Ex Apollo Associate Q&A (But I Actually Answer)

My little sister sent me the other ex-Apollo Q&A thread today, and I didn’t realize so many people were interested in the firm. I was a mid-tier associate some time in the 2010s, who did not particularly enjoy my experience and left ASAP for other opportunities. I recruited on-cycle from an IB / Ivy background, receiving a number of megafund offers and ultimately chose Apollo.


I do have many friends who stayed and have a good understanding of how Apollo and other MFs operate. Happy to answer any questions as I remember trolling this website for info when I was an undergrad. As an FYI, I will not be responding to any salacious questions about the firm as most of us sign an NDA when we leave, and I rather not piss anyone off.


Edit (April 21): hopefully was helpful answering some questions, and hopefully my sister and her friends enjoyed it. Probably it for me on the questions. I don’t use this forum much, so apologies to any messages that I don’t respond to

 

Athene was the most important deal team even when I was at the firm, long before any merger / Marc taking the helm. The top associate from PE was usually put on the team in my time, but I believe the insurance team is now separate.

Hard to dive in too deep over a quick forum response, but I think the focus on balance sheet financial businesses will continue. Hard for PE to be the growth driver for the firm over the next 10 years when your strategy is buying mediocre / bad businesses for low prices. Cannot scale $$$ in PE with that strategy

 

How do you decide which associate to sacrifice at the end of the year?

 

If we are interested in public markets, do you think Apollo HF exits are unparalleled and worth the year or two or suffering or would you recommend a less painful route through other MFs where we may get marginally fewer looks.

In other words, how difficult was it to recruit out and leave early? (have heard of Apollo's stance against it)

 

Don’t think there will be a meaningful difference in the exit opportunities you see from Apollo or other MF. And realistically, with how competitive the recruiting is now, very few analysts will have the opportunity to get more than a couple MF offers and “optimize”. Would just hope to get lucky and convert a few you like, choosing whichever is the best fit personally

 

Best kept secret is that last few years hours have not been bad at all. However, like many firms, there was significant over-hiring which resulted in many associates having a less than productive few years. 

 

I probably worked 90 hours a week regularly and hit 110 in bad times. I did not like it, and I knew I would be leaving which led to not really caring.

The best associates honestly did work an insane number of hours from what I saw. I have heard that these hours do not happen anymore

 

I honestly can’t remember many divorces or other negative family life stories. But the relationship with our bosses was very professional, almost no personal interactions especially outside of work. So I wouldn’t know much apart from bullpen rumors

 

Associates get no carry. APO associate program is 4-years. ~$400-700k (sr associate at that top range - but remember - that is equivalent to VP at other places where there is carry). It's not all cash and there is deferral. 

 

How would you describe the culture back in the day, is it as bad as people says it to be

NOL
 

No relaxed days - always a ton of work to go around. Not much to do = new staffing immediately. Busy days are similar to the busy days at other PE firms I’m sure.

I think things are a bit better WLB-wise now. My associate class was <5 and shrunk quickly when myself and others left. Now associate classes are ~10 and attrition rate is much lower

 

Do you think Apollo’s value oriented strategy is sustainable in the long term? Rowan talks about how PE is not a core focus of the firm because it is a growing segment but not a growth segment. How do you think this impacts the experience and exposure of associates coming in, both for the associate program itself and in terms of career trajectory (whether that is upwards or outwards)?

 

While not many IB analysts have a strong view on their personal investment philosophy yet, I’d recommend trying to form some range of preference in investment style before choosing a PE firm. It’s hard to be excited about work when you like a different type of investing to what your firm does

 

Are they likely to get return offers to Associates who go to HBS? I’m also curious about their policy on recruiting from business schools — seems like they take a few each year from HW

 

Can you provide examples of what exactly makes the culture so notorious?

Define 110 hours of constant work - how? In banking people throw around 90-100 but at least 30 of those are FaceTime / dicking off.

