What do LMM private equity firms look for when hiring?

Anybody work at a LMM or MM PE firm or have insight into what it takes to break in? Assuming some use PE recruiters, but maybe more off-cycle at some of these firms? Does it take M&A deal experience to break in? Can you network your way into interviews?

For context, currently An1 at a lower-tier (balance sheet) bank in a coverage IB role (Mizuho/SMBC/HSBC/Truist) with minimal deal flow and curious about what exit opportunities may exist should I choose to leave

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I interned at a LMM shop. They're usually stretched thin with resources (i.e., training materials, templates, etc.) and don't have the time nor interest to train people so they demand associates to be very modeling proficient and have done a handful of deals where they ran the model. 

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