I'm in a hybrid PE/VC fund - how do I capitalize on this

I just landed a VP role in the VC division (AUM: $100M-$500M) of a fund that also/mostly does PE (AUM: $10B-$50B).

PE activity is focused on real estate and infrastructure with the occasional adjacent tech investment (energy, clean-tech etc.). The VC fund's job is to get into those tech deals early and feed them in as PE deals as they scale.

Here is my question:

Should I stay in my lane and do what I know how to do, or should I be using this opportunity to learn some PE hard skills with the goal of making the switch (if that's even possible, I suspect its not).

I've been in VC my whole career and don't have any of the PE skill-set. I also don't have the classical PE background: I come from a non-target school, don't have an MBA, and never worked at a BB - I just kicked ass as a VC.

As a disclaimer, I actually prefer VC to PE (IMHO: better hours/culture, more interesting work, board XP etc.), and I would be very happy staying in my lane - I definitely don't have any plans to leave VC anytime soon.

Still... Given how much bigger the PE fund is, there will be a huge difference in carry at the partner level. I know it will be hard to know that I make 100th the carry my PE colleagues make. It would also be really nice to learn some more hard skills.

If making the switch is possible, there's also the question of how best to go about it. My PE colleagues are willing to let me sit in on training - which is pretty amazing considering most other people getting trained have to go down the classical route of IB -> MBA -> PE to be there. And yet, unless I'd want to start again as an associate, that's probably not enough. I'd probably actually have to take on actual deal work and impress my colleagues with my execution (which is probably something I'd have to green light with my VC boss).

Thoughts? Is this even possible? If so, what is the best way to go about it?

 

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