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Are you applying for normal associate roles or something that's more of a senior associate or VP-level position? The reason I ask is because if it's an entry-level associate position, you might be overqualified in a sense. Don't know how long you've been at your current fund, but it may be worth sticking it out to the end of your two years then finding a senior associate position after that. 

Would echo the other poster here and say that networking is especiailly important in growth. After all, at least 50% of your job will be sourcing.

 

Normal associate, I'm about 6-7 months into my ASO role and had a previous ASO role before for about a year (sounds flaky but trust that it was normal if you knew the details). I think that makes me both overqualified for ASO and underqualified for S-ASO. Which is a weird limbo. My thinking was to restart my ASO program because why would they hire someone with classic LBO experience in a S-ASO / VP role at a growth firm when they could find someone with growth experience. Thoughts?

 
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So you're saying you have ~12 months of experience at one PE firm, ~6-7 months of experience at a second PE firm, and are now applying to Growth? I think this may be the reason for the ding. From Insight / TVC / IVP's perspective it's a risk to hire you because history suggests you'll leave in ~6-12 months. When they have a stack of resumes from supremely qualified candidates (which all of these firms would have) it's just safer to go with candidates who don't have these kinds of question marks.

My advice is if you want to stay in PE/Growth you should really finish up your two year stint at your current shop. Then you'll once again de-risk yourself and likely be competitive for any top tier firm - Growth or otherwise. If you really hate PE then get out because it's not worth being miserable for another 18 months, but if that's the case Growth won't be much better and you should look to something fundamentally different. 

 

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