Employers

Today, there are approximately 16,000 hedge funds in the world. Many U.S.-based firms are headquartered in New York and other cities on the East Coast, Chicago, Dallas, and Los Angeles, although firms can be found in nearly every state. Many top U.S. firms have offices in foreign countries. For example, Sculptor Capital Management (the 25th-largest firm by assets under management as of June 30, 2019, according to Pensions & Investments) has offices in New York, and overseas in London, Hong Kong, and Shanghai.

Starting Out

Popular job-search strategies in the hedge fund industry include the use of recruiters and job boards, personal contacts, and one’s professional network (both at in-person networking events and industry conferences and on social networking sites such as LinkedIn). Additionally, be sure to utilize the resources of your university’s career services office. Career counselors can help you improve your resume, develop your interviewing skills, and direct you to finance career fairs. Some professional associations, such as National Investor Relations Institute, offer job listings at their Web sites. Institutional Investor’s Alpha (https://www.institutionalinvestor.com) publishes an annual list of the top 100 hedge fund firms in the United States with the highest amount of assets under management, as well as rankings of the top firms in Europe and Asia. Use this list as a starting point in your job search.

At a large hedge fund, an entry-level investment relations specialist can advance to the position of IR manager, and then IR director. Investor relations professionals with considerable experience on the finance side could eventually be promoted to the positions of hedge fund manager or administrator. Additionally, many investor relations jobs are available outside the hedge fund industry, especially at large companies.

The Hedge Fund Group offers The Hedge Fund E-Book (http://hedgefundgroup.org/free-book), a free guide that helps readers enter the industry and even launch their own hedge fund.

Visit the following Web sites for job listings: http://www.efinancialcareers.com, https://www.indeed.com/q-Hedge-Fund-jobs.html, and https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/hedge-fund-jobs.

Use social-media sites to network and learn more about the industry. One useful resource is SumZero (https://sumzero.com), a social-media site for buy-side hedge fund, mutual fund, and private equity professionals.