Getting in
I am looking for some advise for someone looking to get into PE and would be very grateful for advice from someone in the industry.
My Background: 29 years old, 5 yrs experience (1 yr audit, 4 yrs in corp fin: project financing and corp development : modeling, screen targets, valuation, acquire and post acquisition integration), education: Bcom in accounting, CPA, CFA level 1 done. I have no intention of doing an MBA before looking for a job in PE.
1) Should I apply for associate positions? They ask for 2-3 yrs exp as analyst but I have 5, would I essentially be scraping some of my experience by accepting an associate position?
2) In my corp. development role, I work for a company in an industry very praised by PE firms (high stability of CFs, high margin) should I apply directly to PE firms that have a history of interest in my industry or go through a headhunter?
3) I am looking to move in June or after. Is it too early to start looking? Is there a hiring cycle in PE or is it done pretty much anytime during the year?
All commments are appeciated, thx.
1) Without an MBA and no prior PE experience, you would only be qualified for pre-mba associate positions, despite the number of years you've been working.
2) Why not do both? Apply directly to firms you know of and also speak with recruiters. Ask recruiters what types of funds would be most receptive to your background. If you're looking to join bigger funds you may have to temper your expectations, but a recruiter can help steer you in the right direction. 3) For summer 2008 hires, it's not too early to start looking. Although I would say close to all summer 2008 offers have been made, but you will most definitely encounter firms that have unexpected openings for this summer if you're patient. The hiring cycle for most PE pre-mba wise starts in April and ends in October (most of the offers are made well before then, during the summer).
Some general comments: With your background, breaking into PE will be an uphill battle for most firms, but not impossible. Like I said before, it's possible that you may have to focus on smaller funds that are more open to people with different backgrounds and experience aside from your traditional banking/consulting path. In your corp dev role if you have actually been a part of a transaction (the bigger and more complex, the better...tuck-in's will most likely not count for much) from beginning to end (modeling/valuation, diligence, legal and closing items) you will be MUCH more marketable.
GameTheory,
thx, I appreciate your input. Do you have good recruiters names that you would be willing to share? I am open to relocation so I don't mind where they operate.
If you want to get out of Corpfin and improve your employment options, better just go ahead and get that MBA. That's what they're for.
ehf3660,
I would go for an MBA right now but I can't afford to take a couple years off to spend 50-100K. In a few years if supported by my employer then sure.
ehf3660 - I'm not sure if I agree with getting the MBA first. There's no guarantee that he'd be able to land a PE position with no prior banking or PE experience, even coming from a highly recruited top-tier MBA. In fact, from Wharton I know of about 3 people that managed to land jobs in PE without prior PE experience, but all of them had banking or M/B/B consulting. If he can get his foot in the door at a small PE shop, it may open up doors to lateral to a slightly bigger shop without getting his MBA, or entry into a top-tier B-school that would allow him to move to a bigger shop if he so chose down the line.
Simasima - if you want to focus on some of the bigger shops, which quite frankly I wouldn't recommend, the top recruiters are SG Partner, CPI, and Oxbridge. But plenty of regional recruiters specialize in smaller PE. While I don't have any specific names for you, it's not hard to find them by just doing a search.
Why don't you recommend the the big shops? What do you see as pros/cons between small/medium/big shops that makes you prefer smaller?
I know that the bigger ones make you work as much as in IB but the compensation commensurates which ultimately makes it a lifestyle choice.
Someone else told me to aim for medium or boutique because I would have a better chance at landing a position like senior associate or AVP, whereas in a bigger place the only option would be associate.
I only recommend focusing on smaller shops because it's a good way to break into PE with your background, which is not the prototypical background for PE. The bigger, more structured shops will look for more typical PE backgrounds (there is so much competition and demand for these jobs that they can afford to pick the best candidates from a prototypical background without much regard to anything else).
It's possible that a smaller shop (100-300mm) may bring you on as a senior associate, it all depends on how they view your experience. But for a bigger shop (>750mm) unfortunately I think pre-mba associate is the best you could hope for. I don't think you should be unhappy with taking what you might feel or perceive is a step backwards to get to your ultimate goal, though. Many 3rd year banking associates would gladly take a step back to 1st year post-mba associate at some PE shops.
Wow I didn't realize it was such slim pickings out of top Bschools for PE with no previous PE backgroud.
Depends on the b-school. Wharton and Harvard tend to place the most non-experienced students into PE simply because the breadth of their on-campus recruiting. Even then, it's not many. From a firm perspective, why even waste your time with someone with no PE experience if you have so many qualified candidates beating down your door? At Columbia, for example, I've heard it's exponentially harder to land PE jobs without experience.
Yeah Columbia is obviously a great business school, and if you go there you are in great shape to get a top-tier consulting or ibanking job postMBA. However for the buy-side it is SO much harder compared to H/S/W, from what I hear. Even within the top 3, it is really brutal; for example, much easier to get into VC from Stanford, slightly easier to get into PE from Harvard, Wharton with no real advantage over the other two. This is all second-hand info, but it's from the associates who I work with who have all gone to the schools mentioned.
I spoke to a former summer associate of mine who's at Wharton and ran through the list of PE firms that come to recruit at Wharton or expressed interest in Wharton students. I came away pretty impressed. Most of them were small or shops that I'd never heard of, but there were a good 50 to 75 names.
Game Theory .... Good stuff!
all things above correct. would add also that these days international experience / language can help a lot, if you have right profile and are willing to go to eastern europe, latam, china/india etc. For the US, would say that to go to any decent shop you need to do banking/MBB before.
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