Hi all,
I was hoping anyone could provide more detail on BDT & MSD regarding the firm, comp, wlb, perks, exits, etc., especially after the merger. Would you take over other UMM or even MF PE? I know they just raised $14bn for their flagship fund, and it seems like a really cool shop, but would like more info for my research, and I can't seem to find a lot online or even on this forum
Thanks!
| +88 | Nothing to do at work & bored to hell | 10 | 1h |
| +67 | Do people over-index on 'moats' | 22 | 2d |
| +54 | Predicted Net Worth in Trodden Finance Path by 60? | 20 | 2d |
| +44 | Biggest (avoidable) failures in PE Investments? | 25 | 2d |
| +25 | What do you think of PE Value Creation Careers in 2026? | 7 | 1d |
| +19 | LT Career Path after MF PE Associate Program? | 5 | 1d |
| +17 | Is the lifestyle really better? | 14 | 36m |
| +12 | Reference checks after final round | 1 | 1h |
| +12 | NY LMM PE Recruiting | 3 | 3d |
| +12 | Those who left PE for Corporate, why? | 5 | 1h |
Career Resources
Get instant access to lessons taught by experienced private equity pros and bulge bracket investment bankers including financial statement modeling, DCF, M&A, LBO, Comps and Excel Modeling.
Good spot; overrated on this site
Would you take over top eb/bb?
Seems like analysts manage to recruit fine but based on the low deal flow, I’d be worried about falling behind peers who went down the traditional IB path. So I’d probably go BB/EB
Bump - any additional color would be very appreciated
Bump for associates.
Following
Bump. Any current employees willing to share/provide insights?
Talked to a credit MD recently and apparently both sides still are in different offices in NYC
Know a couple people from undergrad who work there and based on their experience, I don’t think I’d work there over any UMM/MF PE firm.
For starters, it’s not really a good comp to other PE firms. BDTMSD is a merchant bank (not a PE firm) and junior folks mainly do advisory rather than investing. Not an issue if your goal is to banking with some investing sprinkled in. If your goal is to do investing, I can’t imagine the experience and deal reps are going to be better than joining a similarly sized PE firm. The work life is probably better but that comes as a result of not being on a ton of live deals, which is the only way you learn as an associate.
The few times I’ve gotten dinner with my friends, it’s a bit jarring how few deal reps they have compared to the people who joined traditional funds (some have literally only been staffed on advisory projects like sellsides and no live deals).
Another point to add is that the perks are below market compared to other UMM/MF PE firms. The main perks seem to be standard late night dinner/Uber, subsidized gym, and a $5k vacation stipend at 5 year anniversary. Pretty underwhelming (except the last one but realistically something more for VP+ since associates probably leave earlier) especially when you consider firms that offer catered breakfast/lunch in office, first class on all trips, and robust social budget for associates.
IMO, the most unusual non-perk is the lack of offsites. Of all my friends/acquaintances at various shops, every single firm has at least one if not several offsites at incredible 5 star resorts with the exception of BDTMSD. As an example, my firm flies everyone out to the annual LP meeting, firm wide offsite (including back office) at places like Palm Beach/Scottsdale, and then the investment team has two offsites (went to Aspen during winter and Hawaii for spring). Granted our firm may have more offsites than other shops but some other firms put on more luxurious ones like I heard Apax flew their entire team private to Mykonos.
At the end of the day, don’t think anyone should necessarily solve for a shop based on perks alone but it does raise a lot of questions when a shop offers materially below market. Especially the offsite because those are things to look forward to, bond with your associate class, and I’ve found a good way to connect with VPs and above bc everyone is a bit more relaxed
Who cares about perks when comp is “top of street” and culture is already so good lol (assuming these are both even true). Rather have 20k extra than a 5k perk at that point
Even though they’ve technically merged, they are still largely separate shops. BDT is more of a merchant banking experience and the junior team has a more investment banking like experience. They were also the side of the firm with an analyst program before the merger.
The MSD side of the shop does some amazing deals, but because they were really lean before the merger (and still are after), and because they don’t have a formal analyst program, the experience on that side of the firm is less reflected in forums and in peer conversations.
BDT is an awesome merchant bank and MSD is a unique and differentiated investor. They haven’t merged fully so hard to assess the firm as a whole since they’re still so separate. Top of street comp and pathways to the top before it becomes saturated means it’s an attractive spot in my eyes if you can get the right seat at the firm.
Don't know anything about them, but reg filings show the MSD side of the house as managing $16.3B, with 62 IPs. Wouldn't exactly call that lean.
They manage a multiple of that once you factor in family office assets.
Not too close to the MSD side of the house but worked across BDT. Think the decision really comes down to preference. If you like the model, cant think of a better place to stick around for the LT. Phenomenal culture with really sharp folks. Personally know many that have chosen them over MF PE and none of them seem to have regretted doing so.
BDT doesn’t recruit at the same time as MF PE though?
They used to before this year
Current employee here (joined as an analyst out of college). Unless you like the unique model at BDT, I wouldn’t recommend joining the firm for both seniors deciding between banks and for analysts thinking about different PE shops. I know there’s a lot of positive sentiment about the firm especially on here, but I think a lot of that is because there’s not a ton of info about the firm and things are very different now vs. 4-5 years ago. Also, the single fact that the firm actively encourages even analysts to take their full allotment of PTO makes it so that you can really tolerate a lot. But eventually, the combo of all the various issues piles up and it’s led to significant numbers of people leaving/actively looking to leave recently.
