I am close to graduating from college, my goal is to land a job in a hedge fund. Im aware that chances are that won't happen straight out of college. What career path should I take in order to be able to have the right exit opportunity to land a hedge fund job in the next 1 to 2 years after graduating? Thank you
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Wouldn't really take into consideration the sector aspect of sell-side versus buy-side as a starting point for a career - you can equally, if not to a greater extent, become a sector specialist on the buy-side if you wish.
So, in a nutshell, you have two things at play: stuff that will get you the interview and stuff that will get you employed. To get the interview it's a bit like banking - you need a good school, branding in terms of work experience etc. It's more intangible once you're already speaking with them.
(I am a VP at a large HF and do tons of interviewing)
I would always say better to be in an investor/analyst seat at a fund than sellside ER. Rightly or wrongly, people who don't take direct risks are always looked at as a bit incomplete in their education. I tend to agree with this thinking, and there is also a reason why buyside guys tend to ignore the opinion of the majority of sellside analysts and use them just for information gathering.
Knowing the name does play a role as it gives credibility, but beyond that its not a case of larger AUM is better. Once you are in the interview room, every interviewer has the mentality that they need to check what is under the hood thoroughly. You don't ever really assume that just because this guy worked at XYZ that he is a certain level. Most likely? Yes, but there are enough that slip through in the data set, and its quite crucial to get each hire right that you have to make your own judgement. HFs arent hiring grad classes of 20+ where a bad hire can hide.
(I realize point 2 sort of contradicts point 1, but thats the power of mental bias sometimes, when I see "equity research" I immediately think "not a risk taker")
There will be very differing views from place to place. You're definitely right that long-only shops (especially the big ones) place more weight on the CFA qualification versus most hedge funds, however it's not like HF guys are ignorant of the benefits of having gone through the CFA material. I fall into the camp of people who believe that it's definitely useful for a broader / better understanding of it all, however the return on time invested is another matter. Learning by doing normally still trumps any qualification as long as you're not just going through the motions, but actually learning whilst doing. Which is probably why any relevant experience will always be better than just reading / taking exams. It's nice and all, but it doesn't really teach you accounting in the real world, it doesn't really teach you valuation in the real world - when you actually get down to it, you notice there are way more complications that the CFA can cover and you still have to learn it on the fly by looking it up online / speaking with colleagues etc.