SM HF from UMM PE Fund

I used to work in PE and now work in a HF.

1. Do any SM firms look at non-MF backgrounds for their analysts? Yes. There are a bunch of SM founders who came from PE backgrounds themselves, so they could be more open to analysts with PE backgrounds.
2. Recruiting / headhunters. I did not get my position from PE to HF via a headhunters. HHs are more inclined to show employers very relevant profiles, so HHs might be more reluctant to show your profile. That said, your profile is quite "prestigious" so its still possible. But I recommend you to search for SM funds with founders from ex-PE backgrounds and network your way in.
3. Fit.
   1. If you don't like creating IC decks, then probably yeah there is much less IC deck creating here. Personally I also hated the deal origination part of PE. But you kind of need to have a passion for markets, else you will hate this job after multiple earnings seasons. Do you do any personal investing? If you are interviewing for any public markets role, you will most likely be asked to pitch multiple long/short stock ideas. If you say you have no ideas or you don't have any companies that you are personally tracking, then that would be a big problem. The skillset in PE and HFs is quite similar, but I think you need to spend some time thinking which is a better fit for your personality.
   2. If you don't love the artificial deadlines, then you might hate this because the "deadlines" can be much shorter. E.g. you might need to quickly figure out the EPS impact when any relevant news hits the tape. You think this earnings season is over? The next earnings season is coming up next.
   3. You will only get the annual near-term compensation opportunity if your fund actually performs. If you don't have any passion for this and don't do well, you probably won't get paid. That said you could be a stock genius, I really don't know.
4. Timing / optionality. The older you get the harder it is to make a switch. It is still possible, especially if you can make yourself out to be an industry / sector expert. It just gets harder, but its not impossible. 

The top 10b+ AUM SMs probably won't give you looks (a lot of them even discriminate between top and not top MFs) but the number of those seats is so low it doesn't really matter.

Lots of regular 250m - 2b aum funds will give you looks. problem is most people feel sunk cost after doing pe and want one of the best funds that you can only get after doing 2+2 and are dissapointed when they cant get them / have to settle for a job they probably could have gotten out of banking without the pain of pe