What emerges is a picture of Reffkin not unlike the trajectory of the brokerage brand he built: stumbling, yet surprisingly successful. Reffkin was a C student with big dreams Reffkin, 41, describes himself as a middling student who received C grades throughout high school and college and who was criticized at blue-chip jobs early in his career at McKinsey and Goldman Sachs for his lack of financial and analytical prowess. From a young age, however, Reffkin seemed to grasp that relationships built through relentless and persistent networking could, as much as talent and performance, grant him access to choice schools, top jobs, opportunities, and money.