I’m an analyst (near associate) at a LMM PE firm. My first month on the job two years ago, I built a model for an acquisition, and have been given nonstop tasks and analysis. The business is performing horribly, so our partners want to give it extra attention. I prepare board materials, attend weekly meetings, am basically the right hand man of the CEO. I desperately just want to spend some time looking at new deals.
This past week, in a particularly intense meeting, I forgot to pro-forma in an upcoming expense in an illustrative P&L. One of our partners pointed it out, snapped, and started yelling for about 5 minutes. After the meeting I went home for the day and put my computer away.
im frustrated for a few reasons:
-I’ve clearly communicated that I want to spend some time on new deals. My manager agreed with me and said they give me the hard stuff because I handle it well. He said they’ll loop me in on more deals. Hasn’t happened.
-I feel like I’m punished for doing a good job with more of the same. No analysis is ever good enough, so they add more and more requests. I don’t even have time to push NDAs across the finish line.
-They keep hiring horrible Finance leaders at the business. They keep promising “once the new finance VP starts you’ll be pulled off” then the finance person is horrible and turns over.
What would y’all do in my shoes? I love most of the people at my firm and think if the time allocation piece is fixed, it’s a great setup.
I've been in LMM PE for 10 years so honestly what you're describing isn't all that unfamiliar to me. If you're at an "operationally-focused" PE firm, you'll have to enjoy longer-term being much more focused on what's happening at your existing companies and that share of your time will always be much larger. Is this a one-off situation at your firm or would you say this is how your firm / team operates overall? Are you close to making associate? If I was in your shoes and the promotion is coming up soon, I'd just grin and bear it and start looking for lateral opportunities the minute I got it. You've been there for at least two years so once you get the associate promote, it wouldn't be unusual for you to leave. It's not a given that you'd be able to make the jump, but you might want to prioritize your search on larger firms. What you're describing is not unusual for LMM PE...even if it's not every firm, the likelihood of a culture like this is much higher (just because the experience in LMM is so much harder to predict).
I think this is fair feedback and advice thank you. I’ll continue to march forward assuming I’m not let go for leaving work at noon on Friday. Ha
While the culture at your firm sounds like it could be better (although you're saying the real problem is time allocation), I think you're thinking about this all wrong. So I'll try to cover each point. I'm curious to see if others think differently.
- This may be hard to hear but I think it's important to remember that even though you're at a LMM firm, as an analyst, you're still at the bottom of the ladder. Which means you are essentially handling tasks and doing analysis that others don't want to do or don't have time to handle (and that are typically not simple).
- So, in their mind, your firm is simply allocating resources as best as possible. Associates are likely more experienced and well equipped to run a new deal process than an analyst. In this current environment, there is a lot fo dry power chasing a small number of really attractive assets, so it's only getting harder and harder for LMM firms to be competitive and put capital to work without paying an absurd price. Meaning there may not be a lot of competitive opportunities for them to staff you on that would be a good use of your time.
- And it's definitely pretty out of hand for any adult to make a scene like that but a mistake is a mistake. It happens but that likely makes it harder to trust you to manage a process from end to end without making mistakes. That's just how people think.
- Finally, I don't think it's entirely fair to bash your firm for hiring struggles. Finding the right talent is much harder than you think right now. As someone that's helped with numerous interviews trying to hire for these roles, there is so little talent for the number of available positions right now at PE-backed portcos and companies in general.
So, no, I don't think you're soft but think you need to adjust your expectations. LMM is a mixed bag and you're not really in a position of leverage to be demanding certain tasks. They could just as easily go hire another PE analyst with all of the IBers trying to place right now.
Resetting expectation is fair advice, but at what point do I become pigeon holed for only having worked on 1-2 semi serious deals?
id also be more inclined to enjoy working on a portco that isn’t losing millions of dollars, causing extremely high tension and pressure. That’s part of why I question whether I’m just too soft haha
Everyone wants to be that person staffed on the "home run" that Partners will talk about their entire career. It's just statistically impossible that everyone will be. And if you were to leave, the numbers of deals completed won't be held against you so early in your career.
The only advice I can really give is to move to another PE firm that you believe you could get more active deal experience at. This is private equity. You find quality assets, deploy capital and then attempt to manage them to a successful exit. You may not enjoy what you're doing but its part of the lifecycle of working in PE. You might honestly just be too soft.
Yi
yes, you are soft
no need to read background context, the mere fact that you're asking it is enough to conclude it
Word
I've been in a position staffed on underperformers sucking up nearly all of my bandwidth. The good news is that you will learn an absolute ton about how a business actually runs through this experience, which is probably the best education possible. The downside of course is that you are getting less deal reps so you may lag your peers in terms of execution experience.
While no one may explicitly say this, you must jockey for deals within your organization. Stay close to the folks originating the new deals, and try to involve yourself in ones that you feel have a higher probability of moving through the pipeline. For example, it sounds like people are sending you NDAs to process, so be sure to process them, and once you get the materials review them and provide your thoughts to the deal lead.
The only way to push through your dynamic unfortunately may be to increase your bandwidth by simply increasing your hours to so that you can be staffed on a new opportunity while continuing to carry the load on the PortCo. Whether or not you are willing to do this will answer the question of whether or not you are "soft". It is up to you. Good luck.
This is the best answer. I’m in agreement. Thank you.
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