Private Equity Associate Regretting Decision
Sorry for the job title - I haven't used this account in a while to post, but am desperately seeking advice for the situation below.
Here's my story and generally keeping things vague.
I did my analyst stint at a top BB and was extremely excited to move to the buyside for the obvious reasons: improved hours, solid compensation, greater visibility / predictability in work/life balance, more intellectually stimulating, etc. I joined a mid market ($1.5bn latest fund) and my experience couldn't be further from enjoyable for this reasons below.
I am constantly stressed and find myself thinking about the job significantly more than when I was in banking. The hours have not improved much, if at all. Typically working until 10-12am with frequent nights well past the midnight mark. The job is WAY more exhausting considering that I really don't have much down time during the day, whether it is on calls, putting slides together, or building models. On top of all that, I really don't enjoy the work and am suffering massively from impostor syndrome.
Everything else in my life is in check - I do find time to workout / go on runs, have even stopped drinking for a while / eat very healthy blah blah.. But, I am utterly miserable. It has only been about a half of a year and am already seemingly burnt out. I don't think I can / want to make it past the two years here.
While this isn't true for all PE jobs, I guess I have some specific questions. When is too early to express a desire to recruiters for lateral opportunities? If not a lateral, what are options to get out into a job with a better balance this early on in an associate stint? Any advice / shared experiences would be helpful. I feel pretty uncomfortable opening up about this topic to mentors and my peers, so I greatly appreciate any insight.
Background on me as a person if helpful: I am generally sensitive to anxiety and have suffered from depression, two things I have always been aware might interfere with my success in this industry. On the other hand, I could probably care less for earning $1mm+ in annual compensation a year. I like nice things / earning a good sum, but am by no means wedded to a path that puts me on the trajectory of getting "rich" one day.
9-10pm every week night standard, regardless of current deal work, seems a bit rough for a fund of your size. If you're not working on something that is "live", what exactly is occupying your time all day/evening? If I had to generalize my experience with hours in PE, I would say they have been better overall in comparison to my days as an analyst at a bank. That being said, when we are sprinting hard on something or near a critical point of a deal the hours can be just as bad as banking and frankly a lot more tolling mentally. Where things are better is if deal work is slow, you'll naturally have more downtime since there is less busy work/BS staffings.
I want to address something in your original post. You mentioned you think about the job "significantly more" and that it is "more exhausting". This is no surprise to me at all. My analyst stint in banking was a sweatshop experience through and through. My years as a PE associate were easily far more stressful. Sure, I had a lot less all-nighters or weeks where I was regularly clocking out at 2 or 3AM, but when things were at max capacity and pedal to the metal mode, there is a lot more mentally challenging than what I experienced as an IB analyst. You have a lot more responsibilities (especially depending on how lean of a deal team you have/how many "hats" you wear in a process) and things feel a lot more "real" than when you were cranking out pitch books, advising a client on a potential acquisition or assisting in managing a sales process. I am guessing you've had a lot of days where pretty much all day you're on calls, taking notes, fielding emails, etc. 5-6-7pm comes around and then you realize you essentially have an entire second "shift" of work where you need to start doing the excel model work, deck drafting, etc.
I am bringing this up because you are asking about the possibility of a lateral move. As you are thinking about that, you should ask yourself what do you expect to get from a lateral move to another PE firm? Are you looking to move to a bigger fund that has more resources and works on larger deals? A fund that focuses on different sectors that might interest you more? Maybe anything that at least offers the appearance of better culture? Think about what you're aiming to accomplish, and if another PE job can actually sooth some of the pain points you're currently experiencing. Based on my understanding of some of your points in your initial post and my thoughts above, I'd be a little concerned that maybe another PE job isn't going to solve some of those underlying issues.
To answer your question, I would probably wait closer to the one year mark before actively reaching out to your recruiter contacts about lateral opportunities within PE. Call me short sighted, but I feel like trying to jump ship before the one year mark just raises bigger questions about your candidacy unless there are some warranted circumstances (need to move geographically, fund is winding down, etc.). Once you start reaching out to recruiters, make sure you're very clear with them about what you're looking for. If you're trying to stay in PE only, be sure to highlight the positive experiences from your current job.
I think PE associate experience would make you a very strong lateral candidate for a position at a FoF or firm that does a lot of direct co-investing. Do you research on this space and the major players, as there are various degrees of how "in the weeds" their teams get with regards to DD. I have had the opportunity to work with a variety of these types of groups before on prior deals where we brought on outside co-investors. This includes the direct investing groups at big domestic names you hear a lot (think Northwestern Mutual, Neuberger Berman, BlackRock, etc.) as well as a few SWF's that have direct investing groups. Some of these groups will do a ton of their own work and lean in hard on the PE firm running the deal while others are a little more high-level. This is all from my perspective of being the guy on the PE side who is partially responsible for managing their participation in a deal (e.g., fielding DD questions, walking them through models, presenting key findings of our 3rd party reports, etc.). When communicating interest in this space, I would not focus on making a move for a better lifestyle or work/life balance. Maybe try to spin it a different way where you find these types of roles appealing since there is more variety and learning opportunities by being exposed to a broader away of deals and partners' diligence styles.
To be clear, I am not advocating that you should abandon future PE prospects and look at a FoF/co-invest role instead - just saying you would be a strong candidate on paper if it's something you want to pursue. Going back to the initial topic, maybe think about listing out the biggest sources of stress are at your current job. Really think over that list and ask yourself if a lot of these are firm-specific issues or things that will likely be present at other PE firms. If the latter, is there a significant variance in degree of those issues? Maybe it's something that exists everywhere but you have good reason to believe it's a lot worse at your current firm vs. another shop? It certainly doesn't hurt to explore other PE opportunities just to see what your gut tells you (e.g., maybe culture at another shop appears to be a night/day difference from your current firm and that's enough to suggest a noticeable change in your lifestyle). I'm not saying you'll find this, just offering up more questions to think about.