Private equity associate jobs, pay and recruiting
Most of the junior investing roles these firms post are associate roles, for people with one to three years of experience somewhere else, most often an investment bank. This page lists every one that was posted in the United States on November 11, 2026, with the experience it asks for and the base it states, and then sets out what firms have said on the record about how associate recruiting works.
15 of 37 listed programs match · Last verified November 11, 2026 · See the full Private Equity List →
Associate roles posted on November 11, 2026
Every junior associate-level investing role in the United States on these firms’ own boards, with the experience line and the base as posted. The largest buyout firms are missing because none of them had a private equity associate role posted.
| Firm | Role, as posted | Experience asked for | Base salary | City | Posted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bain Capital | Associate, Insurance Private Equity | 2–3 years with an investment banking or venture capital/private equity firm | Not stated on the posting | Boston | November 5, 2026 |
| Vista Equity Partners | 2027 Private Equity Associate, Chicago | Undergraduate degree completed in 2025 or earlier; 2+ years in investment banking, private equity or growth equity preferred | $120k–$150k | Chicago | November 10, 2026 |
| Vista Equity Partners | 2027 Private Equity Associate, Austin | Undergraduate degree completed in 2025 or earlier; 2+ years in investment banking, private equity or growth equity preferred | Not stated on the posting | Austin | November 10, 2026 |
| Partners Group | Associate, Private Equity, Goods & Products | Not stated on the posting | $155k–$175k | Broomfield | October 18, 2026 |
| General Atlantic | Associate, Life Sciences | 2–5 years of post-graduate experience, at least 2 in life sciences | $150k–$160k | New York | April 27, 2026 |
| Summit Partners | Associate (2027): Investment Team | Most associates have two to three years of experience, typically investment banking, direct investing or consulting | $150k–$160k | Boston and Menlo Park | May 1, 2026 |
| Blue Owl | Blue Owl Technology Solutions, Technology Growth Investing, Associate | 1–3 years in investing, investment banking or consulting | $90k–$175k | Menlo Park | November 3, 2026 |
| Blackstone | Blackstone Credit & Insurance - Chief Investment Office, Portfolio Management, Associate | 2+ years | $120k–$150k | New York | September 2, 2026 |
| Blackstone | Blackstone Credit & Insurance – LCS, Restructuring, Senior Associate | 2+ years in restructuring, distressed or special situations | $140k–$170k | New York | July 17, 2026 |
| KKR | US Credit Solutions Group (Private Credit/Direct Lending), Associate/Analyst | 3+ years of full-time experience in investment banking, credit, lending or buyside roles | $150k–$175k | New York | February 4, 2026 |
| Apollo Global Management | Associate, Consumer ABF | 2–4 years | $175k–$200k | El Segundo | November 3, 2026 |
| Carlyle | 2-Year Associate, Direct Lending (Summer 2027) | 2 to 3 years in direct lending, leveraged finance, restructuring, credit investing or M&A | $150k | New York | October 13, 2026 |
| Carlyle | 2-Year Associate, Asset-Backed Finance | 1–3 years of finance experience | $150k | New York | October 22, 2026 |
| Carlyle | Associate, Liquid Credit Research | 1–3 years of buy-side credit or sell-side research preferred | $150k | New York | October 30, 2026 |
| Ares Management | Associate, Credit, US Direct Lending | Minimum of 1.5 years of investment banking or principal investing experience by the start date | $130k–$175k | New York | October 8, 2026 |
| Ares Management | Associate, Credit, US Direct Lending | Minimum of 1.5 years by the start date | $130k–$175k | Los Angeles | October 8, 2026 |
| Ares Management | Associate, Alternative Credit | 3+ years | $130k–$175k | New York and Atlanta | June 24, 2026 |
| Ares Management | Associate, Infrastructure Debt | 2–3 years | $155k–$165k | New York | September 11, 2026 |
| Partners Group | Associate, Private Credit | 2+ years in an investment role (private credit or private equity), debt advisory or investment banking | $155k–$175k | Broomfield | November 4, 2026 |
| Partners Group | Associate, Private Credit | 2+ years in an investment role (private credit or private equity), debt advisory or investment banking | $170k–$195k | New York | November 4, 2026 |
| Audax Group | Associate, Private Debt | 2–4 years in investment banking, direct lending, private credit, structured credit or leveraged finance | $110k–$150k | New York | July 17, 2026 |