Hours aside - I saw a comment that seniors treat associates as resources and have no interaction. Do they flat out ignore when walking by? No wholesome Partners / diamonds in the rough?

What are some of the more legendary culture stories (insane bullying / antics / behaviour)?

Do you feel like you have a leg up having worked there or in retrospect do you not think your stint was worth it?

Finally, do you feel you learned good lessons as an investor or is the approach very unique to something only a firm like Apollo can do?

 

Oh come on there’s gotta be some stories pre-2010 that still circulate the office that aren’t part of an NDA that you can share.

Otherwise thanks and look forward to responses to other Qs.

 

Longer response for some good questions.

The work load and culture are of course very closely tied together. I’d say both were negatively impacted by staffing and mentality of senior people during my tenure there. Apollo has 3 titles in flagship PE: associate, principal, and partner. Teams are usually staffed with 1 person at each level, and during my time, there were more partners than associates. You can imagine how that crushes associates based on pure numbers. That ratio has now improved thankfully.

The second is mentality of senior people. The environment at the firm was always very sink or swim. APO only needs 1 superstar per class or maybe even less to fill their partner ranks. Why not load associates with as much as possible when you’re hoping for a decently high attrition rate anyway? The ones that survive will be incredibly prepared and stellar, the others couldn’t cut it. What they maybe missed in the early 2010s is that the economy changed drastically from the 2007 - 2011 they lived through where Apollo was by far the best job in investing + there were no jobs in general for anyone. By the mid 2010s, the economy was so hot an APO associate had so many opportunities that they weren’t as willing to put up with the grind. The firm adapted - hire more and try to improve culture.

As to what 110 hours of work a week look like, there was always endless work. If every partner is looking at 3 deals and screening 10 more, that’s a lot of work for an associate. During a live deal, the flat structure meant you learned a lot, but the work was brutal. Model, diligence, memo, financing, legal, you know the drill, but a huge portion of work on the associate. The flat structure also meant very little down time waiting for comments - your work was expected to be thoughtful and accurate.

As to whether or not I would do it again, personally no. There were certainly benefits to me, mainly Apollo name brand, the broader associate class network / friends, and some good training. I feel like I could have gotten similar things from other MF offers I had, in an environment / investment style that worked better for me. I also didn’t have the work ethic, efficiency, horse power to full absorb the training. Half of us were just drowning trying to complete the work on our plate without much understanding.

Many of my peers who have either stayed or left for other opportunities disagree with me and would chose to join APO again. I’ll give you a positive story since you seem to be after some good anecdotes. An associate in a different class worked as a PE associate but also often worked with Rowan directly. Don’t know when he slept - 4 am nights and he had a standing 7 am with Marc at least 3 days a week. I’m sure he would not have traded his level of exposure / training / learning for other firms

 

I’ll answer this as well. It’s been said elsewhere in this thread but there were a few carriers of poor culture near the top and most have departed for one reason or another. Josh Harris once requested a deal team meeting, in person (for no reason in particular other than he would be in), on Thanksgiving morning with notice going out late the night before. I haven’t seen anything like this since he left. One of the partners I work with now routinely tells associates to log off by midnight latest, the rationale being they’ll do better work in the morning anyways.

 

Why are there so many ex-Apollos at Tiger. One is deep value and the other is growth so doesnt seem to add up

 

How is the real estate group perceived, in terms of returns, comp, progression, etc. I am in corporate buyout but particularly interested in moving into this group

 

Small business for Apollo and not a core focus from my time at the firm. Would probably suggest another firm if real estate is your passion.

