William Blair Exit to BB / EB possible?

Coming in as a MBA associate from M7 school. Is it possible to go up tier to a BB / EB? Search LinkedIn and don’t see much WB alumni at any BB / EB other than Guggenheim. Anyone have experience doing that? Especially at the VP level?

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Sigh, yes it's very possible and tons have done it. The above poster mentioned it, but historically very few WB individuals left because pay and lifestyle was better. Now that it's a bit a dumpster fire, many have gone elsewhere. The thing I will note is the hiring market is not great so it's a very bad time to be trying to lateral. Firms just aren't hiring. After WB did a bunch of layoffs, there was a huge influx of mid level individuals and they landed at places ranging from Stout, Lincoln, and Truist, to morgan stanley, to Gugg. Gugg is common because many individuals at Gugg were formerly WB bankers, so there is a strong relationship there.

I'd add too, my experience has been many associates that historically have left have left because they wanted better lifestyle or PE so they went to corp dev or PE firms. Even some of the layoffs resulted in many people making this choice with some landing even at places like GTCR.

I guess my question for you would be why are you trying to leave before even starting the role? It's kinda crazy to me.

 

Sorry, I should’ve made it clear. I wrote the initial post 2am in the morning. I love the team and people I work with at Blair. I broke into IB after doing my MBA at a M7 and did IB somewhere else other than WB for. Then, I joined WB for little over 1 year now. Another 1.5-2 years out from VP. I realize PE is a long shot for me given my age and I don’t necessarily want to start as an associate after getting IB VP role. I want to stay at Blair until VP but would like to eventually move to a BB / EB with more product to offer. I realize that relationship building at WB is much tougher because you’re only selling M&A advisory which is obviously much harder to do. Ideally I would like to go to a BB, build relationships and potentially move back to a firm like WB or EB.

 
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