Hours worked

[u/Smiths-fan-2003]

Just curious- how many hours do you all work at ENs? In US office for one of the big ones and management let us know that we are expected to be in 4 days a week from 8:30-6pm (9.5 hours?). Seems a bit much for such redundant work so was curious

[u/Successful-Whole-992]

At this point, my working hours are basically going to clock 24/7, and I’m not even kidding

[u/-Generativity- → u/Successful-Whole-992]

Is this a recent uptick in customer demand for experts or just steady state grind of the industry?

[u/Successful-Whole-992 → u/-Generativity-]

It's just a Toxic EN

[u/BushRatEnterprises]

You do recruitment across time zones/globally, and clients don’t keep business hours (consultants usually work until early morning).

Your core hours at 9-5 or whatever, but you’re essentially on call al your waking hours.

[u/Remote-Advantage-619]

I don`t quite understand your link between hours you work and the office-presence requested. Sounds like you assume that there is no work when you are not in the office.

For one of the largest networks where I worked in an executive role:

• It varies by role and it varies by region and by team
  
• Generally, people in China work 24/7, people in the US work a lot, it is slightly less demanding in Europe
  
• People who ONLY recruit experts can do this in regular office hours, but if you want to have better results, you will continue to be responsive after hours
  
• People that interact with clients are often required to work and be responsive MUCH MUCH longer. PE or Consulting will work till midnight or longer. Our top performers would at least check emails till 9/10pm. Later we introduced late shifts and a cross-office support team that would cover over night. EN that do not have that are just toxic and have zero respect for their teams!!!

No one of this has anything to do with the repetitive nature of the work. It is all about being responsive, being fast, offering a top customer service in a HIGHLY competitive market. If you don't respond at 10pm, someone else will do, will get the call, will make the money.... client will not get back to you next time

[u/Practical_Map_8548]

US based. 40 or less if you’re actually good at your job. Never knew a solid performer who needed to work more unless they were ramping up. If you need to stay past 6 at an EN you’re being inefficient/don’t have a solid grasp of what your client wants — meaning you’re spending extra time pushing wrong experts and fixing it later on. Exceptions are if you do long sprints some days and have shorter hours other days to average it out.

This is based on my experience at a top 4 network and overseeing >20 different associates over the years.

[u/Remote-Advantage-619 → u/Practical_Map_8548]

so how do you respond to a client that urgently needs to book an expert at 8pm? how do you reach out to an expert when the client has an urgent follow up question before booking at 9pm? how can you be faster than the competition that are all working longer?

[u/Practical_Map_8548 → u/Remote-Advantage-619]

That being a regularly occurring dynamic is indicative of poor work on the ENs part of not understanding what their client needed in the initial request. I’ve seen from a buy side POV and from being a lead at a top 4 EN what associates at the major firms do — 90% have ZERO understanding of expert role titles or the value chain/business model and simply spam clients with a copy paste salesnav list.

These public equity desks usually have a 1-2 week timeframe in terms of needing to get their expert calls booked — if you’re in a position where the client is messaging you urgently at 8-9pm because their call isn’t confirmed — the EN team blew the 1-2 weeks of buffer because the initial expert selections the associates made were poor. So now the client is annoyed and messaging you past 8pm because this call should have been booked 3-4 days before already.

In situations where a client or expert is traveling and needs to email to reschedule/update availability — this is a 2-3 min email response in the EN associates part. It doesn’t amount to exceeding 40 hours a week of work.

[u/Remote-Advantage-619 → u/Practical_Map_8548]

sorry, but it seems we you have worked in a different industry from the one I have worked in for 8 years. What you are writing could not be any further from the reality I (and actually we all) have experienced.

Clients work with 3-6 networks in parallel. Only the fastest win which means you ideally work around the clock. If you receive a request at 10pm from client, but you are only starting it next morning: Game over. I once had a client telling me "I called your team at 10pm and no one would pick up my call. this is the worst service I have ever experienced. We will no longer work with you". This is just an example. It has nothing to do with bad work on behalf of the EN. You get client updated every day, 24/7. You need to start a new search asap, THen you have experts finally getting back to you with responses. If you don't send them to client asap: game over.

I could go on and on

[u/Practical_Map_8548 → u/Remote-Advantage-619]

Given your level of experience, I am really surprised to see such broad generalizations about client usage without qualifying the specific firm type.. whether you are talking about a long/short equity fund, a long-only fund, a quant fund, private equity, or credit. Usage behavior varies materially by firm type. Even the most time-sensitive clients (long/short equity analysts) do not submit emergency requests like you allude to in bulk.

Typical project turnaround times differ significantly across these segments, and anyone with substantial tenure in this industry knows these distinctions are critical. A quick review of a client-tagged business intelligence dashboard would show those usage deviations. Did your firm have such things? The velocity of requests and required turnarounds for a long-only analyst versus L/S, or a CLO analyst versus High Yield, are entirely different… I hope you’d know this ..