The single biggest issue for analysts/associates is the firm’s model. When you recruit, they tell you its 50/50 advisory/investing model and the advisory part of that is mainly buyside M&A and no sellsides. The reality is as an analyst, the work is almost exclusive advisory (lately there’s been a ton of sellsides) and maybe if you stick around as an associate, the total split over the 4 years is 80% advisory / 20% investing. Also the advisory work is…bizarre. I’ve had projects where I had to interview various family members of a family owned business to help them resolve succession disputes and almost play a therapist type role. There are even situations where you’re advising both the sale while participating as a buyer. I’ve never gotten a good answer on how that isn’t a conflict of interest. Even the investing is not traditional because the firm will only invest in family owned businesses and almost exclusively via structured securities. So you can imagine the universe of potential investment opportunities is significantly smaller than any firm out there and with the sheer size of the analysts/associate pool (40+), there aren’t enough investing reps to go around (the firm doesn’t really take CIMs so you don’t even get the quick kill rep). Even on the portco side, they generally only allow VPs and above to attend the board meetings, associates/analysts aren’t even allowed to join by Zoom. At best, some VPs recognize how absurd this is and will call you on their cell to let you listen to the Zoom board meeting. The lack of reps doesn’t impact analysts as much (evidenced by the good placement at various MF shops), but I have to think it could hurt associates especially the ones who are looking to lateral or join shops as a VP after MBA if you’ve only 1 investment rep total in their 2 years as an associate compared to someone at TB/Vista that has seen 20+ deals. For a lot of analysts/associates, there’s a legit fear of not learning enough compared to peers at banks and traditional shops. You do see a big difference when you get staffed with a VP/P who used to work at a UMM/MF shop before vs. homegrown.
The other big issue is related to the merger is the extent of cost cutting measures. I get that the economy is not amazing, but I don’t see any other firm going to the extreme lengths that BDT has especially since they just raised a $14bn fund. People often get questioned if they expense too many late night meals (even going to the step of checking people’s badge swipes to confirm that they were in the office late), analysts/associates no longer have EAs, reduced the level of luxury on travel, cut the social budget almost entirely (associates/analysts used to do a monthly happy hours), and even tried to cut the number of BamSEC licenses. Not a joke, they cut off some people’s access and they only got it back after extensive complaining. As one of the posts mentioned, we don’t have any offsites where the whole firm flies to a resort.
Less relevant as an associate/analyst, but firm investment performance isn’t great. There’s an open secret that the firm doesn’t make great investments (firm allows 2nd year associates to coinvest in the fund and advice all the VPs give is to put in as little as possible and instead put more money in the credit funds) because the diligence isn’t very robust on company quality. Instead the firm relies on investing through structured securities to protect the downside, which is great in theory but not great if the company’s performance absolutely craters on industry factors that should be caught through diligence. I’ve heard of investments where the IC didn’t even discuss the commercial/industry diligence and only focused on the type of security that was being contemplated. You might ask how this squares with the fact that the firm is able to raise bigger and bigger funds. I honestly don’t know the answer, but I think it may be due to the fact that the investor base isn’t the traditional pension funds and instead it’s mostly wealthy individuals.
Also less relevant for juniors is some of the politics/leadership dynamics. Never occurred to me how weird this is, but most of the partners have very little investing experience outside of the firm. You can look up press releases about some of the recent deals and you’ll find the lead partner’s experience is client coverage at a bank or advising family offices. Among partners that have some investing experience, they often end up leaving (there was a blackstone partner who joined BDT and left within a year). The back office teams have a ton of power and have a say over investment team promotions and if people are allowed to switch offices. The back office mid levels and above all get carry (yes, even HR, recruiting, and IT VPs all get carry). Last point is that there’s a bit of a cult-like/kiss the ring aspect to the founder. Maybe this is true at other firms, but the founder has a crazy degree of control. Even partners don’t seem to have much autonomy to even submit LOIs without his blessing and some leaders have been able to reduce promotion times by basically getting in front of him as much as possible.
Anon to be safe here even though I usually post publicly. My firm is an LP in BDT and none of this surprises me. Commitments to the BDT funds were made before I joined but every fund is below median (some by a lot). You're right there's a lot of family office support and the only reason why I think they've been able to raise so much, otherwise I would never put my own $ in.
what are the returns like?
Can you share some examples of the structured investments. Is it designed this way to avoid downside or is it because the needs of family businesses are easier to meet with some structuring?
Mix of both (from the firm’s perspective). They mainly use pref with penny warrants. Reducing downside risk makes sense, but don’t really buy structure is what family businesses want and it’s more a reflection of company quality which may be why the firm’s investment performance has suffered. High quality companies tend to not take pref with warrants and it’s usually distressed or struggling companies with no other option. Very few of BDT’s portfolio are category killers in their respective industry. There are some genuine head scratchers like majority buyouts where it’s 50/50 common/pref with warrants so you simultaneously cap the upside without fully protecting the downside and get all the downside of mezz debt with none of the benefits. Future of the firm is a serious question. If firms like Carlyle are struggling to raise money, BDT is probably in trouble if it’s returning high single digits
Hows the analyst training program? Noticed a lot of people chose over BB
Can I PM?
I’d say pay is amongst top of streets.
Sent from the top of the RIF list.
Know Gregg well. As stated, it's a very different business model than a typical pe firm. It's not really appropriate to compare to a typical investing approach (e.g. families don't have to return money to investors).
What’s analyst recruiting process like? How do you prep for it?
Would you take over other traditional UMMs (i.e GTCR / MDP)?
Imo you can’t really go wrong either way. Looks like people tend to stick around at BDT far longer than other UMM/MF which is definitely a good sign. Hard to get much clarity on specifics given limited info unless you have friends at the shop
Given merger and fundraising growth, could this be a rocket ship firm where, if you join now, you could potentially outearn peers in UMM/MF PE? Obviously, it is riskier, but given your relationship with Gregg, do you have any insights/thoughts about the upside case here?
Pussy galore Do you have any insights into the firm not reflected so far? What are your thoughts on the firm, and can you endorse joining? Is it as damaging as the responses are trending so far?
