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A young analyst DM'ed me to ask what I learned working for a Tiger Cub - aside from Mandel's interview this week I realize they're low profile so will share my experience. Stuff re: "kick the tires" deep research has been beaten to death so some other notes:
Top-down themes are just as important as bottom-up research - "getting your neighborhoods right" was the focus of most team mtgs as a strong industry headwind can overpower even the best individual companies.
This is why Tiger seems to evolve better than many investors - they don't get complacent. Being taught to rigorously map industries & study profit pools let them capture a lot of disruption in media, retail, software etc early & stay invested in good themes.
Misconception that idea velocity is low - had to look at ~3 new/refreshed ideas a month & of those had to dive fairly deep on 1. This differs across Tiger Cubs but we had weekly idea pitch meetings similar to the original Tiger Management w/ Julian sitting at the head of a table.
Obvious focus on growth but worth noting bc there is a momentum aspect - Tiger will add to positions higher if research suggests the biz is even better than initial underwriting suggested. Internalizing & practicing this concept let me become a better investor.
Many are very good traders despite being long-term investors - tactically trading around earnings, understanding technicals, risk mgmt overall were things an analyst had to care about where I worked.
They are more skeptical than they get credit for - while most run 60%+ net exposure, they were trained as L/S investors. Even if not shorting as much today, the training has helped many avoid career-ending mistakes & get out of bad ideas quickly.
Broadly a talent of most great investors but they really stress cutting out noise vs the key debate points on an investment - I had to distill a thesis down to a few sentences + KPI where I was variant. Anything more and I was told I didn't know what I was talking about.
As an aside - I only noticed the diff when I later worked for a PM elsewhere who used a lot of jargon vs explaining a thesis in simple language + specific quantification. Was embarrassing listening to him talk ideas in contrast to Tiger Cubs.
Last but not least, Tiger investors tend to be extremely honest, generous & humble. There is little ego despite the collective track record. They seek in company mgmt teams the ideals they embrace themselves. I think this is a big part of their continued success.