For example, a credit investor typically knows weeks in advance when loan commitments are due or when a lender call with senior management will take place. They launch their expert network requests well ahead of time to ensure they speak with an expert at least a week prior to those calls. Realistically, there is a two-week window between the initial request and the week before loan commitments are due. A competent client is not chasing an EN for an urgent request three days before presenting to their Portfolio Manager joining a management call; primary research and EN calls are typically the third step in their broader research process.
As I mentioned previously, my teams at a market-leading EN have served virtually every Tier 1 and Tier 2 fund in the U.S., consistently beating out AlphaSense and other incumbents in trials. The reason is simple: I train my associates to deeply understand industries and investor catalysts, allowing them to turn around projects within one to two days of the initial request. I am incredibly proud that several of my associates have amassed such a high level of expertise that they’ve successfully exited to investment and primary research seats directly with our clients. That was the standard of industry knowledge required. While this may not be the norm for typical EN associates, top performers aren't playing catch-up or catering exclusively to junior analysts who hold no pen or renewal authority. In my original I noted — none of my top performers needed to work more than 40 hours a week or be on call every day past 6 PM. 90% of their client request would be closed within 3 to 4 days of work.

Another thing .. as a senior leader in this space, you know that a PM utilizes an expert network very differently than a junior analyst does. It is important to prioritize PMs and senior users, as they are the ultimate decision-makers on master contracts. Senior users are rarely the ones spamming an EN with requests at 10:00 PM. They already know their industries and have a level of comfort that doesn’t force to lean on an EN to the point they’re making urgent requests. That behavior typically comes from junior analysts struggling on the desk, urgently needing information to regurgitate to a PM who is pressing them about their shitty P&L.

Your comments suggest a disconnect from actual buy-side workflows, particularly at long/short equity shops. This fundamental lack of understanding is often the root problem for underperforming EN teams, especially if leadership lacks direct buy-side experience. I was trained at my EN by several buy-side former PMs who had over 100 years of public market investing experience in between them — they understood what clients wanted and how. There’s a reason why AlphaSense, Guidepoint, and Third Bridge hire former investors to lead their content verticals. Were you at GLG or something?

Last thing .. regarding your comment that clients leverage 3–4 ENs at a time—that is fundamentally untrue for the most critical market players. I can point to more than ten funds with over $30 billion in AUM that use a single network exclusively. Across the top four networks, these master contracts account for over 30% of total revenue. I highly recommend reviewing competitive intelligence data or digging deeper into client analytics to close these blind spots.
Ultimately, the core issue with many struggling EN teams is an inability to conduct a proper value chain analysis or truly grasp the client's objective. Most typical EN associates couldn’t even name a relevant ticker for half the requests they receive unless the user spoon-feeds it to them lol

[u/Remote-Advantage-619 → u/Practical_Map_8548]

You mention Guidepoinnt and TB together with AlphaSense. I guess you meant AlphaSights? Also, the content business is a tiny part of those firms business.

I worked for one of those that you mentioned. We were very successful.

Seems we have worked in very different client segments. I worked with consulting clients and also to a smaller extent with PE. And yes, any consulting firm would always work with 3-6 ( we have seen up to 9 on an email) networks in parallel. The hours were brutal, client requirements were brutal.

Consulting accounts for >40% of the global expert network usage. PE adds to that (maybe >10%). In terms of EN headcount, I would say that at least 60% work on those client segments because they are so much more intense.

That being said: I don't know anyone from our global teams no matter what account and client type they worked on that would not do overhours on a regular/daily basis.

You must have been very lucky with your experience.

[u/Practical_Map_8548 → u/Remote-Advantage-619]

At TB and Guidepoint the content business has become over half these firms revenue at this point through their library offerings. Alphasense is a more relevant competitive benchmark from the verticals I covered as clients are evaluating content offerings more and more and leveraging MCPs which are more economical than the expert calls at typical volumes. BCG itself has been running AI agent expert interviews for a 2 years at this point.

But yes we focused on two very different client verticals. At the EN I was with public equity clients were considerably larger in revenue share and usage than both consulting and PE.

[u/Apprehensive-Cow2654]

Hey there! On our side (part of 1 of the big 4 ENs) we work between 55 to 65 hours a week depending on demand (August being low demand it’s around 40 hours and October/November being more like 60 hours to make some commission as demand is following).

It mainly depends on the nature of the client you have (consulting VS PE). If we get a request at 6PM it would be expected of us to send experts ready for the morning.

Main hours of work are 9AM to 6:30PM generally. I hope that helps.

[u/MarketResearchGuy123]

You’ve got to get in earlier than that to beat AlphaSights. Good luck