| Blue Owl | Alternative Credit, Credit Secondaries – Analyst / Associate | 1–3+ years | $110k–$165k | New York | November 3, 2026 |
| Blue Owl | Alternative Credit, Investment Professional | 2+ years | $125k–$175k | New York | November 3, 2026 |
| Golub Capital | Analyst (or Associate) - Direct Lending | 1 to 3 years in leveraged credit or investment banking | $185k–$200k (Associate) | Chicago and New York | November 2, 2026 |
| Golub Capital | Analyst (or Associate) - Direct Lending | 1 to 3 years in leveraged credit or investment banking | $160k–$165k (Analyst) | Chicago and New York | November 2, 2026 |
| Sixth Street | Asset Based Finance Platform Associate | 1–4 years in finance or investment banking, financial institutions focus | $150k–$200k | New York | September 23, 2026 |
| Bain Capital | Associate - Special Situations | 2 years with an investment manager, consulting firm, investment bank or private equity firm | $150k | Boston and New York | September 24, 2026 |
| Brookfield | Associate, Investments (Energy) | 2–4 years in investment banking, infrastructure investing or a related field | $150k–$200k | New York | September 9, 2026 |
| Brookfield | Associate, Infrastructure AI | Experience in investment banking, restructuring, TMT or infrastructure investments; no number of years is stated | $150k–$200k | New York | September 16, 2026 |
Base salary only; no posting states a bonus figure. Titles are the firms’ own: Golub’s Analyst and KKR’s Associate/Analyst both ask for prior experience.
Who gets hired, in the firms’ own words
Nearly every associate posting we read asks for prior experience and names investment banking first. Vista’s 2027 class asks for “2+ years of relevant experience in investment banking, private equity, growth equity, or a related field preferred”. Bain Capital’s insurance private equity team asks for “2-3 years of experience with an investment banking or venture capital/private equity firm”. Summit Partners says “Most Associates have two-to-three years of professional, quantitatively-based experience (typically from investment banking, direct investing, or consulting, although we invite other backgrounds to apply).”
The credit postings read the same way. Ares asks for a “Minimum of 1.5 years of relevant investment banking or principal investing experience by the start date”, Golub Capital for “1 to 3 years of experience in leveraged credit or investment banking”, and Carlyle for “2 to 3 years of experience in direct lending, leveraged finance, restructuring, credit investing, or M&A”.
Some associate seats are fixed-term. Carlyle’s is a “formal 2-Year Associate program”, and Summit says “The Associate position requires a three-year commitment.” Vista’s associates “join a structured class cohort with a formal training curriculum”.
Recruiting years ahead: what firms have said on the record
The largest firms have recruited associates out of banks’ analyst classes long before the job starts. Firms rarely describe this in public, but in June 2025 two of them did. Apollo wrote to candidates: “Hiring decisions at Apollo are among the most significant to our business. With that in mind, we will not formally interview and extend offers this year for the class of 2027.” General Atlantic said it “does not plan to conduct formal interviews or extend offers this year for the Associate Class of 2027.” Both statements were quoted by Banking Dive on June 12, 2025; we read the article, not the letters.
Apollo’s chief executive, Marc Rowan, gave the reason in a statement quoted in the same article: “Recruiting has crept earlier and earlier every year, and asking students to make career decisions before they truly understand their options doesn’t serve them or our industry.” The article also reported that JPMorgan told incoming analysts they would be fired for accepting a future-dated offer “with another company before joining us or within your first 18 months.”
The most recent statement we know of comes to us second-hand. Business Insider reported on October 15, 2026 that an Apollo memo said: “for the Associate Class of 2028, we will not participate in on-cycle recruiting this calendar year and intend to wait until candidates are closer to completing one full year of professional experience before engaging in formal recruiting for an Associate position.” We read that article in a republished copy, not the original, so treat the wording as reported and check it before you rely on it.
None of this tells you what any other firm will do for its 2028 class, or when the 2027 classes were finally recruited. We could not source either.
