Laid off BofA Associate Recruiting for PE - URGENTLY Seeking Advice

What's up guys - would greatly appreciate some advice here. I was an associate in a coverage group (TMT / C&R / Industrials) that was part of the mass "layoffs" (using " " since it technically wasn't a layoff) at BofA last week. However,

1) they told me my "layoff" wasn't performance related, but rather a broader symptom of macro / market conditions (think 20 ppl in my group got axed, and like ~15 in C&R, ~15 in Industrials, etc similar #s in other groups). I have plenty of strong references, got A2A promotion, consistently gotten good reviews, etc. 

2) they're not actually laying me off, but moving me to an operations group within the bank so I still have a permanent job with my same base salary (believe some people were offered this opportunity, while others were laid off altogether). 

I'm in the middle of PE recruiting (have been recruiting for the past couple months) - how would you guys suggest communicating this situation to recruiters / PE firms? Kind of a unique situation compared to a traditional layoff given I still have a permanent job at the bank (just not in IB). 

Should I be upfront from the beginning with recruiters / companies? Wait until further along in processes before disclosing? Do it right before reference checks? Not disclose at all? 

Would really really appreciate some advice here - thanks guys 

9 Comments
 

That's what I'm leaning towards - but then if I progress to the end of a process to the point of background check / offer, should I disclose? Just concerned that they'd eventually find out 

 

Yeah I have a number of really strong references from my group. More so concerned if I approach the where I'm nearing an offer and they want to do reference checks, and I haven't disclosed my situation to them yet... not sure how to navigate that 

 

Just say that it happened during the process, and that the bank placed you in an operations group so you could focus on PE recruiting (as they identified you as a good performer)

Array
 

Thinking was that if I don't say anything, I continue to go through the process, they will likely find out anyways when it comes to background checks, and so I didn't want them to think I was hiding anything 

 

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