Apollo does do a lot of RMBS and CMBS if that’s interesting for you. “Opportunistic Real Estate” is one of their smallest buckets I believe

 

A lot of positives: 1) clearly the growth area for the firm, 2) a lot of other firms have exited FIG, so seems like an interesting area if you don’t believe FIG companies are now a highly regulated commodity low return business, 3) people who are in charge of that group are great, 4) exposure to Rowan regularly - sink or swim, but if you swim it’ll be great learning and career

Cons are that the work is complicated, some would say boring, and certainly esoteric and nontransferable to many other opportunities 

 

Pretty competitive to make junior partner, very competitive to make senior partner. I was never going to make partner at Apollo, because I was not a good personality fit and I didn’t enjoy the investment strategy. People who make partner are very strong performers who give their life to firm, or some small cases nepotism. Some very strong performers are even more ambitious and start their own shops.

I’m still in investing - seniorish person at another investment firm.

 

Estimate is a bit high because funds most likely wouldn’t turn that quickly and a large portion is deferred / vesting. But would it be theoretically possible for an absolute superstar that makes senior partner quickly? Probably

More likely you hope to make partner at 34 which most won’t, and you hope to make it to a second fund

The fund sizes aren’t growing - when you make partner, you are taking dollars out of another partner’s pocket. Not as easy and friendly as most think to earn the top $$

 
Most Helpful

Disclaimer: I also worked there (within last 7 years, not saying more beyond that) and got the numbers out of a senior guy one night.

They said $30-45MM of headline carry (for someone who’s been in the partner seat for ~3-5 years already, meaning they’re in their mid 30s, meaning they won’t receive this carry until their 40s), ~50% of which will they expect to actually end up being paid out, and almost 100% of that payout needs to be committed to the next fund. So annualized $4-5m including cash base and bonus. But this is obviously back-weighted. The senior partners make more, though most people with the partner title get pushed out before they become senior partner. He didn’t know headline carry for a senior partner, but I’d estimate around $50-70MM, where ~50% of that ends up being paid out. Keep in mind there’s a really big delta between headline carry and what actually ends up being paid out

 

I’m sure we could objectively measure somehow, but I can’t remember one time my former colleagues and I have thought about this when hanging out now. We’re all doing pretty well and once you’re 30+, you’re usually thinking about family, wife, etc rather than who has a better resume

 

Were seniors cool with writing references for bschool given the culture against MBA?

 

What qualities on paper made you stand out back in the days? What % of the 4 year Asso classed got promoted to Principal? Did any female Asso/Principal start a family/ kids during the time? 

 

I think MFs generally care about your banking group, school, and scores on paper. Apollo probably bit less school than other MFs now. It’ll be your performance in interviews that matters more, although of course if you’re a superstar on paper, you can play it a bit safer in interviews.

There were no (maybe a few?) women associates at the firm until 2014 or 2015. I think they’ve done better hiring more senior and junior women on the investment team these days

 

Genuine question - what percentage of the firm do you estimate is made up of psychopath/sociopath types?

 

1. Do you know anything about their Hybrid Value strategy and the future outlook of this fund within Apollo? Is it going to be a larger focus going forward? Do they dabble at all in public markets (distressed /stressed public credit)?

2. Were you involved in recruiting at all - specifically on-cycle? What does Apollo typically focus on in candidates, do they do anything unique or different relative to other MFs, and any other insight into this process given they fill majority of their spots on-cycle these days?

 

Hybrid value became a much bigger thing in recent years - I don’t know too much about it besides the goal is to offer a product similar to BX Tact Opps. Probably more growth here than flagship buyout.

With regards to Apollo recruiting, my experience from both sides of the table are that it’s very similar to other MFs. I don’t remember anything being particularly different as the interviewee or interviewer, maybe a tiny bit more aptitude needed on investing across capital structure 

 

Hybrid Value (HVF) is a private-oriented preferred and non-control equity platform first and foremost. They do have the ability to do public investing and distressed, but have never actually deployed a single dollar there in their (short) history. All public corporate distressed is handled either out of flagship PE or opportunistic credit.

 

Thanks for doing this - could you share a bit more about your experience going through and interviewing candidates for on-cycle? Is it just standard technicals, LBO from scratch, and a case study? Anything else noteworthy, and any tips to stand out during the interviews?

