Buyside recruiting is really demoralizing as a non-target
Reflecting upon PE oncycle & feeling a little down in the dumps..
I came from a west coast non-target and absolutely grinded my way, borderline sacrificed, my college experience to land a spot at a well known top group at a top BB. It took a ton of effort, but really thought this might change the course of my life. Most of my peers in my group are targets/top targets.
Flash-forward to oncycle recruiting, where I begin seeing vast differences in opportunities spring up. HHs reached out to us all, however when it came to who got priority in interview invites or solicitations from specific funds, I witnessed my teammates who went to targets receive an insane amount of opportunities. To be frank, I totally witnessed first hand how I was being passed up. For the opportunities I did get, the experience was also very painful— many I hardly made it past first rounds (and being honest, I am strong technically and behaviorally, as I prepped for months for OC recruiting) and for the ones I got cut in the later stages I thought I had in the bag.
Most of said target classmates have offers in hand and had a quick process. About 85-90% of my class who have MF offers are targets in my class (100% in my group). I know it’s well known that PE recruiting is much more traditional in its view of pedigree, but damn it still stings. It really makes me wonder what all this hard work was for, in trying to work up the ladder, when I keep getting the shorter end of the stick. I’m generally a confident person who is proud of how far I’ve come, but processes like these really do make me question my place. Sad boi hours
You should have worked harder in high school. What's done is done. With that being said, your career is 40 years, not 4 years.
edit: Wow, non-targets really are self-conscious about their schools.
You are such a bozo man holy shit I bet you get pegged
We don't kink shame here.
That's supposed to be a punishment?
Not sure why this got so much MS, two things can be true at the same time: OP can't change anything abt his school but he probably should have worked harder in high school as well
.
A lot of times it’s luck/background and not always how hard you work. (Many years ago) I had above a 4.0 (with the AP program) + a nearly perfect ACT + extra curriculars + multi sport varsity athlete and got denied from the targets I applied to.
Think this is attributed to 1) I didn’t know how to write the essays/what they were looking for and 2) no one was guiding me on the recruitment process in high school (first college student in family). I just assumed my GPA and test scores would get me in and I only applied to 4 schools, got denied from 3. No teacher or counsellor or anyone was there to tell me how to approach/game the process and that I should’ve cast my net wider to more schools (since it’s such a luck of the draw; you hear about someone getting denied from Harvard but accepted to Wharton and vice versa).
I attribute both of these to a lack of information/mentorship available to me at the time and not that I wasn’t performing academically. Despite the setback, was able to make up for the deficit and get into a BB and have a successful career to this point.
Does getting denied from a target imply a lack of hard work? Not necessarily. Does getting denied alleviate you from having to work harder to overcome it? No, you’ll still have to work harder because of it, but it’s not impossible by any means.
Applying to college is not how it used to be, it’s heavily reliant on “playing the game” and being guided to do the right thing that cannot be expected by most 14-18 year olds by themselves
Far from a pure test of brains and work ethic
I’ve been there so I completely understand what you’re going through. I was a complete non-target that ended up landing in a top group and somehow made it to a MF. I did not get any MF interviews during the traditional on-cycle process, but landed something off cycle. I would encourage you to continue interviewing for all roles (MM / UMM / MF) as you could lateral down the line if you don’t end up in a spot that you wanted. Just keep an open mind that you may not go the GS / MS -> KKR / BX path but you could certainly end up at those exact same PE firms as a Principal or Senior Associate after a couple of years at a MM or UMM firm. There is always attrition at the MF PE firms and you would be surprised how many lateral or off cycle opportunities come up. I would also take a real hard look at some of the other top tier PE opportunities that may be just as good and if not better than your traditional MF firms. At the end of the day, you can’t control your background or what you’ve done in your life thus far, but you can certainly control what you do from here. I know how much it sucks to be placed into to a certain bucket despite having worked so hard to get what you conceivably thought was the “top”, but I promise you that if you keep trying, you’ll land something. There is a reason why you made it this far from a non-target and I'm sure others will see that come through in interviews. I most definitely give credit to non-targets that I end up interviewing at my firm. Just prep as much as you can and speak with confidence as you had to jump through many more hurdles to be in your current role.
Hate to be that guy, but if you got to the interview rounds, not moving on is your fault and has nothing to do with school.
At my fund (UMM/MF), school obviously plays a role in interviews, but have honestly never heard of us passing up a candidate from a top group because they were a non-target. I would be shocked if there’s a single MF that doesn’t have at least a few non target associates.
If you get a first round, your resume is now useless, it’s all about interview performance. You can argue it influences people subconsciously or whatever, but I can tell you for a fact that we don’t consider resume beyond who gets an interview. The minute you enter an interview room everyone is equal and we are purely picking the best candidates.
So do some real soul searching on why you didn’t convert on interviews - if you’re so confident in technicals, maybe do some work on the behavioral side. Are you coming off as arrogant / try hard / too much of a chip on your shoulder? Can you talk intelligently about deal experience? Did you have strong answers for “why X fund”?
