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I'm wanting to know what people think is better. Kaiser or ucla health for working as an admin staff. Ucla seems to have good pay from what I see on the job descriptions but kaiser only shows pay grade. Ucla has pension and a raise it seems every year. But I was alao told kaiser offers a dollar each year as a raise. I want a place I can grown and stsy Long term. Any one have any insight on kaiser and what they offered.UCLA Health Kaiser Permanente
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Anyone heard of Ten Oaks Group?
How much do VPs at Summit or TA make?
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Mentor
Joined PE Ops in UMM buyouts post MBB because it's the only job I've ever seen that truly combines investing, strategy and execution. I think I'd get bored if I only worked on one or two out of those.
Yes I am happy. It's what I expected and more.
I genuinely have fun and learn a lot everyday. I feel this job is positioning me very well to do whatever I want, including running a large company as CEO if I ever have the chance.
I feel valued by my deal colleagues and contribute with a complementary skillet. We work very closely together on both new and existing deals.
There's very little BS in my job. Almost everything I do is directly contributing to winning a deal or improving our companies. Very few slides and a lot of action.
Also the money has been a positive. I knew it was significantly better than the MBB path but it has exceeded my expectations. There's real wealth creation, especially if you're willing to stay for 5-7+ years and pick a strong performing fund that gives good carry to PE Ops.
One con which I knew before joining is that you work for much longer with the same company, sometimes 2+ years. Some people find that boring. I don't mind this and I actually like seeing the outcome of my actions and learning what actually works vs. what sounded good in theory but flunked.
I definitely lucked out as not every PE Ops role is like this.
P1- Can I dm you to learn more?
Why I joined: Combination of hating MBB and liking the longer term value creation view the PE firm pitched. Joined as VP in MM/UMM
Am I happy? More than I was at MBB but it’s not perfect.
On expectations: I didn’t really know what to expect. I have no team so I end up doing a lot of modeling and slide creation. This is fine for now but not what I want to do longer term. The lack of team and gaining management experience is what makes me think I will only be here a couple years. Typical project set up is me + Op Partner (usually former MBB) which means I’m doing the tactical stuff.
Pay is good so I’m fine with the BS parts of the job, but really questioning medium to long term here
Cash comp is equivalent to MBB for top rated EM/PL level (and is not variable based on performance) and then there is the carried interest on top (could be worth $1M+ but has long vesting schedule and is dependent on fund performance).
WLB is better than PE deal team, usually better than MBB, but can have pain points at times, I have no ability for leverage via a team which can hurt the WLB
I joined because I wanted to continue doing value creation work but without the bells and whistles that comes with consulting. Only after consulting do you realize how much time is wasted, like at least 60% of your time, doing internal firm work, BD, internal networking, 100 cycles completely wasted reviewing wording and deck visuals with partners, internal PMO calls, managing client optics, building slides, and how all of that time can be repurposed to actually helping a client. Now I can comfortably pull up a Google Doc with a portco exec and drill deep into issues and solutions without having to think about optics. Also in consulting there's always an ulterior motive when talking to clients because a) you're afraid of damaging the relationship and b) you want to sell additional work. I can speak freely now.
The thing I wasn't prepared for is that all operational problems now become your problem, at least to the extent that you're the first line of defense at the minimum. In consulting I sized plenty value creation scenarios and gave plenty recommendations on how clients can mobilize and execute. In portfolio ops, execution is now also your responsibility. Now I often find myself waist deep in labor dispute issues especially if you're dealing with unions, accounting operations, tax, supply chain issues not just at a plant level but at a widget, SKU and process level. Actually doing execution vs giving recommendations on what to execute on is a whole different galaxy of depth.
If a person likes to sit comfortably running scenarios, models and giving recommendations on slides then this isn't a role for them. It's a very hands on role. Portfolio ops sets you up much better for a future COO role than a Head of Strategy/Commercial/Revenue position.
tl;dr yes it can be better than consulting but it depends on the person
Do you enjoy being involved in the execution portion of your work? It seems it can be overwhelming.
PE Ops at PortCo here. Post-MBA and came over with significant functional experience. Have been at MF and MM companies, but now at a LMM co. Really enjoy working in a smaller company where you can drive impact a lot quicker. Pay is much better than previous companies, with opportunity to receive equity and invest.
I worked with multiple head hunters and gave types of roles and sizes of companies that I wanted to get into. Saw several offers come across in a period of six months.
Much better pay, WLB, and impact than all previous roles.
(Doesn’t have to be post consulting? Could be post industry as well). Please feel free to share
Thanks for the insightful responses C1, P1 and M1. What’s the best way to leadn more and eventually recruit into PE Ops?
Great stuff! Can someone also elaborate on how to break in? Especially at what rank/ YOE is the sweet spot?
Thanks for this breakdown C1- This is really good. I noticed the very few headhunters I had the chance to talk to in the past are looking for previous MBB experience. I will take a closer look at UMM funds. Can I ping you with some follow-up questions?
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