Do people ever leave PE and come back?
How do firms view leaving after a couple years? Is there a negative impact if you want to come back a few years later?
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Yes, seen that happen. Usually those people went back to the fund they worked with before and had good relationships with.
Happens quite a bit. There's obviously the standard way of doing this, which is to take a two-year vacation in business school then come back to PE after. But I've seen a lot of people leave PE for other roles (HF, portco, startups), then come back to PE, albeit usually at a smaller or newer fund. Unless being at a MF/UMM fund is a necessity for you, I don't think jumping off the PE train for a couple years to try something different is as much of a deal as people think it is.
Every person and situation is different
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