I work with him now and the guy he just hired Richard Rivero used to be one of my mentors at GS. I don't work at the firm however so I can't comment on the place, but he is one of the most impressive people in finance so that says a lot to me about where the firm is going and the type of people they are looking to attract
Anyone know general comp figures?
Curious as well. Is it actually “top of street” meaning around $375-$400k for Aso 1? What is analyst pay? Higher than EB?
I believe associate base is $225. Not sure on all in but believe it’s in the high 3s/low 4s
Is this real
is this for ASO1 or more seasoned associate?
Yes but not for AS1
Heard through the grapevine that the BDT side is an absolute peasant-filled mess, the MSD side has remained relatively exclusive and more of a traditional ivory tower, would definitely consider joining the MSD side, would not touch the BDT side with a 10 foot pole.
i know this firm intimately from both a senior and junior perspective, pre- and post- merger, and this is the most accurate statement i’ve seen so far.
BDTMSD is a great place to work!
Heard comp is top of street... like well above cvp
This is not accurate lol
Comp is above market and hours are below market
all depends on your group/group head. high variability
Anyone know what teams they have in LA?
Comp and culture aren’t as great as this forum thinks. Comp is fine especially given the hours, but nowhere near top of the market. ASO1 base is $180k but bonus is not 100% of base like other shops and TC is closer to $260k run-rated for ASO1 (seriously stub is $40k). Bonuses are very opaque to the point where you won’t get told what your target bonus is and more volatile than other shops supposedly because bonus pool is based on advisory revenue not management fees. Keep in mind bonuses get paid year end, so if you leave in the summer after finishing your analyst program to join a different shop, you won’t get a bonus unlike normal banking. Also ASO2 are required to coinvest in the fund and you’ll most likely have to use leverage since the commitment is $100-200k. Fund life is way longer than normal funds, so your money ends up being tied up for a while.
Culture is fine in some areas and not good in others so make sure you do diligence before you join and be ready to play hardball to get what you need. Take office location: recruiting will tell you that all analysts are required to start in Chicago with no exception and you can transfer to NY later with good performance. But some analysts will get to start in NY from the start because they negotiated before signing. Once you do try to move to NY, you rarely get a straight answer about the timeline or process. Recently, they have started to let people move to NY given all the churn. But regardless, if being in NY is important, make sure to insist on that before signing or walk away. The other issue on culture is the work. Can’t emphasize enough that there is very little investment work and it’s all advisory despite what recruiting tells you. Compounding the problem is if you’re good, you’re expected to shoulder a really big load to carry weaker people on teams. You can probably guess but certain associates aren’t expected to do any work on teams. Churn has been really high lately. Last analyst class entirely left the firm and the trend is likely to continue. It doesn’t make sense to stay to make VP when your comp is heavily tilted towards carry and the fund investment performance is so poor. The numbers the LP person posted above are accurate and will probably go down further
Have a hard time believing $260K TC as ASO1. There is no way they would be able to pull the quality of Associates (good school + BB/EB) they do with that number... LMM/MM PE shops pay more than that. Multiple older threads confirm BDT (before the merger) was ~350 TC as ASO1
I think the confusion comes because the firm has a complicated pay schedule. Bonuses are paid year end, but base salary is reset in the summer.
Take the ASO class from 2023. Started in June/July to Dec 2023: 180 base + 40 stub is how you get to the 260 run rate. Then from Jan-Aug 2024, you get your base of 180 and you become ASO2 in Aug 2024, so from Aug-Dec 2024 you’ll get a base of 225 and bonus in Dec. The 350 number people quote is not really ASO1 comp and instead your TC in 2024 which is a mix of ASO1 and ASO2.
Comp is very opaque and most people assume it’s good because of the high base but recruiting team never outlines what bonus looks like or explains comp clearly. You do wonder if the comp structure is complicated on purpose to make it really difficult to compare what you get versus other places. Also with the merger, they are trying to change comp so it’s closer to 50-50 on base-bonus so I’d imagine there will be even more variability than before on bonus payout
Great response - thank you
What’re the hours like would you say for associates?
Could you comment on WLB?
reAlly helpful post. Can you clarify what you mean by "you can probably guess but certain associates aren't expected to do any work on teams"?
If you’re playing golf professionally, you’re not expected to do any real work on project teams
On average, hours are better than banking and probably most PE shops but it comes at the cost of very little deal experience and learning. Hours are bad and on par with banking if you’re staffed on a struggling portco or staffed on a team with minimal resources. Staffing model leaves a lot to be desired. Given how few deals the firm sees, expect staffing to be all advisory but you won’t get much leverage as an associate that you would in banking. Some sellside projects have been staffed where there are two associates and no analysts so you end up doing all the grunt work that analysts should be doing. Meanwhile if you stayed in your banking seat and made A2A, you would get a solid team of analysts to help out on all your projects. If you do get analysts and they aren’t great, associate is expected to pick up the slack because you won’t be allowed to re-staff with better analysts. It’s maddening and you can imagine how you can get burnt out, which has happened to a number of people who quit
BDT side is a mess. A lot has already been covered above so I won't re-state, but I would add that the analyst program is pretty deceiving. As some already mentioned, recruiting promotes it as a sexy mix of advisory and investing experience, but it's largely advisory and you neither get the industry / investing exposure as you would in a solid UMM/MF analyst program, nor the network / optionality as you would in a top banking analyst program. You get pigeonholed with a niche skillset unique to the firm's model. There's a reason why attrition rate in the last few BDT analyst classes have been so high - anecdotally exits from these classes have been solid, but these exits speak far more to their individual capabilities than the opportunities that being an analyst there gives you. Internal transfers to NY are a lot harder than they make it sound during recruiting, and b-school placements (for those interested) aren't great. Overall unless you are for whatever reason set on working in Chicago, I would not take them over any decent BB/EB or UMM/MF analyst program. I feel bad for the kids who uprooted their lives and moved to Chicago for the fantasy they were told while recruiting. I'm glad folks are catching on and hopefully this whole thread brings some more light to the whole situation.
