Hey you.
Yeah you. Stop what you're doing and listen to me.
You're probably panicking about getting internship experience in the midst of a world pandemic. You're thinking to yourself, "I'd take literally anything! Even if it's unpaid, or the job sucks." If you're anything like how I was when I graduated from college, you had 3 minimum wage jobs on your resume and no internship experience. I had just graduated summa cum laude from my honors college with my Bachelors in Economics, and I had graduate school to look forward to that upcoming fall semester. However, I was worried I'd be just another grad student who'd never had a real job. I was even in the running for a full-time assistantship with the Department of Economics where I was going to grad school, but somehow I felt like I was just another victim of the American education system that feeds off of people who never want to get a real job.
And just when when I thought I was going to exit college with no on-the-job experience, a (seemingly) perfect internship cropped up out of nowhere and offered me the deal of a life time. You speak to a recruiter, maybe at a job fair or a networking event, about an opportunity to become a "financial advising intern" with Northwestern Mutual, the "top-rated financial institution in America for nearly 20 years."
Let me explain something to you about this internship. It is a scourge upon all finance, business, and economics students around the nation, and you should not even humor the idea of interning with this god-forsaken company.
I know what you're thinking as you read this though. "Psh, yeah whatever. If I don't like it, I'll just quit. It can't be that hard to do it, right? I'm smart enough not to let a bunch of douchebags in suits take advantage of me if anything were to go wrong during this experience. I mean look at the good employee reviews on Glassdoor and Indeed for Northwestern Mutual!"
You want to know why I know that's what you're thinking? Because I thought the exact same way when I started my internship with NM. I had just graduated as an economics major from my university, the most egotistical of all the finance and business-related fields might I mention. I knew what I was getting myself into, unlike all these business administration students from John Carroll (yes, that was a combined burn on John Carroll and business students).
But that's not how this internship works; it's an active brainwashing scheme. It all starts with what I'll call The Grooming Phase:
The recruiter you meet, whether it be at a job fair or some other networking opportunity, will text you about meeting up to discuss the internship in more depth, keeping the nature of the position intentionally vague, lest you do your own research about the company before they can introduce you to their favorite flavor of kool-aid they're going to have you drink later on (how does whole-life-flavored pouch sound to you?).
Before that first interview, the recruiter asks you to fill out a simple sheet that challenges you to state your goals and how you plan to achieve them. It even has you give a salary amount that would be required to reach these goals if they cost money. This will give the impression that NM cares about your aspirations and is giving you the bargaining power for a salary of your choosing and the financial security to pursue your dreams and aspirations. This is not actually the case like 96% of the time, but more on that later.
Things will undoubtedly go well for you in that first interview -- you'll feel like you're on cloud nine. Throughout the interview, the recruiter will probably shower you with complements, telling you that they "truly think you'll be a great fit for the company" and that they "can see you becoming one of the top performers in the near future." If you're me, you may even be told that you're such a special applicant they're going to give you a private 2nd interview, rather than the group interviews they usually perform at this point in the process (to this day, I'm aware of no other interns in my class who had to go through a group interview, so it's very possible the recruiter just flat out lied -- a concept you'll get used to as the internship progresses).
They'll brag about all the money people make at Northwestern and all the vacations they're able to go on because you can work your own hours. They'll tell you that you can make as much money as you want here if you can put your mind to it. Here's a little red flag that you might run across as well. The recruiter will make a point of telling you "that this is not a pyramid scheme." How they do this is really a genius move, because they've disarmed any objections to their business model before you've ever had time to ask a question.
Anyway, it all sounds great otherwise. Granted, they didn't tell you anything about the position itself or what exactly Northwestern Mutual even does for their customers, but you think you read something on Glassdoor about insurance and investments, and their office has such a cool view of the lake. Oh well, they'll probably mention it in more detail at the next interview...
Which brings me to the 2nd interview. This one is where they pull out all the stops.
