Advent vs H&F vs Carlyle vs EQT

Carlyle is always underrated in these threads as a place to *work* as opposed to judging the fund as a whole.

If you get an ASO role there, you're going to have tons of prestige that will get you a leg up in MBA admissions or lateral / midlevel recruiting, and it's not like you have carry that matters. You also will face very little, if any, "competition" in getting a return offer--it's yours to lose considering how tight their classes are.

If you get a VP offer there, of course the returns matter more, but you're going to be one of like...six people at your level in the whole office across verticals, regardless of NYC vs. DC? Yes, upward mobility is ass given the partners seemingly just stick on until they die and don't expand their ranks, but are you complaining about having tremendous job security for PE midlevel comp?

If you're in the DC office and being in that region matters to you, it's quite literally the only firm except *maybe* Arlington that has a platform like it in the area, which is a lot saner to raise a family in than New York or SF.

None of this is me arguing that it's the best option on the table--that's pretty clearly H&F--or that there aren't legitimate reasons for pause when thinking about their future, especially when you chart out their long-term fundraising trajectory. I don't care to issue an overweight rating on their stock and I'm not predicting their next flagship is going to be a 3x. But acting as if someone who picked Carlyle to work at either pre-MBA (especially) or post-MBA instead of volunteering to be Advent's 20th Boston midlevel under quite literally 10 partners / MDs (these are numbers straight off the website) is making an insane choice is classic WSO unhinged absolutism.