P.S. I'm a different person to the associate in PE above (this is my first comment)
What’re your thoughts on the associate program? Would imagine a lot of the same cons carry over but curious from the perspective of getting a more laid-back but decent experience coming out of the classic 2 and out of IB
My 2c: associate program is even worse than joining as analyst. As the person above mentioned, analysts can easily exit to a normal PE shop after 2 years but it becomes much harder to recruit laterally as an associate especially if you started at the firm as an analyst. Candidly, lateral interviews at UMM/MF PE shops are challenging because BDT doesn't train you to think about investing in the same way as other firms. From friends at other shops, they do a lot of work to identify interesting industries, dive deeper to find sub niches, create an investment thesis, look at dozens of companies within a space, refine thesis from diligencing these companies, and ultimately finding the right asset to buy. BDT does none of this and instead the investing philosophy is to buy assets that are large and family/founder owned. You also work exclusively on structured security deals so the modeling isn't fully transferrable because most UMM/MF shops invest via common equity and their models are more focused on operational drivers. A friend of mine at an UMM shop showed me her deal model that she had to build in a day and I can confidently say most BDT associates would struggle badly to build that kind of model quickly and accurately. Not because of intelligence but the lack of reps. Tell me, how can you stand out to an UMM/MF firm compared to your peers at Blackstone/KKR who know their industries cold, can talk about dozens of companies they diligenced (even if they didn't close any), and can take over the modeling workstream seamlessly.
It might be slightly better/chill than staying in banking or joining a sweatshop, but you won't get decent experience here that is transferrable. You should also consider the value of the brand and future. Firm's track record is terrible (investment performance is worse than SP500) so next fund is probably smaller, which means they won't need the current headcount to invest it.
Firm was founded and led by a bunch of bankers with no investing experience. No surprise the returns lagged and the training isn’t great.
People say analyst exits are good, but can you provide any more info? Will you have a shot anywhere? Are exits consistently UMM/MF? If so, are there any specific pipelines?
Very helpful. Do you have any insight into the MSD side?
i’m from the msd side so i’m clearly biased, but if i was a new hire/younger professional, i would stay away from the bdt side or group heads/functions who are legacy to the bdt side. the msd operation was basically a multi-strat hedge fund/private investment fund that posed to the outside world as a family office.
comp on the msd side was variable according to group, but the mid- to high- end was at the very top of HF standards.
Agree fully with all the comments so far. I'll add a few more things that aren't apparent before you join like the firm makes it challenging to leave. Bonuses are paid in December so you'll leave a lot of money on the table by leaving in the summer, which is typically when analysts leave to join PE. Non-competes are 3 months long for analysts and associates, which probably hurts associates looking to lateral because all the roles that are looking ASAP are out.
Also even if you want to join BDT to be in Chicago, the office environment is very dead compared to NY. They let almost all the 2nd years transfer to NY - probably to stop them leaving if they had to stay in Chicago. It's a 3 day in office policy, but in practice people show up on Mondays and often wfh rest of the week. Chicago used to have catered meals for breakfast and lunch, but that stopped during COVID and hasn't resumed. Chicago has a gym in the office with a trainer, which sounds nice in theory but the trainer's hours are during the work day so it's not practical to utilize it. On the other hand, NY office gets a gym subsidy for Equinox. Another NY vs Chicago difference is the summer picnic. One of the few "perks" is the summer picnic. Half the firm goes to NY picnic at Gregg's house and half goes to Chicago picnic at Byron's house. Last summer the NY picnic had steak, lobster rolls, and everyone got a nice swag bag. The Chicago one had burgers, hot dogs and no swag bag. I only share this to illustrate that the firm's experience isn't the same in every office and clearly NY office puts on more effort to try to create a decent culture.
..
It’s a stretch to say most firms hiring lateral associates will cover unpaid bonus. The norm is PE firms will pay you a bonus in the summer when you finish your 2 years and leave. The only exception I’ve heard of is a firm insisted that my friend start earlier than the summer because they were short on staff and they paid the bonus to make sure my friend quit the firm to join early. Maybe other firms are lenient about enforcing non competes, but that’s definitely not true at BDT if you leave to join another PE firm.
Former employee here. What other former employees have said here about BDT are 100% accurate. People - do yourselves a favor by listening to former employees who actually worked at the company, not those who read about the amazing fundraises on the news or spoke with them through recruiting processes. They have a recruiting team that's amazing at sales - be extremely wary and question what they say.
In light of recent comments on this thread, would like to reiterate my stance above that the BDT side is full of idiotic peons and the MSD side remains a relatively selective/exclusive/well-run ivory tower.
Why's BDT manage so much more assets than MSD?
To answer some of the questions about the MSD side. After the merger, the MSD side is just credit, real estate, and growth equity. They had a PE buyout team, but it was small and didn't have a dedicated fund and they ended up getting folded into the BDT merchant banking team. I do feel for them because they are now forced to do advisory work. Also their NY office is one of the least nice offices I've seen and even principals have to share offices.
The credit team is legit and have their own dedicated funds raised from outside money. The head of credit actually sits on the BDT IC, which I didn't realize until recently was unusual - no other alternative asset manager does this and only the very senior people sit across multiple ICs. I've heard the difference with MSD credit compared to other PC is they are very conservative so you may not get as expansive an experience as other shops. Similarly, the RE team is narrowly focused on a small subset of the market so your experience may be limited.
