Hi all,
First time poster on WSO - benefited alot from reading this site years ago and decided now's a good a time as ever to give back.
I'm also considering launching a blog to share my thoughts on LT professional development in PE (vs. just getting in) and am keen to hear what people would like to see (e.g. core skills needed in the LT, investing frameworks in PE, deal closing aspects to master, communication etc.)
**Background **(whilst trying to balance with anonymity): - Target European Uni
Currently few years into PE, been at 2 different large cap funds (think >1bn transaction size) [Background before PE intentionally left out to maintain some anonymity (I have a somewhat unique profile)]
International background (lived and worked in > 3 different countries)
What got me into PE: always wanted to be an investor since high school. Joined to learn how to be one
- What I like about the industry: control / influence over real decision-making at company level, operational insight (how a biz actually runs day-to-day), LT investment thinking like an owner
What I dislike: a lot of process work (i.e. non-thinking) at almost all levels, low velocity of investing compared to public markets (close 1 big deal a year is an achievement), senior people who "made it" from politics / optics vs. real skill (back at a time when PE wasn't as big a thing), other high ego professionals who fulfill every negative finance stereotype out there (making the workplace that much more unpleasant and unbearable)
Ask away!
What's your advice for people like me who wants to transfer to Europe and work in a PE firm?
Really depends on your existing situation (are you already in a PE firm?).
If you are and its a global firm, ask for a transfer.
If you're not already in PE, I would focus on reaching out to European headhunters and focusing your interviewing efforts on American funds with a meaningful Europe office. To name a few - KKR, BX, Advent, Bain Capital, Apollo, TPG etc.
To be honest I've never found anything thats holistically prescriptive, with everything laid out in one source (hence my idea of creating content). I've scowered the internet and books looking for it, but with little luck.
The painful way I've done it is:
1) Reading Sponsor-led Buy-side / Sell-side IMs (given you're in a bank), Try and pick out elements of what people think as "positive" or "negative" for the investment case. HUGE caveats around: - a lot of the info is not getting to the crux of the investment thesis, but usually descriptive. Skip those sections entirely - Anything that has to do with exaggerated business plans / intentionally paint a rosey picture for the purposes of getting a good sale
2) Join as many Q&A calls with the buy-side as possible in your current job. It gives you an incredibly good flavour on what is a well balanced investment thought process (investor mindset is afterall, reliant on asking the right questions) - it will never be served to you on a silver platter, so you really have to invest the time and attention to squeeze out the highlights of the call
3) "Case Study" style extraction: backing out the frameworks
- Biz school books tend to have this. Grab this from any MBA friends you have, there should always be one - Consulting Case studies come close (although they lack the deep financial analysis in a real investment deal). They get you thinking about the right topics (market size & growth, competitive landscape etc. )
Short answer is that there's no easy textbook way of just absorbing everything in just a few resources - none that I've seen that goes into the actual depth anyway!
I'll answer your latter question first as it relates to the first question.
So if your end goal is PE in London, then definitely working on transactions and networking here does have a meaningful difference. Main reason is because deals in Asia and Europe are tremendously different .
To elaborate, PE transactions in Asia are more growth / minority style, and if you are in SEA thats even worse (so tiny it barely counts as an add-on in Europe). Even corporate M&A (non PE) transactions are not of the same complexity, size, scale. This matters from professional development / learning point of view - its just not the same working on a +1Bn transformational M&A vs. a 100m deal.
To your other question on recruiting from Asia - its definitely possible (seen many US and AUS folks interview and get in, so Asia is of course possible but less people seem to want to do so). That being said, its of course more ideal being in the same geography (all things equal) when it comes to Headhunting.