After soaring in the 1990s, bottoming out in 1998, soaring from 2005, and crashing again, the Russian job market may be even more erratic than the market in London. Despite this, the anonymous Russian analyst below held his nerve and refused second rate job offers even at the market’s nadir in 2008.

Current role

Equity research analyst (sell side), top three Russian investment bank in Moscow.

Previous role

Equity research analyst for a Russian branch of an international brokerage firm in Moscow.

When the lights went out

November 2008, when the firm was closed down and all the employees dismissed. The office was never particularly successful, and once the crisis began it was unable to meet its costs. When it was founded, everyone thought there was enough work for all on the growing Russian capital market. This turned out not to be the case.

When the lights came on

June 2009, when I found my new job.

How the job was found

I did the usual stuff - talked to my friends/colleagues, sent resumes to investment banks directly, posted resumes on jobs sites, and talked to headhunters directly. Interestingly, I got all my offers through headhunters. It seemed that people at banks don’t react unless they know you personally – they prefer to use an intermediary like a headhunter.

The low point

I’m not sure there was a low point – it never felt that bad. There were a number of brokerages and banks in Moscow which were hiring throughout the crisis and trying to catch big fish at small prices. I got several offers while I was redundant and considered most of them not good enough.