How to recruit for buyside roles from a firm that looks down on recruiting?
Anyone have tips / tricks to recruit for PE roles from a small group where it becomes painfully obvious when you are not in the office and senior mgmt. is against non-lifers?
Have an irrational fear of getting caught in a coffee chat with a head hunter by co-worker or worse, a senior partner
Do excuses like dentist appointments and annual check-ups or weddings work or will others be able to see through that? Assume even senior guys who are out of the loop on recruiting will have some idea of when on-cycle happens...?
gotta be sneaky sneaky sneaky
I was in this situation, albeit in a non-major city at a MM firm. These tips may or may not be relevant to you, and I am happy to answer via PM if more helpful.
That’s good advice. I was in a similar situation recently and was able to recruit so can also add a few points:
Overcommunicate to headhunters that your team is anti-recruiting. They will almost always let you do your meeting with them over the phone so no sense wasting one of your “dentist appointments” meeting with them. Banks and funds are also generally understanding and will work with you and be flexible, I’ve had a fund that offered to do weekend interviews for this exact reason though I wouldn’t ask for this unless offered.
Take a Friday off if possible and schedule a series of first rounds / super days / etc on that day. If you’re smart with the timing then that is useful since you only have so much political capital as stated above.
Walk to Duane Reede or CVS and buy a bottle of vitamins or something while you’re taking recruiter calls during the day. Easy way to get 15-30 min off the desk and nobody ever asks about medicine/pharmacy stuff like that.
If you’re taking a sick day and know ahead of time, pretend to be a little sick in the office the day before and make a couple off hand remarks about it. Slump in your chair and look a little disheveled. Text your boss at 3 or 4 am to really sell it.
You probably won’t run in to anybody on the subway, but it will give you a lot of mental sanity to just take cars to and from your interviews so that you aren’t worried about running into your team the whole time.
Interviews are still happening now despite COVID and are 100% phone/virtual. Reach out to all of the headhunters you know and network aggressively if you’re ready for a move now.
Misc excuses I’ve used: dentist appt (you get 2 per year), physical with doctor (1-2 per year), general doctor appt/checkup, physical therapy (make up minor injury like ankle roll or elbow pain), fridge getting delivered, A/C being fixed, friend visiting (excuse to leave early to “let them in your apt”), traveling for the weekend (excuse to take Friday/Monday off)
Overall, people probably can figure out what you’re up to but won’t care enough to pester you about it as long as you’re getting your work done. Moving is so common in this industry that people generally don’t care too much, even on teams that are anti-recruiting.
Yep, agree with all of this. Hope it worked out for you! I was so relieved to be done with it. I can add one more tip which I previously forgot.
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