Having joined Barclays Capital from campus, thereafter making a career switch to join the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Rohit Goel, an alumnus of IIM Bangalore’s two-year full time MBA: Post Graduate Programme in Management (PGP) 2010-2012 batch, has had an interesting and successful career trajectory, which makes him a role model for the current students of the institute.
Rohit joined Barclays Capital India from campus, where he worked as a lead analyst doing stock market research. While a career in investment banking is common amongst the IIM alumni, Rohit’s next foray into global macro research and policy advocacy stood out. In 2016, Rohit was hired by the International Monetary Fund’s Global Market Department to analyse global financial stability risks. In the last six years, Rohit has advised global central banks on strengthening their financial systems, published globally acclaimed research and helped introduce a systemic way of monitoring risks at the IMF as part of their flagship publication. Rohit now returns to the private sector, and planning to join a new global EM Equity asset management firm launched by Ruchir Sharma and Swanand Kelkar – ex-global strategist and portfolio manager respectively at Morgan Stanley Investment Management. He will join as the Director of macro research – responsible for global macroeconomic research and top-down country work.
Describing his 10 year career arc, Rohit says: “While IIM alumni have done exceptionally well in investment banking, multi-lateral institutes like the IMF have typically been reserved exclusively for Post doctorates and not MBAs. IMF was not a planned move but something that happened by chance. Amongst a total of 2500 employees, very few are non-PhDs, and only two are from IIMs. But despite this, and maybe because of this, it has been a very fruitful and productive journey within the IMF. I got an opportunity to develop my analytical toolkit and advise global central banks on policy options and financial stability risks – while bringing a unique market-linked thought process to the institute. Gita Gopinath, and earlier Raghuram Rajan, have obviously been the face of Indians in the IMF, but there is a big group inside and at very prominent roles. These trainings have helped prepare me for the next step of my career and join people who I have respected for the longest time – and are excellent investment and people managers”
Rohit’s success story spanning a decade, from IB to IMF to global investments, will serve as an inspiration for current students to design their academic and career goals, and will influence their ideas of success. Rohit also notes that the friendships and network made during the IIM days continue to act as a personal and professional support system. His career has been an amalgamation of markets, macro research and now asset management – and across various levels – starting as a junior analyst to amongst the senior leaders in the team. He notes how various courses come to use at various points of the career, and his example shows how an unproven path can turn out to be just the recipe needed.
IIMB has always been proud of its alumni, and it is their wonderful achievements which extends the reach of the IIM Bangalore community across continents