The firms with no associate role posted
Blackstone, KKR, Apollo, Carlyle and TPG all run job boards, and on November 11, 2026 none of them carried a US private equity analyst or associate role. Their boards carried credit, insurance, operations and MBA internship roles. The same was true of EQT, whose one US posting was in tax, and of Brookfield, whose private equity associate role was in Toronto. Another 15 firms on this list post no roles at all. Apart from Insight Partners, whose campus pages profile an analyst promoted to associate, none of these firms says in public how its associate seats are filled.
What candidates and prep sites say (not confirmed by any firm)
Prep sites describe two routes. Mergers & Inquisitions, in a guide last modified on November 5, 2024, before either Apollo announcement, calls the first “on-cycle”: “The on-cycle process is the one that begins for Analysts at bulge-bracket and elite-boutique banks in New York within a few months of their start date – or even before their start date! This on-cycle process is short and intense.” It says a job won that way “will start in 1.5 – 2.0+ years”. It calls everything else “off-cycle”, and says those processes “tend to take more time – months rather than weeks or days”.
The claim that recruiting runs through headhunters comes from the same kind of source. Wall Street Careers, in an article modified March 3, 2026, attributes it to another prep site: “There is no online portal, no single application window, and no standardized timeline. Instead, the process runs almost entirely through headhunters”. No firm page we read names a headhunter or uses the term off-cycle, and three firms here contradict “no online portal”: Vista, Summit Partners and Warburg Pincus all take applications on their own boards. The first-party traces are two: Warburg Pincus’s candidate privacy notice lists “recruitment agencies we collaborate with to fill vacancies” among its sources of candidate data, and Providence Equity Partners’ careers page sets terms for recruiting agencies that send it candidates.
Blackstone describes itself in its postings as “the world’s largest alternative asset manager”, investing across real estate, private equity, credit, infrastructure, life sciences, growth equity, secondaries and hedge funds. On November 11, 2026 its two job boards carried no US private equity analyst, associate or summer analyst role. The junior investing roles it did post in the US were in Blackstone Credit & Insurance (BXCI) in New York, and every one asked for prior experience.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Blackstone PE page →
KKR is a global investment firm that, in its own words, “offers alternative asset management as well as capital markets and insurance solutions”, and it sponsors funds in private equity, credit and real assets. It owns the insurer Global Atlantic, which accounts for a large share of its open roles. On November 11, 2026 no US private equity analyst or associate role was posted. The junior investing roles were one private credit Associate/Analyst role and 2027 MBA internships.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full KKR PE page →
Apollo is an alternative asset manager and retirement services provider (through Athene) built on private equity, credit and hybrid strategies, and it shares its job board with Athene. On November 11, 2026 it had no private equity or analyst-level role posted. Its one junior investing role with pay was in consumer asset-backed finance, a structured credit business and not corporate direct lending.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Apollo Global Management PE page →
Carlyle’s postings describe it as “a global investment firm with $485 billion of assets under management, across 678 investment vehicles as of June 30, 2026”, and give Global Credit about $211 billion and direct lending about $14 billion as of the same date. On November 11, 2026 it had 2-Year Associate roles and a liquid credit research associate role live in New York. It had no US private equity investing role: its private equity postings were product specialist, fund management and technology roles.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Carlyle PE page →
Bain Capital is a private investment firm established in 1984, with businesses in Private Equity, Growth & Venture, Capital Solutions, Credit & Capital Markets and Real Assets. Both associate roles it had posted on November 11, 2026 ask for two to three years of experience at an investment bank or another investment firm, and the Special Situations role also accepts management consulting. It also runs Investors of Tomorrow, a half-day program for undergraduate sophomores, which is not a job.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Bain Capital PE page →
Vista describes itself as “a preeminent technology investor, specializing in enterprise AI and software, with over $100 billion in AUM”. It takes open applications for a summer analyst class, an associate class and an MBA summer associate class; no other buyout firm on this list had all three posted. “Associates join a structured class cohort with a formal training curriculum covering financial modeling, SaaS diligence frameworks, and deal execution, alongside senior mentorship from Vista’s investment team.”