GE team is meh. They don't have a dedicated fund and not taken very seriously as a lead investor. Friends at startups say they are more of a co-investor where if you'd only go to them if you secured a lead investor and are closing out the last few remaining dollars.
When will the merger be complete internally, so to speak? Will the BDT and MSD sides come together? Or will they always operate as separate entities under the umbrella firm? Are there tensions between both sides?
Is it possible to jump from one side to the other? Say BDT to MSD.
How are exits from the MSD side? Better than BDT? Given their strategies, can you even exit to traditional UMM/MF PE if on the MSD side?
MSD is much better than BDT, look at recent threads on how BDT's structure pigeonholes you and you get no real reps/exposure, exits are subpar as well. MSD's strategies are highly respected and legit, definitely a couple tiers above BDT. I think the merger diluted MSD's brand name/prestige somewhat, but you can definitely leverage a MSD credit/RE (GE team is a joke) stint to UMM/MF credit/RE
The merger is complete, but people still sometimes call the merchant banking team 'BDT team' because there was no overlap between the two firms on strategy. The NY team is split between the old MSD office and the old BDT office, but once they move into a new shared space, it'll probably feel more cohesive and similar to how the different teams are structured at places like Carlyle/KKR.
There's some tension behind the scenes. It's an open secret that the credit team doesn't think very highly of the merchant banking team because the returns are so poor and it's due to poor diligence rather than some macro or unforeseeable issue. Plus, comp differs across teams - merchant banking gets paid much more.
Theres a rotation program where people can work on a different team for 6 months. Funny enough, it's only gone one way where merchant banking people have gone to work on credit and RE and no one from those teams has volunteered to work on the merchant banking team. People have already pointed out that merchant banking work is very little investing and mostly advisory, but compared to banking, the advisory work is not great and you won't learn much. Despite the negatives, banking programs do a good job of giving you a foundation of skills that's transferrable to so many areas of finance and you'll get a variety of reps. BDT's model is to set up retainers with family businesses and you get staffed to a specific client so your experience is entirely dependent on what that client does. As a result, people will naturally have fewer reps, industries are going to be skewed towards the less sexy (there aren't a ton of tech companies that are family owned), and you'll do a lot of projects that aren't transferrable to the buyside like helping a family set up a FO or charity foundation. So even if you like doing more advisory than investing, it's probably better for your learning and development to stay at a EB/BB.
Very interesting. Are the merchant banking returns bad to the point that the credit returns are better? Hahah
Why would ppl that have undergone the rotational program opt for the credit/RE side if the merchant banking side gets paid much more?
I can’t reiterate enough that any sophomore or junior considering BDT&MSD for a summer internship or full time analyst should avoid the firm like a plague. Everything that’s been said so far is 100% true and would recommend anyone deciding between BDT and IB to go IB. There have been so many cuts and changes that there’s nothing special about BDT. Used to have a 3 day in office policy, but now the new policy is to be in person 4 days a week by 9 am and principals take attendance like we’re in kindergarten. Some of budget cuts make you worry about the future of the firm like analyst and associates no longer have EAs. How bad must things be that the firm’s trying to save a couple extra EA salaries when no other bank has done this? A ton of people have quit recently (including partners) so workload has increased for everyone remaining. Investment performance is really as bad as people have said. Credit team’s returns are better than merchant banking and only going to get worse because several portcos are on the verge of going bankrupt. I hope all the info here saves someone from making the same mistake that so many of us made because there was so little info on the firm. To put it in context there’s not a single analyst I know who wants to stay at the firm long term.
Would you recommend staying at a MM bank or start career off at BDT as an analystZ? Also recruiting just for Chicago so this was really helpful, thank you!
I'd go MM bank (assuming it's a place like William Blair in Chicago) over BDT analyst program. You'll get much better training, reps, and experience than at BDT. The training for analysts is a total joke because the firm doesn't have enough deal volume to give everyone good reps. You'll be much better off joining a good MM shop that has good deal flow. Plus, BDT won't give you the same level of support and tools that a MM bank will. For example, analysts and associates no longer have EAs and the firm is actively trying to cut the number of licenses for tools like BamSEC.
EXPERIENCED HIRES BEWARE - Anonymous account for obvious reasons. As a former employee none of these posts highlight the incredibly exclusionary culture of the legacy BDT side. If you did not grow up at the firm, expect to experience the worst that these comments have mentioned and then some. If you didn't join as an analyst you will generally be treated like a second class citizen. You will work your butt off while the guys who played the same sport as the founder in college or have the right family last name, and came in as analysts, sail by doing minimal work. That dynamic happens at a lot of places but what is unique about BDT is that the favoritism is so pervasive that you will have trouble getting staffed on any substantive deals without navigating a political maze. The staffers act as gatekeepers, hiding the favoritism from junior folks (VP and below) as best they can. As a lateral you will only get the staffings that no one else wants and you will still have to schedule weekly calls with the staffers to get those awful staffings. You will never get any clarity about why you aren't staffed on better things because they won't come out and say that you haven't proved yourself to the right group of insiders, i.e. the senior people don't want to work with you. The problem is the firm makes it all but impossible to actually prove yourself. Forget about working on anything that could get you recognized or promoted because that will go to the same group of people that are the firm favorites. This then of course leads to the firm favorites being promoted on expedited timelines while everyone else is left wondering where it all went wrong. Best case scenario as a lateral you end up on a struggling portco that gets you noticed just because its on deaths door every quarter. If you have a good set up at a PE firm don't listen to BDT recruiting. You are better off going to B School or going to any other PE firm/boutique bank if you want substantive work without having to spend 15-20% of your time playing politics to maybe get somewhere with the people there.
this is accurate from my sources. as mentioned, some of this nepotism goes on at all investment firms (and in the business world in general). however, my sources on the culture at bdt in particular are super negative on how much of this goes on there.
