Tips for excelling as a first year associate in PE

I've got some thoughts.

I believe that #1 and #3 are the most important ones, and #2, 4, and 5 are natural extensions of those. My biggest issue when I started (both at Bain and in LMM PE) was that I didn't know how to get tactical with those directives, so here's some tactics. I'll call out ahead of time that I have SEVERE survivor bias, but having gotten a top rating and the soft offer to come back as a VP to my fund after B school, I'm relatively confident think these are the keys to my success:

- Mind shift: I decided that I wasn't going to be an excel monkey, and instead, I was going to think critically and logically about the deals and analysis I was making, something that I didn't do that well at my previous job. I used to be content to just say "Hey I'm going to work through this and then be done" but that mindset was useless for investing because everything comes together to form one recommendation, unlike in consulting where my work could be basically disregarded/appendix work. The shift was going from "I am doing this because my Manager says to" to "I am doing this because it impacts our answer/decision" and that shift was invaluable to me. I started to add analysis here and there because I knew it made sense in context, and I knew that it was the place that my VP/Partner's minds would go because I forced myself to think like they would think. I think that's what proactivity really, truly is--not taking work off their plate but instead, empathizing and thinking through exactly what they would think through, and then doing it before they had the chance to ask. No quicker way to build trust then by reading their mind.

- Action-oriented proactivity: When I started at the fund there had been some recent departures and reading between the lines I figured that I was going to have to pick up the slack, so I pretended that I was in charge and thought through, "What would I want to see if I were a partner?" I drafted up a plan for some PortCo improvements that I saw and then told/asked the partners that I was going to work on them, as they weren't really managing me fully at that time (their plate was full on other things). The plan I made was simple, just some profitability/SKU rationalization stuff, but it was clear it would impact EBITDA in the company so I just went for it, because I knew that the work would be what partners want anyways, that being more EBITDA in less time. In other instances that were less PortCo oriented, like when they needed info on a market or something to that effect, I forced myself to not ask for help or much clarification (outside the first chat with the partners, when they asked me to do something) and then put myself in the mental place of "If I didn't have any resources outside of myself and google, how would I do this?" And then did that thing, which helped me enormously to think/feel like I could step up to the plate and do whatever was asked. It took more time up front, but it's paid off.

- Getting it done: Linked to the skill above, I gave myself the label of "100% finished man" and made sure that my analysis on my current task was 100% complete before I engaged my VP/Partners with it, so that they didn't get bogged down with formatting, missing info, etc.--even if it was clear that it was WIP, I'd get it "done" and then modifications would happen after that, which typically weren't hard to put into place. This makes the VPs happy because they have that mental space where they can say "I know that if I give my Associate Ulfric a task, he'll get it done, and I don't have to worry about doing his work for him/checking every detail" and that makes you the go-to guy for step up opportunities.

- Follow the format/make drastic working changes: I went out of my way to understand how the PE fund typically presented materials and then copied that template. For example, when a deal first comes in, we have a 1 page slide that we use to present the deal. As ex-MBB I wanted to make it longer, over-engineer, etc. but that would just feel foreign and open them up to critique, which is what I didn't want, so conformity was the path I pursued. I also made my work vey consistent so that I developed my own "brand" in my models and slides--I'd use the exact same headers, naming conventions, etc. So that I didn't have to waste time thinking about it and so that my team didn't see change. In general, changing formats/templates was something I avoided. When my VP came with comments like "Hey, we usually format things this way" or "The LBO should have these units here" I just made that my template, even if I thought it was wrong, because it's not a hill to die on.

- Executive presence: When my work is in front of the IC, I gracefully force myself in to talk about it because I know the material better than the VPs do, and when I spoke, I spoke with confidence and clarity, and answered the questions that the IC had. This meant that I had to know my slides and analysis cold going in, but that's not an issue if you're actively thinking about the deal (see skill #1). When you speak, tactically, use a low and slow voice, don't say "Um", when asked a question say "That's a good question" (because it gives you time to think) and end your sentences/thoughts with a downward voice inflection instead of upwards, so you convey confidence in your answer. If you're given the chance to start and lead a meeting, take it. If no one is speaking up to get things rolling or to go from topic to topic, you do it. I was at a lunch once with the working team of a portco and we needed to chat with them about management in an open format--no one was saying anything to kick off, so I got up, kicked it off, and chatted with the teams. Later, the partner that was there told me that that was s defining moment for how he saw my potential, as I was willing to communicate/lead without being told to do so. You may also notice from the way I write that I'm not necessarily eloquent, which is something that I'd recommend getting better at, but I don't think it's table stakes.

- Point out the obvious, then take it it one more step: This speaks to point # 4 of your skills, but it's something that bears repeating: if you see something that seems obvious, say it out loud, and then say the implications. Weak EBITDA growth? Say it out loud. RONA is 100%? Bring it up. Biggest customer's margins are 2x those of others? Tell someone. Take everything that is obvious with a quick glance and then put it in bullet points next to the pic of the financials. Once you have all of that together, it becomes super easy to do the job of the VP, that being to bring the data together into one recommendation. That "one more step", the recommendation, the "so what", the down arrow, whatever your fund calls it, is the most valuable piece of the work.

- Don't screw up the table stakes: You don't get points for doing basic things right, but you do lose points if you screw them up. Organization of files and data, Bulletproof analysis, understanding the PE process/ecosystem, quick output, etc. are all table stakes, and you have to be able to do them well, but no one gets to be a VP by just doing the job of the Associate well.

Those are the musings I have on the questions. Hopefully that's somewhat helpful. I'll call out, again, my severe survivor bias and the fact that this is not exhaustive.

Best,

KHC