In our series “Jump-start Your Job Search,” Bostonia brings you short interviews with BU alums who are leaders in their fields, such as banking, advertising, tech start-ups, journalism, or nonprofit organizations.

They talk about how they got to be where they are and what they’ve learned from their mistakes. They tell us what they look for when hiring and offer advice for those just embarking on a career.

During her senior year at BU, Jalpa Bhavsar (College of Arts & Sciences’09) found herself questioning her decision to switch from a premed track to an economics major. She was interning at Barclays Wealth Management in London in fall 2008—the worst months of the global financial crisis—and the Barclays office was next door to the London office of Lehman Brothers, which was filing for bankruptcy. “I was looking out the window, seeing people walk out with their boxes as they were being laid off,” she says. “The financial world was crumbling right in front of my eyes.”

But the New Jersey native stayed the course, and she says she’s glad she did. By 2010, she’d been hired at Citi (formally known as Citigroup, Inc.) as a risk analyst and has steadily risen through the ranks there, except for a brief stint at TD Bank. She is director, global operations and fraud analytics, for Citi’s consumer banking operations in North America, Mexico, and the Asia-Pacific region, based in Delaware, overseeing 55 employees in the United States and India. In addition to her undergraduate economics degree, she also has a master’s in management and systems from New York University.

Her team’s goal is to find efficiencies in call centers and other operations, “to make sure processes are flowing seamlessly, that we have people in the right places, and to balance that with the customer experience,” Bhavsar says. “Customer experience is a big part of the job, with the move to digital and mobile, so we are able to service the needs of customers in their preferred channel.”

Bostonia spoke with Bhavsar about how her economics degree helped prepare her for a career in banking, what she looks for in the job candidates she interviews, and her advice for those interested in entering the banking field.

Bostonia: What are the qualities you look for in the people you hire?

Bhavsar: Curious. Eager. Willing to learn. A candidate might not have the exact right experience, but if they have this willingness and desire to learn, I think that is what sets people apart.

What kind of questions do you ask during an interview?

I am more of a behavioral interview person. We’ll usually have more technical people on the call who will ask whether you can leverage certain tools and things like that. I ask about working with other people. How do you work with a partner? What are some of the projects or initiatives that you headed? What difficulties did you face along the way and how did you overcome them?

Are there some common mistakes that young job candidates tend to make?

Not preparing for the interview. I think people google how to prepare for an interview and get lost in learning company facts. It’s not so much knowing the stock price or how many sites there are, or things like that. It’s more preparing around your background and having lots of good examples to answer our questions. I ask, “Tell me a time you worked really well with a partner,” and they take a minute or two to think and that’s fine. But then they’re like, “Oh, I don’t have a good example for that one.” And if they can’t think of a good answer to that, it becomes a little challenging.

What’s a deal breaker for you?

A good sign in an interview is having questions to ask. But what kind of questions? I had a candidate ask, “Is there a cafeteria in the building?” And I’m thinking, you are definitely not getting the job.

What advice would you give to someone interested in your industry?

I found getting internships to be really helpful. MetLife was doing an open hiring session—this was after my freshman year of college—and I went to the MetLife building and it turned out they were looking only for full-time employees, not interns. But I ended up talking to a financial planner who was there, and she said, well, she could use an intern. She wasn’t necessarily looking for one but she’d be happy to take one on. So I went into Manhattan every day that summer and worked for her at MetLife, and that got me the next interview, because I could say, hey, I have this experience.

What’s the competition like for new graduates in the financial industry?

Fairly competitive, but it’s a pretty decent job market right now. Citi is definitely hiring. The challenge with financial institutions is they’re looking for experience, and if you just got out of college, it’s hard to get that experience. And that’s why I think the internship is key.

What expectations do you have for new employees?

It definitely takes a while to come up to speed and get your bearings, and I understand that. But it all goes back to that eagerness and willingness to learn. Are you being proactive? I think the reason for my trajectory and success is being proactive about my development—signing up for leadership courses and talking to my manager about what I should be doing. I have someone who just joined my team, and a week before his start date, he sent me his 90-day plan of what he wants to achieve, who he should connect with, what subjects he wants to focus on. Being proactive in asking those questions will get your manager and your team excited about having you on the team.

Name a mistake you’ve made during your career, and the lessons you took away from that experience.

As much as I talk about willingness and eagerness, there’s also understanding and knowing your place in an organization. At Citi, ideas are valued, and they don’t care where they come from. But a mistake I’ve made—and a lot of us do when we’re young—is that we think we know it all. I was in a meeting where the senior person was on a call with another senior person, and he got asked a question, and I thought I had the answer, so I jumped in and answered it. Luckily, it didn’t impact me too badly, but it didn’t look that great. I left his office and went back to mine, and then I walked back in about 10 minutes later and said, “I’m really sorry I did that, it wasn’t my place.” It was OK after that. You may think you know more than them, but they’ve gotten to that position for a reason.

Who has had the greatest influence on your career and why?

My parents. They are immigrants. I am first-generation American and so is my brother. He is currently an anesthesiology resident at the University of Maryland, and I think I am doing relatively well, too. My parents came from India in the early 1980s; they came over with nothing. My dad had a paper route and then he started a business. My mom started a job when she was pregnant with me and went to work at 4:30 or 5 in the morning, commuting 30 or more miles each way, so she could be home in time when we got off school and make us dinner. My work ethic comes from my parents.

Are you an alum who would like to be interviewed for Bostonia’s “Jump-start Your Job Search” series? Email John O’Rourke at orourkej@bu.edu.

Read other stories in our “Jump-start Your Job Search” series here.