In this second interview, you'll notice a few things. Firstly, the people you're meeting with are usually pretty young, maybe at most middle-aged but more often than not this second interviewer will be a young and successful member of the Northwestern Mutual team called a College Unit Director (CUD). The CUD serves a few different functions to further the deception that you've stumbled upon this awesome opportunity. Firstly, they'll relate to you a lot, telling you they were just like you 5 years ago and look where they are now! They're an idol to establish in your mind throughout the grooming process. I mean they're wearing an NM pullover over a dress shirt and tie for goodness sake! They must be the real deal!
Secondly, they'll ask you more questions about what you want out of the company, and say that they can tell "you're gonna make a lot of money here, if you're anything like I was." Maybe they'll take you into one of their massive conference rooms to do the interview -- a conference room that almost always appears to be empty. But maybe you're just imagining things. This interview will also go uncannily well. I know I was weirded out about it, and I'm a pretty good interviewer as it is.
Between the second and third interview, the CUD will ask you to do "a project" for them. They'll email you a little packet with info about the sales cycle and different techniques for networking. Nothing too weird there. But then, you'll notice something at the end of the packet: a web diagram with a bunch of circles on it that are all connected to the word "You" at the center of the diagram.
They tell you that, like all successful entrepreneurs, you need to leverage your personal relationships to establish a network of clients. You think to yourself, "okay a little weird, but I understand where they're coming from, and I can always just refuse to sell to my family if I'm uncomfortable with it."
You finish this "project" for them and send it back. Almost immediately, the recruiter will schedule a third interview with you, alluding towards the fact that they think you'll be a good fit and they want to bring you on as an intern. Yes! You did it! You're going to have job experience finally, and supposedly with a great company!
Over the next few months, you'll do a bunch of prep courses and meetings to prepare you for what all your CUDs and trainers refer to as "the summer of a lifetime." They say this is a life-changing program. Eventually, once you've already said yes to the internship with about as much knowledge as you had before your first interview, they spill the beans -- you need to get your insurance license.
You'll start thinking, but wait! They told me this was going to be investing and financial advising. Maybe you even bring this objection to your CUD. Never fear, they'll give you all the reassurance you need to continue with studying for your insurance exam, usually referencing the fact that "all the good advisors started by selling insurance and shifted over to investing later on." They'll tell you that "investments give you a salary, but insurance pays the bills."
So you sink all your time into studying for the exam and partake in all the prep courses. For me, it took a lot of time away from my senior research and my mental health deteriorated from splitting my efforts between school and these stupid classes.
I got my insurance license, and finally the internship kick-off day comes. I've filled out form after form and been background checked a million times... and finally I can sit back and start to learn about the finance industry. This kickoff day is the start of what I'll call The Hook Phase:
Nothing close to finance is discussed in this kickoff day. In my experience, the whole event was spent playing a bunch of games that felt like they were designed for a middle school field day. They keep talking up the internship, yet they're reluctant to explain how exactly we're going to be paid. By this point, they've mostly revealed to you that it's just an insurance sales position.
Note: I forgot to mention this, but I was told that I was going to be a graduate intern because I graduated college, only to find out later on that they were going to treat me like all the other unfortunate college freshman and sophomores that enter the internship.
The reason I call this "The Hook Phase" is because you've sunk a lot of resources, time, and energy by this point, so they've basically hooked you on the internship.
Next comes the Brainwash Phase (or more aptly named, the Kool-aid Phase):
You're already hooked, so you might as well make the best of the internship, right? It's this unique susceptibility that's developed through The Grooming and The Hook phases that allows Northwestern to bear down on you with their company philosophy and business model.
In this phase, you'll hear from all kinds of successful advisors about their stories and reasons for becoming an advisor through NM. Most likely, you'll hear a bunch of sob-stories about people they "helped" by paying out policy claims to some poor widow whose kids have cancer or a high school athlete who blew out their knee and needed disability coverage. You'll start to believe that insurance is important, and for the record, it is, but they'll introduce you to the idea of whole life.