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Vista Equity Partners PE page →
General Atlantic is a global growth equity firm. Its postings say it “manages approximately $126 billion in assets under management, inclusive of all strategies, as of March 31, 2026, with more than 900 professionals in 20 countries across five regions”. It recruits an associate class by year: in June 2025 it said it “does not plan to conduct formal interviews or extend offers this year for the Associate Class of 2027.” (as quoted by Banking Dive). In the US on November 11, 2026 it had two junior roles posted in New York: Associate, Life Sciences, and Analyst, Portfolio Management, which is a fund and portfolio reporting team and not a deal team.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full General Atlantic PE page →
Ares has businesses in private equity, credit, real assets and secondaries, and it is ranked here on the first. Its own posting describes that business: “Ares Private Equity flagship corporate opportunities strategy pursues investments in growth-oriented middle market companies in North America and Europe.” The one private equity investing role on its board on November 11, 2026 was Associate, Private Equity in Los Angeles, a lateral seat that “requires 2+ years of prior private equity experience”. The junior investing roles, and the posted pay, were in the credit arm: Associate, Credit, US Direct Lending (New York and Los Angeles), Alternative Credit and Infrastructure Debt. We could not source a figure for the size of Ares Private Equity or of the firm, so none is stated here.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Ares Management PE page →
Partners Group is a private markets manager investing in private equity, infrastructure, real estate, private credit and royalties. Its postings say: “We have USD 185 billion in assets under management and around 2,000 professionals across 24 offices worldwide.” Most of its hiring is outside the United States: 10 of the 75 postings on its board on November 11, 2026 were US roles, in New York and in Broomfield, Colorado, which a posting calls its regional headquarters. They included a private equity associate, private credit associates and an MBA summer associate program.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Partners Group PE page →
Brookfield is a diversified manager, and it is ranked here on its private equity business. “Brookfield Asset Management is a leading global alternative asset manager with over US$1 trillion of assets under management across real estate, infrastructure, renewable power and transition, private equity and credit.” Its own posting says: “The private equity group has $150 billion of assets under management, with an integrated team of investment and operating professionals located in key regions around the world.” On November 11, 2026 a private equity associate role, Investment Associate, Private Equity, was posted in Toronto and stated no pay; no private equity analyst or associate role was posted in the United States. The junior investing roles posted in New York were in its Energy and Infrastructure groups.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Brookfield PE page →
Summit Partners is a growth equity firm with a four-decade history that has invested in more than 550 companies in technology, healthcare and other growth sectors; its home page gives $44B+ of assets under management. Associate is the entry title on its investment team, and the role is built on sourcing: its responsibilities open with “Driving research, idea generation, and thematic sourcing” and “Engaging with entrepreneurs and executives of privately held companies to explore and develop new investment ideas”.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Summit Partners PE page →
Audax operates “through three business lines: Audax Private Equity, Audax Private Debt, and Audax Strategic Capital”, and it is ranked here on the first. Audax Private Equity describes itself as “A strategic equity partner in the middle market”; its own site gives it “$20.1B AUM (as of July ’26)” and a $5.25B flagship Fund VII. It had no investing role posted on November 11, 2026. The one investing role on the firm’s board was in the credit arm, Audax Private Debt, in New York.
Salary band, hiring status & why it ranks here — see the full Audax Group PE page →
Blue Owl invests, in its own words, “across three multi-strategy platforms: Credit, Real Assets and GP Strategic Capital”, with “$330 billion in assets under management as of September 30, 2026”. The junior investing roles it had posted on November 11, 2026 were in Alternative Credit (credit secondaries and asset-based finance) in New York and in Technology Growth Investing in Menlo Park. No core direct lending analyst or associate role was live.
Salary band, hiring status & why it is not ranked — see the full Blue Owl PE page →
Golub Capital is a direct lender to private equity-backed middle market companies whose stated mission is “to be best in sponsor finance”; its home page gives $95+ billion of capital under management. Its lending team provides senior, one-stop and second lien loans with hold positions of up to $700 million. The work is underwriting: the posting lists “New Deals (>85% of time on an annual basis)”, “Preparing investment and downside case financial models” and “Preparing historical and projected covenant models”.
Salary band, hiring status & why it is not ranked — see the full Golub Capital PE page →
Sixth Street is a global investment firm that invests across credit, growth and other strategies. Its home page counts 750+ team members, 300+ investment professionals and $140 billion+ of assets under management, which its careers page dates to June 30, 2026. The one investing role it had posted on November 11, 2026 was Asset Based Finance Platform Associate, which the posting describes as “a full-time Investing Associate role based in New York”. That is asset-based finance, not corporate direct lending.
Salary band, hiring status & why it is not ranked — see the full Sixth Street PE page →
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