Give up Private Capital Advisory Associate role?

This summer, I'll finish my first year as an associate in private capital advisory (less placement agent and more advisory focused). I'm considering lateraling to IB. Doing so would require me to jump backwards to 2nd or 3rd year analyst. Would there be enough long-term benefits to justify making the jump? I'm leaning heavily towards b-school in a couple of years anyways. Would it be foolish to take this pay / title cut just to be in IB, especially when I could earn more for a couple years in PCA, go to b-school, and come out as an IB associate if that's what I still wanted to do? Thanks!

13 Comments
 

would you be moving to IB internally? and isn't PCA part of IB anyways at EBs?

 

Yes, it is considered IB normally, though it doesn't seem to have the same exit opps as normal banking which is one of the big motivators for the switch. From what I can tell, there's a decent opportunity to move to a secondaries PE firm, but it's a niche role. Moving to a more traditional IB seat might open up some additional options. That said, if the benefit to moving is marginal (and if I may go to grad school anyways), seems like it would be brutal to bounce around analyst roles for 4 years when I could already be chugging along as a 2nd year associate.

 

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