过，认定了是个难搞定的主儿，所以提前做好了心理准备（事实又证明了保持厚脸皮是非常关键的）。

上来就是walk me through your resume，楼主挑了time mgnt skill, internpersonal skill说了一发。对面听完之后完全没有反应，开始问what did you do at the asset mgnt firm & what is your understanding about middle office。楼主联系了一下对面的背景（在GS Middle做过一年）就挑了几个最安全的communication, ensuring order啥的说了一说，然后把问题抛给他，but it is just my personal understanding, i wondered whether i could have you kind comments。对面果然没有上当。。。说不同的house对middle ops的要求都有分别，要我继续go on with job nature & provide me with cases that you encounter with when you have problems in your work。。。楼主于是长吸一口气，开始跟他扯跟印度人打电话跟日本人要非日文文件的经历。。。之后就全是基本的behavioural question，楼主吸取了之前面DB悲剧的经历前一个晚上好好go through了一遍自己的resume，所以接下来二十分钟虽然有过小囧的时候但基本都应付过去了。

面试进行到二十五分钟，就在楼主沾沾自喜面得还不错以为快要结束了的时候，对面突然说let me ask you several basic questions abt finance...于是悲剧开始了：
Q: What is IRR?
A: Internal rate of return
Q: Go on
A: ...... I think it is a rate that you use to discount future cash flows (大误=-=）
Q: Note really. bla bla bla...
A: Sorry for my misinterpertaion.
Q: It's OK, let's gon on, what is NPV?
A: Net present value
Q: Talk more about it
这个时候楼主才意识到把Corp Fin都忘光了是一件多么悲剧的事情。。。于是一边打开wiki一边痛苦的回忆一边尽量表现得很镇定地回答，对面不停的comment：not true, i dun think so, give me an example, if it is the case that bla bla bla, then what would be bla bla bla？。。。整个technical interview持续了20分钟，他最后给我的comment是i learned about these things more than 10 years ago and these should be the common sense for those learning finance. your major is quantitative fiannce but you don't seem to have a solid understanding about finance at all。楼主很桑心，本来这学期GPA就跪了面试的时候别人还要说你不好好学习，答：Thank you very much for pointing it out and getting me realized of how serious the problem is. I would try to gain a much more solid academic understanding in my future study and internships in University. I am really grateful for this lesson.

对面可能没有预料到楼主的这个反应（这小孩儿怎么这么贱。。。），问楼主有没有什么问题问他们。楼主于是重新调整心态，问了manager的personal experience, why real estate investment, why china, why mapletree, how do you comment on your job and share something about your team。努力把对话气氛调节回面techical之前的状态中。。。

然后有点意外的，下午就给了口头offer，估计是没什么人申请？No idea...不过这次面试还是学到很多东西的，hard skill is very very very important。