None of the anecdotes from here surprise me. I work at my family’s company after IB/PE/MBA and we’ve been LPs of few different UMM/MF funds including BDT. The fund performance is every bit as bad as people have mentioned and easily the worst performing fund out of the ones we’ve invested in by some margin. Funds certainly have their ups and downs (case in point: Bain struggled once upon a time, but recent funds are actually doing great), but I think BDT will continue to struggle because they don’t have the investment discipline, know-how, or team to make great investments consistently as traditional funds.
The overwhelming majority of BDT’s leaders have never invested professionally before BDT. It’s entirely former bankers or people who advised FOs. Just google BDT’s Culligan press release and look at the backgrounds of the partners from Advent/Centerbridge and BDT who led the deal. Anyone can manage a portfolio company doing well, but you invest in firms because they know how to manage companies when they struggle. Ask yourself, who do you have confidence can do that from those 3? They also don’t have fully dedicated industry teams so how can you expect them to compete against funds that have verticalized industry teams or funds that are sector specific? There’s a stark contrast when you look at co-invest opportunities where the sponsors will send you their diligence packets. BDT’s are by far the least developed and the investment thesis is often entirely based on the fact that they have a preferred security versus industry/company factors. As a result, you see terrible investments like solar financing company (google and see how many lawsuits are pending alleging customer fraud and predatory lending with every one of these firms) that proper diligence and industry knowledge would have uncovered how bad of a sector it is.
The firm’s fundraising growth is on paper impressive until you dig into the model. The ideal situation is one where BDT advises a family business on some kind of liquidity event where BDT invests from its fund into the family business (the LPs of which are other family businesses) and the family business then uses some of the proceeds to invest into the BDT fund. You can imagine the various permutations of this kind of model and because of the long term hold, you can actually commit a lot more because the investment period is much longer so you can easily use distributions from earlier funds to fund new commitments. This model isn’t scalable because there aren’t enough large family businesses that have never taken outside capital and it’s not a firm well equipped to invest in traditional PE. A lot of the early momentum at BDT was based on the enthusiasm of a prior generation that’s now passing the baton to the next generation. I know so many peers who have a chance to invest in a wide range of funds and see no value proposition to keep investing in BDT. The investment world is completely different and BDT is simply not equipped to compete with all the new sector specific funds and even the UMM who have differentiated investment thesis. If BDT were public, I would put a lot behind a short position because I can’t see how they continue to grow AUM with their current model.
^^^ very accurate statement
.
Bump - Anyone has any idea how FT recruiting work for BDT? Know Amity runs their ASO recruiting
Based on your school or if you get a referral from someone that works there
I worked at BDT a while back and can only confirm the above - this place is a mess. First off, lots of people here as well as those I encountered when recruiting love to emphasize the supposedly great culture at the firm. I thought the same after my interviews, but once you’ve hit the desk you’ll realize that there is a pretty important difference between people being polite in your first encounters and a place actually having a good culture. Sure, people there seem like nice, quiet mid-westerners, which to me certainly looked preferable to the arrogance I encountered in banking in NYC. Sadly, this is really only due to the fact that lots of the mid-level people/BDT-lifers there are just really nerdy (or straight-up weirdos) with often lower than average social skills. When shit hits the fan and you’re constantly underwater due to unhinged requests from seniors ill-equipped for their positions or you get shafted by an irrational performance review because you didn’t give a shitty deal a 10/10 rating in IC you can forget about them doing anything to help you out. As bad as it was, in IB mid-level people/staffers were on the Analysts’/Associates’ side most of the time and I was able to build meaningful relationships with some of them even as an analyst. At BDT on the other hand, people seemed to truly not give a shit about their colleagues and everyone’s fake politeness while simultaneously backstabbing each other was just infuriating.
Today I’d describe BDT’s culture simply as that of a cult. As mentioned by others, Byron is in total control of everything and, for example, “good” deal teams knew they had to organize a private audience with him and his two chosen disciples ahead of the actual IC, which was toothless and usually did whatever he wanted. This is bad enough for the funds’ performance, but it arguably has an even worse impact on the firm’s culture as the complete lack of structure or functioning processes means partners in his good graces are essentially free to do whatever they want. I learned this the hard way when working with a partner who had a fairly obvious substance abuse problem (you can take a guess as to which substance I mean) whose work instructions were erratic on his best days and outright insane on his worst. Like lots of other partners, this guy had no investing experience before BDT and you saw that in his teams being utterly unproductive (despite 90+ hour weeks) and him making up for his incompetence by straight-up lying to Byron/the IC and forcing juniors to do the same. When multiple people in (previously) very good standing repeatedly raised his unprofessional behavior with the firm’s Chief Admin Officer, the latter did absolutely nothing and instead made it clear that such feedback, even when alerting the firm to an employee’s potentially highly damaging conduct, was not welcome.
The same CAO did, however, react fairly aggressively when another associate had some issues with the deal we were working on, which brings me to my next point - the out-of-this-world nepotism at this firm. This guy was easily the most useless person I have ever worked with, combining simple incompetence with an attitude the likes of which I have never experienced. When you politely told him to fix an error he had made (most of which any first-year analyst would have caught) he got so upset that, on multiple occasions, he would intentionally repeat this very same error in whatever materials we were working on just to piss you off (I’m not exaggerating here - he would literally build this error into places that were previously fine). This guy’s family was heavily invested in the firm’s funds though, so he got away with everything and when he eventually complained to the firm’s CAO about having to work past 8pm occasionally (while the rest of us worked until at least 2am most nights), the latter sprang into action right away, demanding that our deal team treat him better. Knowing the CAO’s family background, however, it’s fairly obvious that he got his well-paying job through the exact same route despite his obviously extremely limited skillset. There actually are kids at BDT from well-known families who pull their weight and I’m aware that nepotism in finance is pervasive wherever you look, but, my god, in more than a decade in corporate finance I have never seen anything even remotely as bad as this.
