Life after the Buy-side?
I currently work at a prominent investment fund (public equities) as an analyst and find myself increasingly… bored. While the pay and the lifestyle (read: hours) are great, I’ve found that the learning curve has flattened out substantially after 3 years on the job and the investment process has become a repetitive quarterly process – earnings release/call, meet with management, update models, decide if investment thesis has changed, buy/sell/hold.
I realize that leaving the buy-side is a rare occurrence, but does anyone have any experience moving on to a new career path after the buy-side? Any stories of regret related to leaving a buy-side gig?
I find myself leaning towards consulting (specifically non-profit, developmental) as a potential next position due to the ability to get heads on operational and strategic experience. As an investor you only get to approve/disapprove a company’s strategy; I’m interested in being a part of the development and implementation process. The non-profit, development slant stems from my desire to tackle business from a different perspective and in a different geography.
Other potentials interests include corporate strategy or product management at a start-up. Are any of the above-mentioned options realistic? (3-years exp, undergrad business)
Any advice or shared experiences would much appreciated.
Perhaps you should look into activist buy-side firms, like PE shops that take controlling stakes.
I'm sure I'm biased, but if you're bored in that gig then maybe public equities was never for you in the first place. My interest is only limited by the number of publicly traded companies in the world, and I don't think I'll be alive to see the day that I've covered them all. Though I guess I don't know what the research process is like at your firm, and if you're forced to cover a specific sector then I can see why you'd want to leave though.
The opportunity to tackle a different sector would make things more interesting (for a bit), although I think its the passive nature of equities that qualms with (like it -buy, hate it -sell). Some sort of activist investing, as mentioned above, might be appealing. Although I think you could be right; I may not be cut out for public equities.
While I do think I at least need to try something else to find out what truly interests me, the risk/reward of jumping ship in this economy is something I am still wrestling with.
I'll refrain from getting into any sort of attempt at arguing that every area of finance is just a "like it = buy, hate it = sell" model, and opt for something a little more constructive. My fund is an activist fund in the traditional sense, since we put people on boards and frequently make suggestions to management that we consider being the stepping stone to some new level of growth or profitability or what have you. So that could be something where I guess you feel like you have even more skin in the game and take an active part in managing or at least suggesting the management of a business. If you truly are interested in the way businesses work, then that could be a new way to "mix things up" so to speak and keep you interested.
Like you mentioned, too, it's definitely not advisable to jump ship if you have a good thing going unless you're certain you can get into a gig you're more interested in and still has some level of financial stability.
Analyst at the firm I interned at started at Lehman in 2008 then when shtf he moved to a PE firm for a year then moved back to sell-side as a 2nd year analyst, he's just made associate I believe.
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