Hey Guys,I am sure a query related to this has been addressed on this forum many a times, however I thought I will seek your opinion on my situation which might be little different given my background and aspirations. Apologies if its a long read.I am a couputer science graduate and have studied engineering and discreet maths for at least 2.5 years of my 4 year degree. I also went on to do my MSc in software engineering soon after that. Here I did not do much of math but more of computer algorithms and data structures etc.I have been out of uni for more than 8 years now and have been in full time employment for this period. The job has all been about operating system development for a leading smartphone manufacturer and heavily focussed on programming, especially using C++ and OO concepts.I have been planning to do a degree in financial mathematics for some time now and have recently applied to warwick for their full time FM course. I know I have not really used any serious maths in my professional career but I am confident that given decent background in maths and coupled with some pre-studies, I should be able to catch up.Now here are my concerns. Clearly, given my profile above, I am an 'outsider'. However my aspirations are not to be a quant, at least not immediately after I finish the MSc. I am fully aware that it takes years of research and ideally a PhD to be successful as a quant. I know that MSc does not necessarily lead to a lucrative quant career, let alone for someone like me who does not even have a finance/banking background.What I will be seeking after a good maths education, combined with my solid C++ development experience, is a front office role with responsibilities that lies somewhere in between that of a desk quant and an quant developer, Where to start with, I get to apply some of the academic learnings but at the same time be quite hand on. However, I would be eager to know what could realistically be my career options with a degree in financial maths.Do you think will it be a bridge too far for me? Or should I first switch to a back office IT job in a bank before thinking about doing this MSc. If I manage to get into Warwick, the least I am hoping that it will equip me with quality education and a well regarded degree which will give me a platform to have a career in FO sometime in the future.I will be glad to know your honest opinions, suggestions, feedbacks.Regards,mandhan

The first thing to say is that there are probably 50,000 programmers / IT people out there in the world who feel bored or underpaid in their current role and are thinking of trying to get into the quant world - presumably because they think it will be more interesting or better paid.With that in mind and bearing in mind that universities just in Britain and the US are probably turning out 5000 new graduates per year with Master's in FM/FE/MathFin, etc (even 5000 might be an underestimate plus many more in Europe, Australia, Canada, etc plus CQF), my advice (for what it is worth): Warwick is an excellent Uni (although without the cache of Oxford/Cambridge or the top US schools) - you could do worse. Do an MSc in FM if you think it is what you really want to do.Don't look for a job in the back-office at a bank - it is likely to be more tedious and less well-paid than anything you are doing now.IT programming skills are more and more important if you want to work as a front-office quant so, if you are really good at C++, it could help you stand out at job interviews after your Master's is finished.If you want a really juicy role in front-office, you do almost certainly these days need a PhD (actually, it is so competitive now you almost need a PhD plus a good internship + a couple of published papers in relevant areas) but you should take it one step at a time. The bottom line is: Do a Masters if you really want to do one but there are so many people around with an Msc in FM/FE that it really is hard to stand out in the jobs market.