Should I tell IB partner about my intentions to move to PE?
I am in a bit of a dilemma. Currently I work at a very small lower middle market IB that mainly represents financial & strategic buyers, because of this the partner I work with has a lot of PE contacts. I have been with the firm for the past year as a sr. analyst and prior to that I was in a transaction advisory group of a public accounting firm for 3 years. As the PE recruiting season is coming up I plan to reach out to a few of the PE contacts that I had met and worked with during the year.
I would like your thoughts on whether I should contact those PE firms? and should I tell the partner that I am exploring opportunities in PE or should I wait till I have an offer?
Any thoughts, suggestions, criticism would be appreciated from the folks that have made the move to PE.
this is risky, if the partner knows/is close with the PE firm(s) you could be outed I am inclined to say don't tell him until the offer is on the table however.
It all depends on your relationship with the partner you mentioned. If you have a good relationship and you think that he will support your career move, you should actually reach out to him first and ask him if he can help you to get in touch with his contacts. I think it's better this way, because some people get really emotional in these cases for some reason.
Not exactly same, but I once had a good experience with a partner at a MM IB boutique I interned at. I was in the similar position as I was trying to get into summer analyst programs at BBs. I applied without telling the particular partner and waited for replies. As I was late in the cycle I didn't get many calls. For some reason the guy invited me to lunch and I ended up asking him for help a few days later and he got me an interview at his old BB's M&A division that turned into a summer analyst position.
This will entirely depend on your relationship with the partner. If he's serving as a mentor to you and you guys have a great relationship, then you better reach out to him first. He will see it as respect and his duty to help you out.
But if the relationship is shallow and strictly work related then you need to tread carefully to see if this guy is possessive or not. After all, you are talking about going after his clients for a job and from my experience, guys that are possessive of their talents will rather burn you than to help you.
Thanks for the advice everyone. I am having lunch with the partner in a few weeks and I will try to bring up the issue indirectly discussing my career path.
I will post on this thread with any updates.
Thanks again for all the help.
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