Front Office Investing

Front Office Investing interview prep.

The library content Coach uses to tailor reports for this role. Generated reports personalise this against the candidate's CV + the firm's context.

Behavioural questions to expect

  1. Walk me through your CV.
  2. Walk me through your most impressive project or deal.
  3. Tell me about a weakness, a failure, or feedback you've received and worked on.
  4. Why growth equity?
  5. Why the firm?
  6. Why the sector?
  7. When you're in a competitive process against a top competitor, what's the pitch to the founder that makes the firm win?
  8. How does value creation platform name work in practice for a portfolio company?

Technical concepts to master

  • Structured capital — instruments you'll discuss

    Convertible note · Revenue-based financing (RBF) · Structured / preferred equity · Warrant coverage · Liquidation preference stack

  • Valuation methods for growth-stage software — when each applies

    ARR multiples · Forward DCF with terminal multiple · Comparable transactions · Returns scenarios + IRR target

  • Three financial statements — connections you'll be probed on

    Income statement (IS) overview · Balance sheet (BS) overview · Cash flow statement (CFS) overview · Statement connections — the canonical question · Prepaid expense scenario

Practical drills

  • You invest $100M at a $500M pre-money valuation. After 5 years, the company is worth $2B. What's your MoM and IRR?
  • A European B2B SaaS company in sector adjacent to firm has $50M ARR, growing 40% YoY, 75% gross margin. Raising $200M at $1B pre-money. Walk me through how you'd evaluate.
  • Pitch me a the sector company you'd recommend the firm invests in. 5 minutes prep, 5 minutes delivery.

Smart-question anchors

  • Capital structuring approach — how the firm decides when to deploy structured vs pure equity, with one recent named deal as proof
  • Regional franchise build — pod structure, IC coordination, regional sourcing approach
  • Value-creation platform — frequency of associate engagement with portfolio teams, one specific recent example
  • Sourcing model — thematic vs banker-led vs founder-led at the associate level; how associates contribute to deal flow
  • Year-1 success — how the team measures associate progression and what 'good' looks like at 12 months

Sourced from

Wall Street Oasis (WSO) · Mergers & Inquisitions / Breaking Into Wall Street · Bessemer State of the Cloud (annual reports) · ICONIQ Growth annual benchmarks

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