Exiting FoF

Hi all,

Would appreciate some thoughts from people who have seen this career path before.

For context, I’m 25 and have been working at a boutique fund of hedge funds / allocator since graduation. Firm is around $10bn AUM. I graduated from a mid-tier school in France, so I did not have a ton of great options (in the US) straight out of college and ended up taking this seat.

At first, I wanted to stay away from fundraising / IR-type roles. I viewed them as riskier and maybe worse from a long-term comp perspective. But after almost three years in an allocator seat, I’m starting to feel the vulnerability of the role more. It is hard to clearly define the tangible skills I’ve built, and I worry that this could get worse the longer I stay. In this type of role, the ideal path would be to either make it to CIO after 20 years to move to a top-tier endowment, SWF, or larger allocator, but realistically those seats are limited and I don’t think I can base my whole career plan on that.

The roles that seem more receptive to my profile product analyst, product specialist, or investment specialist roles at larger asset managers / alternative investment firms.

My questions are:

• Would moving into one of these roles at a larger firm be a good move from a career-risk and earnings-potential standpoint?
• Can product / investment specialist roles be a real stepping stone into PE placement, capital formation, or IR at a larger private markets firm?
• Are these roles generally good long-term seats, or do they cap out unless you become a true fundraiser?
• Am I overthinking the risk of staying in a FoHF seat, or is it fair to worry about the long-term optionality?
• If the goal is not passion, but finding the most reliable path to solid comp and career stability, which route would you pick?

I don’t have a strong passion for either asset allocation or fundraising. I think I could do both reasonably well. I speak French and Saudi Arabic, which could hypothetically give me an edge in fundraising (maybe not). I’m mainly trying to be practical and figure out which path gives me the best odds of strong earnings and long-term relevance.

Would appreciate any honest views!!!