I Was Not Ready For MF PE
I was in a pretty sweaty banking group and worked anywhere between 70-110 hours a week in my two years there. I am 6 months into my stint at a MF and holy shit this is so much worse. Consistently working 100hrs a week at this point and I ALWAYS feel like I am behind on my to do list. I legitimately cannot keep up with the tasks that come in and have never felt this way before in my whole life. I feel like I am over staffed being on 3 live deals, and a high-touch portco, but it seems like alot of other people are in the same boat as me. Not to mention the work is 10x more stressful.
Is this just how it is or am I in a particularly bad seat? Don’t know how long I can keep up this pace honestly
Sounds pretty on par with MF associate lifestyle. A sad reality but many people like you are in the same spot. Grit your teeth and survive for two years. Sounds like TPG, right?
That's on purpose. Their goal is to have you burnout and leave at the end of your ASO period. Only the choice few that can do it all and like Oliver Twist say "please sir may I have some more" are the ones they want to stick around and promote. Just don't get fired and put in your two years, it'll pay dividends when you leave.
I am curious if MM funds are better and you can enjoy what you are doing + actually have a life outside work? If anybody working in MM can share insight that would be great!
Maybe LMM potentially but Im at a fund at the cusp of MM/ UMM that is in growth mode and associates work 80-100 hours still.
Sounds like TPG
I’m at a MM PE firm and feel the same way.
Sips coffee at LMM working 45 hours per week.
With the same base + bonus as a second year BB/EB banking analyst. The give and take of the financial realm. Thus is life...
Keep telling yourself that if it helps you sleep at night.
Have fun in your future corporate development role, brother!
Settle down guy. All I stated is a fact of life, you go to LMM you make less and have lower hours. You go to a MF, you get paid more and sleep. Wasn’t meant to be a diss. Didn’t realize you were so self conscious about your comp.
I’m thankfully in the UMM, but it’s funny, the Corp Dev role you shit on is essentially on par with your pay and lifestyle
Why does Corp Dev receive so much hate? No one compares it to IBD / PE from a all in comp / prestige perspective. I think its an interesting and thought provoking area for people who are interested in M&A but dont want to work an average of more than ~50ish hours per week.
Doing Corp Dev for a PE backed company at the manager level or above usually comes with an equity component that pays out (from what I've personally seen) anywhere from $500k+ at the manager level to several million at levels above that. It's still the 35-50 hour weeks, $200-400k annual comp, and then the equity component at sale which can drive comp much higher.
Working 70-100 hours a week including weekend work to make $400k as an associate with very few people moving up into VP roles or higher where the carry starts to become a possibility (relative to how many people go into banking or PE at the analyst/associate levels) compared to working half as much and making enough to be in the top 5% of earners in the country, or more overall comp that IB/PE with the equity component. It's not "prestigious" to say you work at a relatively small industrials company no one has heard of doing M&A versus a bank or investment firm that everyone knows because it's plastered all over the NYT or WSJ, but the life you can live doing so is much more enjoyable when you stop caring what other people think of your job.
Not sure if you are elaborating on my point in agreement, but this was a great example of why it is a fairly promising career path. I would also argue that Corp Dev for the F100 companies is extremely exciting, as the deal size and investment theses are both pretty special, and are typically pretty differentiated. Do you want to feel like you're making an impact? In Corp Dev you can be responsible for taking the first steps in inorganically building a completely new division, sometimes through a series of investments totaling a multi-billion dollar sum.
You also get to see how companies look at their less attractive portions of their business, and when they decide to sever ties, and what returns they look to achieve to justify these carveouts. Idk, maybe its just me, but I think all of this sort of decision making is super interesting.
Also, the comp for these roles is pretty attractive, ~225k-250k at the Manager level for some of these solid roles for a fairly good WLB isnt bad if you ask me. Especially if some sort of your bonus or TC is RSUs, you could end up in a great role with manageable hours. Not to mention you will have a strong voice and be a fairly key decision maker on some very material deal discussions and 99% of the time you will be the sole junior employee in the room. Idk, that's a pretty cool spot to find yourself as a 25-28 year old.
Again, if the highest level of total comp and prestige is what you're after. I don't think Corp Dev is for you. But if you want to work on a chiller team with people that have "lifestyle banking" mentalities (is that even a term? hopefully you get what I mean), then it is worth strong consideration.
Because there are a lot of people on the board who haven’t figured out what makes them happy so they compare everything
Corp Dev > LMM PE when adjusting for hours and comp lol
Is your team supportive at least?
the worst part about MF/UMM PE is in banking it feels like you and VP/Director (and even MD) are all on a team together even when things suck while in PE your client is the VP (and their client the Partner) and you need to be on your A-game with everything buttoned up
This. It sucks when every single VP+ thinks their staffing is the most important and you're just stuck in the middle trying not to fuck anything up. I can't wait to leave and I'm not even an asso... can't imagine how much worse that is.
What are you looking at in terms of exits?
at a MF myself and this is the most accurate way I've ever seen it put
I choose to believe this is the guy that was over the moon celebrating TPG HC like two years ago in the on cycle thread and then had some sort of existential crisis when 20 people replied telling him to renege at any cost
Couldn’t be me lol. Not at TPG but it goes to show that this is not a unique problem
Can you please link this hahaha
link
Never understood why the amount of hours one is working means anything. Clearly it is about how smart you work and how much impact you make. I doubt you are doing anything meaningful beyond 6-7 hours and dont let the idiots around you trick you into believing so.
This is why you work in LMM credit brother
I hope its worth ur health/youth/social/romantic life
I'm going to learn from you and not make the same choices, that's for sure
You had time to write this post so get to work....
Yep
Hi this happened to me too and I feel close to want to quit because I can’t handle the stress of barely staying above water at every new task - can I ask how you’re managing now? I feel like I need to quit
What type of fund?
Update?
This sounds awful and is no life
But remember this is temporal . Lots of careers start this way . Just suck it up and you’ll be on to great things in a. Couple years
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