Pros
IRM has a small firm feel despite significant headcount growth 2012-2015, managing principals and senior management seek to know their rank and file employees. Management genuinely cares about their folks, and trying to keep them happy. Culture and Flexibility is nice, maternity and paternity leave better than most other investment management firms. Vacation days good- includes summer Fridays, floating “skeleton” holidays. Team understands if I have a family/kid emergency. The firm has had significant growth over the past few years. Upward and team mobility has been OK. As AUM growth has slowed, it has been much harder for those who are ambitious to move around.
Kontras
There is a lot more politics than meets the eye here. Often the most successful here are not always the highest performers or qualified, but rather those who will not push back. Firm operates around what makes Managing Principals and their inner circle happy, comfortable and not challenging them. Critique is discouraged despite coming from colleagues genuinely seeking to ask tough questions to make the firm better. This breeds comfort with mediocrity and status-quo across some teams. Beware about being honest with feedback to/on your manager or colleagues, those with the courage to speak up for themselves have had their careers clipped over the years. Overall compensation will develop slower than peers. IRM strategy has been to hire younger, cheaper, or less experience at market level into the firm, but trajectory does not keep pace especially for the newer hires I’ve seen who have missed out the most from salary growth potential. Management attempts to keep people by advertising its unique culture/stability on the buy-side. Ultimately, that works for people looking to be comfortable, and keeping a seat warm. I would advise younger people to seek to understand what their career growth and role looks like over the next few years (title and salary) especially as total comp for most have been trending lower. The firm will dangle shareholder ownership as something to eventually aspire to make up for subpar compensation. In truth, it is not a meritocracy but an opaque, non-linear and very subjective process and who senior management wants to see in their inner circle. The exceptions are those who joined before the firm experienced the burst of growth in the years right after the Recession.