With nervous, but mostly eager, anticipation I walked up to the C-suite floor to meet with a senior manager at Merrill Lynch. When I’d initially met him two years earlier, he’d seemed quite supportive of my career as a sell-side analyst. And now that I was Institutional Investor double-ranked, I decided to reach out to him, and confide in him my long-term dream of moving into senior management. I hoped he would offer to sponsor me on my five-to-ten year quest.