Also, how did you practice developing the across the cap structure investment perspectives during your interview prep?

 

I personally think PE recruiting has become silly with how early on-cycle is now. We recruited a year into our banking year, so there was a lot more content to talk about in interviews and the MFs more or less knew our reputations in our banking groups. It’s always been a crapshoot but more so now than ever.

I generally try to get a sense for a candidates aptitude, investment acumen and interest, and work ethic. Prepare all the basics you’ve listed of course, but if you can standout as memorable in some of those other traits, you’ll probably do well

 

Did you ever do any cross staffing with the LA office? Or were they mostly their own unit?

 

Not specifically Apollo related, but what is your general sense of PE for the next 20 years? Can firms achieve similar fund returns in a bloated, high IR environment? Do you think this is still the golden path for those in Finance to pursue for the foreseeable future?

 

Not OP. Time will tell. I heard Marc Rowan once tell a senior partner “I’ve seen you invest for 30 years and I still don’t know if you’re any good” (i.e. citing the 30-year bull market in rates making everyone look good). Ultimately the value-oriented Apollo PE model relies less on expanding multiples (largely a function of declining rates) than most other PE orientations. Apollo benefitted less than others on the way down, and will (probably) do ok at least relatively on the way up.

 

Thank you so much for these great insights! I am curious if MF PE people with "high horsepower" take supplements, ranging from the more prevalent Vitamin D3/Vitamin K2/Magnesium/Omega-3 to the less common options such as Alpha GPC, particularly the one mentioned above who "slept 4 a.m. nights and had a standing 7 a.m. with Marc at least three days a week."

 

I don't think anything about them or interact with them much. S3 is almost effectively a different firm with externally-hired leadership and an information wall between them and the rest of the firm (an intuitive requirement to receive information on competitor funds and positions). Apollo is unique for having no internal information walls of any kind (between PE, Infra, HVF, Credit, Athene, etc) - S3 (and Atlas actually) however sit outside the circle of trust.

 

I don't think anything about them or interact with them much. S3 is almost effectively a different firm with externally-hired leadership and an information wall between them and the rest of the firm (an intuitive requirement to receive information on competitor funds and positions). Apollo is unique for having no internal information walls of any kind (between PE, Infra, HVF, Credit, Athene, etc) - S3 (and Atlas actually) however sit outside the circle of trust.

S3 has pitched this before as being a one-way wall.  Ie; S3 can see all Apollo things, but other Apollo can't see S3 stuff.   Not sure if true.  

 

Only thing I like about banking is how people share in the misery / form friendships through the late nights and silly asks at the AN/ASSOC level.

How was junior camaraderie doing your assoc years? Did you have friends in bullpen? Were people backstabbing each other? Constantly competing with one another? Any comparison points to banking?

 

Going to retype this just to further reiterate. This is one of the dumbest questions I've ever read.

 

Assuming you can make snr partner there implicitly assumes you’re fishing for right tail events.

Even then, I can say with reasonable certainty that a LO partner track, career in tier 1 HFs, or career at a scaling MM PE fund (maybe one going from MM —> UMM) will all net you more than whatever you’d make at APO. Not sure whey everyone tends to think prestige has 100pct correl w/ comp

 

Feels like the Apollo experience becomes a sunk cost in that career choice. Why spend a grueling 2-3 years working as an Associate at Apollo to get a job at a MMHF whereas you could have gone straight to one from banking. Not really applicable in anyway 

 

I mean he doesnt look all that pudgy. Anyone confirm if he is a short king as described by the book?

 

Just wanted to say you're the fucking man for actually delivering where so many have flaked!

"The obedient always think of themselves as virtuous rather than cowardly" - Robert A. Wilson | "If you don't have any enemies in life you have never stood up for anything" - Winston Churchill | "It's a testament to the sheer belligerence of the profession that people would rather argue about the 'risk-adjusted returns' of using inferior tooth cleaning methods." - kellycriterion
 
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