Whole life is the worst financial instrument you could ever use. It's incredibly expensive, you can't access its cash value for a long time, and it's ROI is abysmal compared to mutual funds, bonds, real estate -- you name it. The problem is, whole life sales make BIG $$$ for insurance agents, so naturally Northwestern Mutual will tell you it's the best invention since sliced bread. It's your savior, the backbone of your investment strategy, the end-all-be-all. By this point, your college unit director will largely ignore questions about investments because realistically, you're never going to actually use them in your "financial planning process." This then reveals the real kicker of the internship: it's all commission-based, aside from the $100 stipend they give you for working nearly a full-time job.
They'll also help envision a future for you and your business. They'll tell you to dream big, to believe in the system. Finally, you start learning the phoning language. This is the first of many aspects of the internship that give you an actual indication of the problems with the job. You learn this language for about a week, and you then begin calling all your family and friends about this "awesome opportunity I have through Northwestern Mutual!" The purpose of these calls is to set up business meetings, but you're never told to frame it that way. Instead, you tell your friends (who probably miss you and would love to reconnect) that you just want to catch up and grab some lunch together. In reality, all you're doing is setting up a meeting to gather information about their financial situation.
Let me tell you that the first time you see your friend's face after they realize all you're doing is roping them into a glorified pyramid scheme under false pretenses, it will make you want to up and quit the internship right then and there.
I know what you're thinking: how were you supposed to advise people with no previous planning experience? This is where the idea of a joint work partner comes into play, Your joint work partner is an experienced agent who shows up to the meetings with you, apparently to "show you the ropes," but in all actuality they're just coming along to extend their network by using your relationships to get new leads and take half your commission from any of the policies and investments you sell.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fast forward a few months into the internship. You've called every person on your contact list, and you've resorted to rationing out any remaining contacts you could call. You're supposed to call at LEAST 40 people a day, but you can barely get to 10 dials by this point and most of those you've already left multiple voicemails for. You've come to the realization that your circle is a lot smaller that you originally thought, and with you constantly hounding friends to set up meetings with you, that circle is only getting smaller. You've messaged people on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, LinkedIn -- pretty much anything to get just a few more meetings set for the week, but no one ever answers back.
And those joint work partners? Surely you've gleaned some useful information from all those tag-team meetings, right? Think again. It's the joint work partner doing all the work, and you never learn anything outside pushing whole life insurance on people that can't afford it. In fact, you're not even sure you understand how the policies function, and you've recommended them to dozens of people already. In virtually all the meetings, you just sit there with a shit-eating grin because you know that if you had to run any part of it, you'd reveal just how ignorant you are about the policies themselves.
Given the fact that I like to be competent and knowledgeable in the jobs I take up, it was at this point I started to really read into the policies and business strategies of Northwestern Mutual. I grabbed "Investing for Dummies" by Eric Tyson (an INCREDIBLY useful book, might I mention) off of my bookshelf and read it cover-to-cover over a single weekend. Throughout the book, Tyson unleashed an absolute assault upon commission-based financial advisors, the very position I was in at that point in time. He mentioned all the commissions brokers take out of managing your investments and the financial infeasibility of whole life insurance (the holy grail of the commissioned agent). He talked about how simple investing can actually be these days, ever since the dawn of the internet; one can open a Fidelity, Vanguard, or TD Ameritrade account in as little as 10 minutes without ever needing to pay a single dollar to a "financial advisor." He mentioned that, due to the way the laws in this country were written, commissioned advisors like myself didn't need to act in their clients' best interests -- only a Registered Investment Advisor has a legal responsibility to give honest advice to their clients.
He talked to the reader like I wish I could talk to my clients.
I realized that all Northwestern Mutual taught me to do was trick people into thinking that investing was too much work for their busy lives, so they had to hand over all control of their finances to me so I can save them from their stupidity. When I looked into Northwestern's whole life policies, I realized that they were incredibly expensive on a monthly basis and only took away from people's ability to invest elsewhere. And our investment management? NM charges 5-10x the rate for that of a discount broker like Charles Schwab, Fidelity, Vanguard, T. Rowe Price, TD Ameritrade, etc.
Sorry this was so long, but please stop giving Northwestern Mutual the power of your time, energy, and resources. You'll be better off for it.
