Goldman Sachs Principal Investment Area (GS PIA) Interview

I interviewed with Goldman real estate PIA; there were two rounds. My experience was probably unusual because the interviews were almost all fit, which could stem from the fact that it was a real estate group - pretty specialized. There were two rounds - one on campus and then a super day with four interviews and a lunch.

You will have to be lucky to find any deals done by PIA - they act like a private equity group, so there won't be much coverage unless the deal is particularly large. I'd focus much more on preparing your response to "why do you want to work in this division of PIA," but that's just my experience.

Hope this helps.

Recent GS PIA deal was the acquisition of Michael Foods (egg producer) from TH Lee.

Thanks a lot for your answers so far!
powers99, I guess your were interviewing for a summer internship and not off-cycle?

If you are looking at their "buyout group" the interviews will be very technical in nature. High stress/pressure interviews with some quick mental math required (sometimes complex). Tend to hire straight out of other GS groups.

Similar experience to powers99 with two rounds of interviews. My second round super day consisted of four 2-on-1 interviews, mainly fit questions. Best recommendation is to be yourself, be honest about all experiences (they will dig deep into everything you say), and have a memorable story for why you want to do PIA.

What office is this for?

REPIA interviews were entirely fit with almost no technical questions.... that was for 2nd year analyst.

Going for a final round with GS PIA SA (London). Anyone got some info how it will be different from and IBD interview when it comes to technicals?

Thanks

When's your interview? I had mine with them last Friday - expect lots of accounting-related questions.

Just to add some more depth, I had prepared my experiences/cv and was ready to talk principal investing in general - but I was thrown off when they skipped all of that and wanted me to talk about LBO modelling in granular detail.

GS PIA last summer in London offered... 0 full time positions. They had almost 10 interns! for the good ones, they offered a job in IBD

Final round in London. Three itw in a row with 1 or 2 employees: you can expect a lot of brain teasers and business cases, and of course the classic finance questions & motivation questions!

Do you know why they don't offer FT positions to the interns?

They interns were prob not stellar (still very good) - those groups tend to only offer FT to the best of the best... typically only giving out a few SA offers, surprise to hear almost 10 - though it was London... in NYC, almost impossible to secure a SA from PIA.

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Does anyone know if GS PIA (any industry group) has any other locations besides NYC like Los Angeles or SanFran? I believe PIA (from their website) has a tech venture fund in SF but no other mention of anything on the west coast.

Thanks for the help!

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Does GS PIA take summers/undergrads in NY or is it just London?