FIT | Qualitative

Question 1

What are your strengths?

Answer 1

• Persistence

- Perspective / Leading by example

Question 2

What are your weaknesses?

Answer 2

• Getting lost in the details

- Self-Promotion

Question 3

Why did you decide to leave Goldman and go to b-school?

Answer 3

• I really wanted to have a long-term perspective on my career
• I put my head down and had a really myopic focus on getting to my goal of a role in sales & trading
• I could have easily stayed in my old role and been complacent but that wasn’t going to help me grow

Question 4

What project are you most proud of from this summer?

Answer 4

Thermo Fisher

• Preparation of a roughly 40 page deck in preparation for a coverage meeting
• section on coverage from equity research community
• section on recent M&A and opportunities as well as its positioning relative to some competitors
• 19 page appendix with 19 one page profiles for potential acquisition targets

Question 5

Why Centerview?

Answer 5

o I’ve always considered myself to be ambitious and persistent; through sports and career
- Wanted to surround myself with smartest people
- it will challenge me but also make me better
- when i look at centerview, i see that combination
– small shop, no balance sheet, no suite of products
– intellectual capital but also relationship capital
o Focus on advisory and providing the best possible solutions
o Culture of retaining people: career move

Question 6

Moelis Experience

Answer 6

o Option 1
 Had a generally positive experience
 They’re moving away from a generalist model asking people to pick teams earlier
 But I ended up being aligned with a team in life sciences and biotech which is not where I wanted to focus
 I expressed that discomfort in my review meetings
o Option 2
 I had a family emergency right in the middle of my summer
 I was staffed on a very tough project that overlapped with this emergency
 I talked this through with HR who then disseminated through to my staffer

Question 7

Questions for Us

Answer 7

What was your favorite transaction?
What was the first project you worked on?
What’s your single best piece of advice for post-MBA associates?
What else can help clarify for you? Is there anything you would like to drill deeper on?
I want to reiterate how much i want this opportunity. I want to make sure i leave you knowing that is something i really want and care a lot about.

Question 8

Why Restructuring?

Answer 8

• From a personal perspective:
  a. sense of urgency: corporate bureaucracy gets thrown out the window in times of distress
  b. opposite end of the spectrum in terms of where i’m coming from; i see that as opportunity to add value
  c. relationships matter: competing priorities across capital structure and between debtor and creditor
• From a macroeconomic perspective:
  a. great time to learn
  b. one of longest but slowest expansions in history
  c. spread per unit of leverage on 1st lien LBO loans lowest since crisis

Question 9

What do you like to do outside of work?

Answer 9

• Exercise
• • Running, Cycling, Hot Yoga, Pick up Basketball
• Reading
• • Biographies: Path to Power - story of LBJ