PE to entrepreneurship, any feedback?

All,

Hope you’re doing well. I wanted to post on WSO today as I have more and more thoughts about launching my own company one day. I was wondering if anyone heard good (or bad) stories about people leaving PE to do this, and any advice/opinion would be of course appreciated. I don’t necessarily want to launch something in the RE sector, even if it would help given knowledge accumulated over the past few years. My profile is the following:

  • Currently associate at a MF within the real asset department (Real Estate/Infra)
  • Have been involved on asset but also corporate deals, so not unfamiliar with company structures/corporate finance concepts
  • Tired about working for the past 4/5 years for someone else fortune (given long hours, uncertainty to make it to partner track, etc. I would like to spend this time on my own project)
  • Interested in new technologies but unfortunately have a business background so would need to find someone with tech background to help on the app/website/product building
  • MBA seems to be a good way to develop network, find a co-founder, brainstorm and clear my mind but this is quite expensive so not sure if it’s worth it

Thank you for your feedback.

Most Helpful

Just bumping this thread as someone also toying with this idea. I can't get over the mental inertia that the job market is super tough right now and quitting in this environment to pursue my own thing is down right stupid. That, and a lot of recent conversations with growth capital allocators who believe the cost of everything is going to zero i.e. building a business today is f***ing difficult given AI, tech disruptions, etc. destroying true MOATs in record time

Would love to get the perspective of someone who's made the jump and is swimming. There's a few ecom guys who seem to have done it but that industry is also getting decimated right now...

Just bumping this thread as someone also toying with this idea. I can't get over the mental inertia that the job market is super tough right now and quitting in this environment to pursue my own thing is down right stupid. That, and a lot of recent conversations with growth capital allocators who believe the cost of everything is going to zero i.e. building a business today is f***ing difficult given AI, tech disruptions, etc. destroying true MOATs in record time

Would love to get the perspective of someone who's made the jump and is swimming. There's a few ecom guys who seem to have done it but that industry is also getting decimated right now...

lol does that make sense to you?

AI is disrupting incumbent moats so that means it's a bad time to start a business?

no one is hiring so that means it's a bad time to pick up strong talent that would normally make a lot of demands of a new startup? 

Be prepared for what it means to actually run a business. You may think you know what this means but you are almost guaranteed not to. There is going to be an infinitely greater amount of admin-type work then whatever you think you will be doing. The amount of time you think you’d be spending on strategy/new business opportunities/running operations/etc will be an overestimate.

Friend of mine left his bank ~2y ago to start his own business. from developing his first mvp, admin and legal stuff, to getting into sales, dealing with potential customers and all while being bootstrapped was a hell of a ride to watch him doing. He got his first customer now and has some promising leads in the pipe, but it’s a grind as others said. If you’ve the cushion of a job right now, I’d keep it for the moment unless you’re dead settled to start now

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