PE GP diligence when switching jobs
What are the things you'd ask / ask for in order to diligence a GP as an employer? This is for mid-career level (senior VP / junior principal level) switches.
1. Is it too much to ask for fund performance details? What level of detail is appropriate?
2. And at what timing (thinking it'd be post-offer or close to the finishing stages of the interview process?)
3. Is it too early to ask about the partnership structure (tiers of partners, any 3rd party investors in the GP, etc.)?
4. What else would you ask?
Trying to get beyond the verbal "we have great performance", "you'll have great runway to become partner here".
If I was recruiting for a Principal role (currently a VP), some things that would be very important to me are:
1. Fundraising plans (what's the plan to raise the next fund - timing, status, placement agents, required % of capital deployed before allowed to fundraise, etc.)
2. Track record of previous fund(s) performance
3. Recent successful exits / not successful exits
4. Partnership structure
5. How staffing works / composition of deal teams
6. Process of screening new deals
7. Typical investment committee process and timeline / who sits on the committee
8. Hiring plans to fill out team (junior, mid-level, senior)
9. Pivoting to new strategies for future funds?
10. Composition of LP base
11. 3rd party service providers and level of support provided for reporting (i.e. does investment team perform all quarterly valuations, etc.)
There's probably a lot more but these were the ones off the top of my head. In terms of timing, I'd probably ask after I advanced a couple rounds and felt confident that there was a level of material interest from the hiring firm's side.
Thanks! very thoughtful answer.
100% reasonable to ask for fund performance. Most people I've interviewed ask about that, because they know it impacts their future growth prospects quite a bit.
How much details would you ask for? Do you just get a verbal mark-to-market or do you actually ask for deal level stats?
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