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Matt Rooney

Summary

Matt Rooney is a co-host of Deal Sourcery alongside Dan Herr. Matt runs an executive search / recruiting practice focused exclusively on deal sourcing and business development talent in PE, and brings a distinctive labor-market lens to the podcast — comp structures, career paths, title inflation, and what differentiates top-decile BD professionals from median.

Current Affiliation

Coastal Partners — Matt runs the BD-focused recruiting practice at Coastal Partners, and is the author of the firm's annual Business Development Compensation Survey. In Ep. 11 (The Ultimate Guide to Deal Sourcing Compensation, Part 2) Matt describes the survey as "one of the most influential things for our business. As you can imagine, a recruiting business, knowing market compensation is table stakes to be an effective recruiter, both from advising firms, but also candidates. So this information is super valuable for me and my business."

Personal Bio

Hosting Style & Perspectives

Matt's contributions consistently pull the conversation toward the economic and structural side of sourcing — who gets hired, how they're paid, how roles evolve, and how firms build BD teams.

  • Deep market data on BD comp. In Ep. 11 (The Ultimate Guide to Deal Sourcing Compensation, Part 2) Matt presents the 2024 edition of the Coastal Partners BD compensation survey: roughly 259 respondents out of ~824 identified dedicated BD professionals in PE, showing an 11% year-over-year increase in both base salary and bonus from 2023 to 2024, and documenting that carried interest allocations jump sharply at the VP level (72% of VPs, 100% of MDs and partners participating have carry).

  • Title progression and structure. Matt frames BD career paths as loosely parallel to investment-team title progression (associate → senior associate → VP → director/principal → MD → partner), while noting that "there's a lot of title inflation in business development and PE" (Ep. 11 (The Ultimate Guide to Deal Sourcing Compensation, Part 2)).

  • