Do you hate your life more in PE or in IB?

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IB significantly more for me… my PE job has much better WLB, but even if the hours were the same the work is a lot more interesting to me in PE.

It depends on what you’re optimizing for and how that evolves. For instance, I got brutalized in IB, but it wasn’t the worst thing in the world - I was young, most of my friends were in similar situations, and it felt kind of like a boot camp where I felt OK giving away a lot of my time. In PE, my hours were objectively slightly better, but by that time I started to really value my time, so on a relative basis it felt much worse as my values changed. I didn’t really find the work more interesting…it was just more stressful bc your work does impact actual investments with less oversight (but a lot of work was the same).

Hate my life exactly equally, tbh. PE is just as much bullshit as banking. It’s not critical thinking or investing, it’s just picking the deals that the partner thinks they have an angle to ultimately win and is worth the time (which involves just as much sales/fake bullshit as banking). The internal portco work is essentially just ensuring you can bullshit adjust the numbers enough to make sure you don’t push up against leverage covenants and never have to mark down on internal valuation, and then taking company to a sale is essentially just banking. Not saying it’s any worse, but sure as fuck not better, and I genuinely have a passion for investing which is the worst part cause you simply don’t think like an investor in PE (and if you think the partner cares about your well thought out investment write ups - trust me he doesn’t)

At this point I am also considering remaining in IB or possibly moving to consulting, where at least working culture is better

Everyone's experience is different; IB and PE are both tough industries. I think if you are chasing comp, the two are very similar in terms of WLB: not good. For me, I've found PE to be more interesting due to the type of work. Banking tends to be more surface level for shorter periods of time, where PE you gain a deeper understanding of both industries and portcos. Regardless, I think finding a good, small team is important for both IB and PE, though you will likely sacrifice some comp relative to larger organizations. My shop has a small investment team where I feel like my voice can be heard. I also enjoy the level of responsibility and autonomy (not meaning I have free reign to pursue acquisitions at my discretion). My WLB is essentially the same now versus IB; though, I think overall my WLB will likely be better in PE because of where my work comes from. Bankers are more or less middle men, playing ping pong with deliverables between buyers and sellers. IB has less freedom regarding timing and actual work product. PE work is all driven by the shop, meaning you only work on what the shop deems important. For example, if my boss decides an acquisition isn't worth pursuing, we can stop diligence right there and move on. Bankers don't really have that luxury when working for sellers. You will still have firedrills in both industries, but less so in PE.

Overall, I would suggest finding a small PE shop where your voice can be heard, WLB is better, and comp is likely to still be better than boutique banks with similar WLB. If you are chasing comp, WLB is going to suck regardless and you may find yourself getting burnt out. Everyone has different experiences, but I've been satisfied with my decision thus far.

PE is a little more controllable and you have some idea of when the work is coming. In IB it can be 4pm on a Friday, weekend looking great... you get staffed and a Saturday exception with no warning. PE it's rare to have those fire drills truly out of nowhere like IB.

That said, generally the WLB is not too much of an improvement and the work/job/culture are fairly similar to IB. People still won't have much of a life outside of work and you'll likely work weekends. If you want better WLB need to do corp dev or some other corporate role.

Working hours are pretty much the same in PE (a little bit better), echoing what most everyone else is saying, much more visibility into deadlines, but the volume of work is probably more and the work pretty much never ends, (constant portco work, new deals, random research and one-offs, quarterly valuations, etc) so there's really no fuckaround time like the IB days when I would literally have jack shit to do for days then get blown up at 8pm on a thursday. PE stress is real, much less oversite into your work product and you pretty much have to own everything as the associate, definitely more interesting and meaningful work though, but the grind is still very much real. One thing I do miss about IB is bullpen comradery and rowdiness of my group, lots of good memories that I do miss, but overall PE WLB is slightly better imo, a lot less sick fucks looking to murder your soul that existed in IB.