This is a really tricky one a lot of candidates make assumptions on what a fund will be like or where they would like to work.

I think it's incredibly hard to know what kind of fund is right for you without going and meeting a number of them.

The trouble is every fund expects you to already know why they are the fund for you.

We work really hard with funds to remind them that when they were looking themselves. They probably didn't have an exact idea of where they wanted to be. My best advice is to work out what you enjoy in your current role the most.

If you like banking, but no you want to be in PE long term then a large fund with a structured associate program is probably a good shout if you want to get straight into working more closely with management teams and a little Jaded by banking then a smaller fund environment might work being PE. It's never quite as simple as this though, as some large cap funds have very small sector teams and you can get huge exposure very early on.

Basically try not to make assumptions.

We very often end up placing candidates into Mega funds who thought they wanted mid-market and vice versa. It normally takes a bit of trial and error.