Activist Funds | Recruitment Experience

you're sitting at intersection of event-driven and deep fundamental strats here. need to know your companies / stories / corporate actions + pro formas / event paths. varies by firm what sub-areas / industries / caps you're focused on. clear emphasis on ID'ing thesis that market won't price absent your involvement and figuring out if/how you can bring that about. then, ofc, there's execution / going through process and people components

elliott, trian, svu, all skew fairly junior with recruiting (ditto for sachem head, etc). basically 1-6 years out of UG typically via IB/PE (maybe HWS for elliott). truth is most of these orgs are pretty lean (except elliott lol). processes will test elements of L/S and special sits / event-driven

comp-wise, you get paid well but not incredibly by HF standards. these are more "one team / one dream" models, which **can** work nicely but realistically you aren't getting the explosive upside unless you're a partner (ie comp discretionary and senior guys rarely err on side of over-paying when they can make a reasonable argument that they built the mousetrap so should keep more of the cheese) >> prob a smoother distribution of outcomes vs C/M/P... but most HF people aren't playing for smooth distribution of returns. 

i think many of these orgs are actually more similar to PE than HF stereotypes from a career pov. still very fascinating work. but time-/labor-intensive vs. L/S, etc. Distressed / opportunistic credit strats have high degree of overlap as well if i were mapping strategies (many similar personalities as well). 

bringing it full circle with the distress bucket, these are often more cyclical opportunity sets -- there are times in the biz or market cycle where these can work really well and times when there's just not enough to do. 

would not call this a growth area by any measure. but can be a fun one.