Deal experience for PE recruiting - can you fake it till you make it?
I'm a first-year analyst working at a decent BB, but have not worked on a proper M&A transaction so far.
Last week, one of my fellow analysts quit, so I took over her sellside M&A project - but the bad part is that all the marketing materials/models have been made already, so there is nothing much for me to do other than BS admin work... Since this deal will still likely close this year, do you think I can learn the project in and out (study the CIM, VDD materials, model, etc.) and talk about it in my PE interviews? Has anyone got a similar experience? Will they ever figure it out?
Yes, you very easily could do this. I think the 1 risk is process questions - i.e. when they ask you where you are in the process, or when you built the CIM, or how you handled the diligence questions, are you honestly good enough of a BSer to look someone right in the face and make something up? This is the hardest part about bullshitting in interviews, because they will ask questions (even unintentionally) that will poke holes in your story, and once they realize you are lying then you are fucked.
Epescially because PE interviews focus so heavily on deal talk, you really need to have your story in line and be 100% confident/sure of yourself to do this. I would suggest just using a pitch that you worked more directly on/know the model and say that it was just mandated or some BS like that, rather than saying you did all this stuff for a deal that you didn’t.
Coming from someone who interviewed at 2 MFs, the first place my deal talk was all over the place and I think that got me dinged from the process.
Bump
My biggest deal was the first one after I joined where I basically sent calendar invites but I spoke about it a ton in interviews. Just claimed I did the model and all materials and got the offer. As long as you know things inside and out and can lie if needed it’s easy enough
Interesting - may I ask what PE funds typically ask about your deal experience? Is it really the modeling aspect? If so, what kind of things do they ask?
Every reputable PE firm you interview at will ask about deal experience in some form or fashion.
Mind if i pm?
The key part about talking about your deal is to assess if you are able to: (i)spot strengths and weaknesses of the company and the industry ; (ii) Explain why the valuation happened at that price (ie: historically M&A comps were valuing the business at 8x-10x, but the deal closed at 7.5x because the competitiveness on the deal wasn’t high, the company was losing market share and the seller needed to sell); (iii) explain why the buyer bought it and why sponsor took part / didn’t take part, what were they thinking of the business and (iv) explain clearly what you think of the business if you were a sponsor/investor (would you do the deal? Why? How would you have created value?)
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