PODCAST: How to break into private equity

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Despite being a traditionally male-dominated industry, efforts to make private equity more gender inclusive are underway. According to Level 20 and the British Private Equity and Venture Capital Association’s Diversity and Inclusion Survey 2021, 38 percent of professionals at European PE and VC firms are women, up from around 29 percent in 2018. Yet, even though this is progress, there is still a long way to go to equality. So how does one break into private equity? What are the challenges that women face in the process? And how do they overcome them?

This episode of Spotlight features Keren Raz, senior responsible investment manager at APG Asset Management, and Melis Kahya Akar, managing director and head of consumer for EMEA at General Atlantic. They discuss challenges they faced as women coming into private equity, provide insight into how they overcame them and examine steps that need to be taken by the industry.

Raz and Kahya Akar are among 10 professionals featured in the private equity category of PEI Media’s Women of Influence in Private Markets list, class of 2022. The list celebrates 60 outstanding women working in alternative assets across six categories: private equity, private debt, infrastructure, real estate, venture capital and cross-asset class.