I was nevertheless somewhat lucky though, since at least the above happened on an actual investment mandate. Others in my class were not so fortunate and had to deal mostly with the firm’s already mentioned, bizarre advisory assignments. For example, I know of projects that included setting a monthly allowance budget for some billionaire family’s unemployed children and another where an associate had to interview a family’s potential maids.
Overall, this place cannot be considered a serious investor. Instead, it’s really just a vehicle for Byron to exploit his one true skill, which is talking people (ideally 2nd+ generation wealth) out of their money. This explains the absurd nepotism, the hiring of partners with no investing experience but instead thick rolodexes, and the smokescreen of an investment approach. When you join, you’ll be given some practice models that are like 10% operating mechanics and 90% structure and all the models you’ll build are essentially interchangeable - just the same 3 pieces of structure over and over again. DD is absurdly shallow and, as others have mentioned, investment decisions are based almost exclusively on the securities being acquired. All this makes sense when you realize the goal is not to invest in or build businesses but instead to siphon off as much of their investors’ cash as possible. This approach has made Byron phenomenally wealthy but that’s of little solace to the juniors wasting their lives navigating the firm’s insane politics or building low-quality models instead of actually acquiring valuable skills. People who have actual ambitions rarely stick around, as evidenced by the firm’s rising star (one of the two disciples I mentioned above) leaving to start her own shop in 2022 just months after taking over BDT’s new Dallas office, taking several of the firm’s top performers with her. I won’t pretend to know all the dynamics behind seniors coming and going but the firm’s astronomically high turnover at the partner level doesn’t surprise me one bit.
In summary let me say: I used to work at a bank that was in a very public downward spiral, but I’d take that experience over my time at BDT any day. So please, do yourself a favor and don’t listen to the outright lies their recruiting team or Stockholm-syndrome-afflicted lifers will tell you to make you join this clown car of a firm.
Tbf these are the kinds of shops where all the senior banker chads we glorify go, not the BB/EBs.
Great shop especially if you're a senior and have the chance to work with Trott
This is one of the best Chicago-based seats you can get, and I wouldn’t take anything over this. The advisory and investing experience here is exceptional, and there is a well-maintained balance between both over a longer time horizon. The firm has evolved such that there are generally none of the family projects like helping a family set up a family office or charity foundation, which was mentioned by someone else.
The compensation is in line with market rates, and the work-life balance is significantly better compared to other IB and PE firms—there's really no comparison. The B-School placement has also been excellent, with several individuals going to HBS. The firm operates on a direct promotion model, so B-School is optional, and they even provide sponsorship for it.
Moreover, the exits from the firm for analysts and associates have been impressive, leading to top-tier private equity and hedge funds. That said, retention is also high since it is such a great place to work. The firm benefits from substantial tailwinds, boasting one of the largest funds in the industry that isn’t fully deployed yet, and they’re raising even more AUM in a tough market. The fund performance is double digits across all funds, contrary to what some other posters might have suggested.
Additionally, the firm is expanding its technology merchant bank practice, which is led by Juliet de Baubigny (previously from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and founder of Bond) and Rick Brubaker (founder of Kinetic, a massively successful technology hedge fund). Byron is renowned as the best closer in the industry, capable of closing any deal he works on, making being in his orbit early in your career invaluable. The decision-making and IC are concentrated around him because of his impeccable judgment.
Furthermore, the partner who left to start their own firm was actually dismissed due to poor investment performance and they took some underperforming talent with them. Their private equity fund has since struggled with fundraising, having only completed two small deals so far.
There are a lot of people here on the forum who don’t know what they’re talking about and tend to complain a lot, so don’t believe them. If you build a strong relationship with the seniors and the founder and become their favorite, you could make VP in five years, which is the fastest path in the industry. You’ll also have the opportunity to meet lots of very sharp billionaires as part of the job. Plenty of people have made the move to BDT&MSD from top firms like Apollo, Ares, Bain, Blackstone, Carlyle, EQT, Golden Gate, GTCR, H&F, KKR, Searchlight, TPG and Vista. Don’t be fooled by the other posts here.
Don't know why you have to put down others to get your point across regarding your paragraph on the "underperforming" talent that left to start their own firm...sounds like insecurity and bad culture on your part
And your comment shows how clearly biased you are...
Your comment about the IC decisions made by Bryon because of his "impeccable judgment"...you're saying anyone else at BDT doesn't have that good judgment? Tons of bad PE decisions have been made when a leader is not challenged and becomes myopic in his perspective. Also points to the lack of mentorship from Bryon if he's not willing to mentor other leaders to impart that "impeccable judgment". Also if a firm is centered around one person, there's going to be succession issues going forward...
And your comment about "If you build a strong relationship with the seniors and the founder and become their favorite, you could make VP in five years, which is the fastest path in the industry." - so you're blatantly admitting that you don't need to do well in the actual job (or that's not the #1 promotion criteria) but just need to pander to the leaders and be a "yes man"? Sounds like you're just corroborating the criticisms above. And 5 years to VP is not the "fastest" in industry...there are PE programs out there that have 3 year associate programs before becoming VP
Sounds like you're just an employee at BDT / MSD trying to dispel the numerous (and likely truthful) criticisms above...there's no smoke without fire
Created an account just to post this? Lol this is definitely BDT HR tying to put out fires.
Please tell us more about your great culture…
removed
The comment about Byron having impeccable judgment is laughable. Credit team’s been asked to look at rescue financing for several of BDT’s PE investments and in each case, you wonder how on earth they got comfortable enough to invest. One company in particular generated negative revenue for a period of time. Also, the funds being double digit across the board are blatantly false
You know it's bad when revenue has a negative number
How does a company generate negative revenue?
