Help: What kind of careers in AM lead to management of people rather than portfolios?
I'm considering trying to enter a career in Asset Management given my strong interest in investing and the markets, but I know I won't be happy in the long run unless I am a manager of people (instead of portfolios). Aside from being a founder of my own asset management firm, are there other career paths that will eventually let me spend 30-40% of my time thinking about investing and 60-70% of my time managing people? My background is investment banking and corp dev as an analyst, but I keep coming back to wanting to be more involved in investing.
I think when you speak to any kind of fundamental portfolio manager, they'll tell you they only spend 50% of their time investing and the other 50% managing their analysts, marketing and business (if they're responsible for it). I get the impression that this holds less true for macro type products or fixed income (not credit fundamentals) because they won't delegate risk taking in the same way an equity PM (non quant) would.
Vagabond85 is spot on here.
I work in fixed income, and I can say that the PMs tend to spend just as much time worrying about their portfolio positioning as they do worrying about two other things: Bringing in more assets, and managing their analyst's recommendations. They spend a tremendous amount of time talking with clients, potential clients, etc. They also spend a tremendous amount of time having meetings with their coverage teams.
If you really want to only be about "the people" you could try to work as a PM for a few years and transition to a product CIO role, where you won't be running your own money at all, but rather managing the PMs...of course, this is a very prestigious job, so don't expect this to come easy.
There is always sales, which on the buyside means lots of travel, lots of pitches, and lots of talks with institutional investors. Its very much a eat-what-you-kill lifestyle, but can be very rewarding.
A final option would to become something like an account manager where your primary responsibility is to strengthen relationships with the client base.
All and all... no matter where you are in AM, you'll deal with people. The level of management you'll have over them varies, but this should get you started.
A common sentiment I've heard is that as you climb higher and higher in pretty much any career, your technical skillset will become less important than your managerial skillset. I too really enjoy managing people, so in my opinion, when trying to decide on a specific career path, pick an area where the subject matter will interest you the most; as you grow more successful, managing people will become a bigger part of your job.
Thank you guys for the advice. I guess I need to focus on getting good at investing (and getting an opportunity to get good at it) before I can look for ways to become a leader, but I'm glad to hear that there are leadership roles I can aspire to.
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