This is a surprisingly naive take. Obviously there is a selection bias toward target school candidates, but to claim there still isn't an advantage of school post the screening process is just absurd. If you go to Penn, your network of alums / peers is far more robust than most other schools and at firms that are over 50% Wharton (more common than you think) makes it so much easier to make the initial good impression and break the ice in an interview. I can't tell you how many times I've seen PE interviews go so smoothly because the interviewer and the interviewee had mutual friends (often due to school) or could relate to similar school dynamics vs a non-target candidate with a target interviewer.
People need to understand that non-target candidates are not just fighting to get an interview, but also fighting to overcome the robust connections that target candidates have which ultimately make interviews smoothly given the ability to connect with one another.
With all this said, this is not an excuse to feel bad for non-target candidates, instead this should be something you understand you need to overcome sooner rather than later. As a non-target, I completely recognize the challenge of this, but don't expect handouts.
I've suffered from this endlessly and now don't waste time thinking about this. I come from an Asian country, went to a good school nobody knows outside of the country, worked for a boutique that again very few people understand. Recently joined a top sector specialist UMM in their large cap fund alongside a bunch of target + BB people in London (RIP £). I'm literally the only person in my cohort to have non-BB TMT experience. My two cents would be to stop looking at things like "how many opps was I shown" but instead look for that one firm/ partner/ recruiter who will take their chances with you. I have realized that instead of targetting hardo places which place a lot of importance on pedigree, I am a much better fit with people who want me instead of trying to impress people who place more weight on metrics I don't have. This means an easier working environment, my development being taken care of, and good career opportunities. Not working at KKR is not the end of your life. You've come a long way by working hard, please try to enjoy it.
Congrats, now you know how ridiculous this world is: people treat the adult version of you as basically a high-school version of you.
What's done in high school seems to haunt you for years. That's how absurd the elite hierarchy of investment banking and private equity is.
Maybe go the public market route. There is less structure and less hierarchy there. Even if you are the top 0.1% at H/S/W doesn't guarantee a positive return.
You’re crying you’re at a top group at a top BB and messed up your PE interviews?
The only reason you’re not getting offers is your undergrad school and not your performance in interviews?
No one who works in PE comes from a crappy undergrad like you? Seriously?
I'm sorry to hear that you're having challenges. I graduated from a non-target 15+ years ago and so have a pretty good amount of experience both on how it affects you as a candidate and an employee.
For background - I am a co-founder of a buyout fund. Previously, I was an MD at a MF. I started my career at a boutique. I've personally been directly involved in deciding who to hire for 50-100 analyst/associate/VP positions over the years. I went to a non-target and as far as I know, I'm the only person to ever graduate from my school and then work in PE.
My experience has been that where you went to school almost always affects your recruiting, even fairly late in your career. The amount that it matters diminishes over time, but it is always present.
To start, when a firm is selecting who to give interviews to, they receive a resume book and a spreadsheet from one of the HH firms that lists the following things: name, firm, group, school, GPA, ACT/SAT. That's it. School is on there because people absolutely do take it into account. When you get a spreadsheet with hundreds of names, you have to use something to narrow it down.
For the interview process, and the decision making that follows, people are ultimately trying to put together a comprehensive view of you as a candidate. Your interview adds significantly to that picture, but it does not replace the basic biographical details that are on your resume. This includes everything from details of your current role, what school you went to, where you are from, what your hobbies are, etc. Using that full picture, people will then decide: i) can you do the work, ii) what is your max potential at the firm, and iii) do they want to work with you.
Once you're hired, where you went to school doesn't matter as much at that job and you will normally be evaluated on your performance, relationships, etc.. That being said, HHs definitely call people with more prestigious backgrounds more frequently (since many firms, even for senior positions, will explicitly say something like "degree from a top school strongly preferred"), so my friends with more prestigious backgrounds were generally able to feel more secure in their positions, since they knew that at anytime, they could lateral to another firm.
The complete picture of who you are cuts both ways. There was one case where we were choosing between two equally qualified candidates. The job ended up going to the candidate from the non-target because his background made him seem scrappier compared to the candidate who listed his prestigious high school on his resume.
Ultimately, you're absolutely correct that your school will make your career more challenging. However, you can't go back and change where you went to school and you can't change our unfair world, so all you can do is keep moving forward and figure out how to improve your interviews to get the job you want. You may have to follow a longer course, but you can still get to where you want to be eventually.
Best of luck!
Lmfao people in here talking about “you should have done better in high school”. Couldn’t sound more like a privileged, self-absorbed moron.
Are YOU a product of a low-income public school system?
Do you know what it feels like to be worried about your safety even within the walls of a school?
Do you know what it’s like when the teachers don’t even give a damn because 90% of the students are already checked out and plan to deal drugs or be a truck driver?
Did you ever have to go hungry before and after school bc you had no money for food? Did you ever have your lunch tickets stolen from you?
Do you know what it takes to pull yourself up from an environment like that and break into a top BB?
Come on guys… “Should have worked harder in high school..” lucky we even got out of that situation and could grow into something far better. In fact, I’m of the opinion that most are SCARED of hungry non-targets because they have NOTHING TO LOSE and will out-work them in a field where hard work is what matters most. Most have already figured it out.