Returns and associated costs
BT is a narcissist who habitually purges managing directors who lead deals that don’t perform to expectation, which evidently happen quite frequently at his firm. If you take a look at their historical deals, many of them have underperformed. For those deals that have underperformed, you will see that the MDs who led the original deals are no longer there.
fwiw, for the creepily positive comment above, “Chad Feingold” is the name of the CAO that one of the posts referenced previously…The general timing of that comment is interesting because there’s a lot within the firm not going very well recently.Growth equity team got dissolved, bunch of senior people quit, some got fired, lot of turnover at the junior level, promotion timelines have been expanded, sizeable number of portcos are tanking financially, and there’s a power struggle between the MSD and BDT sides. A month ago there was a thread about American Securities downsizing and struggling to raise money. Doesn’t take a genius to see the situation at BDT will be much worse and next fund will be way smaller. Most of the analysts and associates have already recruited or actively looking to leave and a midlevel i'm close to mentioned a lot of mid levels would have already left if the hiring market wasnt so bad. Feels like people are rushing to get off the sinking ship before things get dire
Amusing anecdote for the WSO community: the green highlighted post above wrinkled A LOT of feathers at BDT. Of course instead of addressing the grievances, HR went on a witch hunt to discover who wrote it. No exaggeration, HR asked IT to check all work laptops if it was sent from there. Thankfully whoever it was wasn’t dumb enough to use their work laptop.
just to add another perspective, while some things are true, they are exaggerated… things might not be perfect, but no place is?
The growth equity team was merged into a broader tech investment strategy and the senior folks leaving can be seen as part of the natural ebb and flow in any big firm…
The power struggle between the MSD and BDT sides is exaggerated… any large organization is going to have them… All the teams are also siloed?
Promotion timelines expanding are more for senior folks to make partner… associate to VP and VP to principal is still 3 years… juniors leaving were analysts leaving post program
There’s a few portcos (smaller check sizes) facing challenges, but but there aren’t anymore than other similar sized funds…
The anecdote about HR going on a witch hunt is pretty sensational as well… which legit firm wouldn’t check…
Ps: the firm should fund a ski trip
Planning to start here. Are there any people to avoid working with?
Any thoughts on Greg Olafson taking over?
They also just poached Noah Ryan - GS tech banker
Any new updates - especially from those within the firm? Increase in perks after this thread? Have seen them hire a few big names recently
Similique est sit quos et. Expedita deleniti mollitia a ipsum deserunt perspiciatis qui ut. Error temporibus tempore distinctio soluta. Aut maiores voluptates numquam.
Non mollitia labore eum ducimus alias maxime suscipit. Aliquam suscipit in veritatis aut id. Id placeat accusamus repellat delectus corrupti amet. Omnis vitae sed aliquam quis.
Aut est et nostrum. Aut officia illo harum dignissimos dolorem sequi nihil autem. Corrupti culpa consectetur ea. In sed beatae et provident. Dolor corporis dignissimos occaecati sequi distinctio non.
See All Comments - 100% Free
WSO depends on everyone being able to pitch in when they know something. Unlock with your email and get bonus: 6 financial modeling lessons free ($199 value)
or Unlock with your social account...
Possimus molestias placeat ut accusamus placeat dolorem eaque. Nemo accusantium corporis nulla facere nam enim. Nemo deleniti eum omnis. Qui aliquid ut nobis.
Sequi qui cupiditate culpa qui. Ut nemo qui minima numquam nihil. Repellendus et ipsa libero dolorem inventore.
Quis commodi dolorem sed molestiae qui dolores voluptas. Expedita aperiam et occaecati sint nostrum.
Consequatur quidem repellat dolores tenetur temporibus. Et at qui error. Quis ad nostrum sed rerum cum labore. Dolorem autem perspiciatis et aut ipsam pariatur. Aut magni inventore reiciendis nisi rerum explicabo. Omnis consequuntur delectus sit dolorum.
Enim officiis quas totam ratione. Unde accusantium praesentium placeat esse earum ea dolorum mollitia. Eveniet sit soluta ipsam cumque dignissimos. Amet quod quibusdam asperiores tempora dolor. Quae ipsam laudantium ullam esse non illum.
Odit molestiae ut quibusdam dolor sunt commodi aut. Maiores laboriosam nostrum amet in. Dolorem et unde quos quis atque ab. Culpa maxime molestiae qui.
Dolor delectus delectus eius sunt doloribus sapiente et. Voluptatum eos consequuntur praesentium consequuntur nesciunt fugit. Officiis perspiciatis magni dolore magnam delectus cumque quis.
Laudantium quia ea et at. Omnis sunt quidem enim corrupti dicta nam.
Ut praesentium id dolorem omnis est vel. Maxime et repellendus nemo iusto. Eaque omnis nulla sunt rerum natus. Aut vel enim suscipit atque id repellendus.
Id et et nemo perferendis necessitatibus at labore ut. Eos et dolorem nihil voluptas quos animi itaque. Non qui debitis magnam dolorem tempora.
Voluptatem mollitia et officia neque asperiores nobis. Animi esse veniam qui rerum omnis.
Voluptas optio dignissimos vitae ut odit tempore voluptatem. Laudantium eos unde laboriosam est explicabo. Id molestiae autem repellat sunt. Atque quia ipsum velit et. Corporis voluptatem sit voluptatum.
Dolores eius necessitatibus consectetur accusantium neque molestiae sapiente. Voluptates et molestiae in sed sunt. Beatae maxime sunt vel aut quam sed iste. Et quis assumenda est placeat aut quo aut hic. Aut odit rerum laudantium nulla.
Est et nobis quia in. Et suscipit repellat aut.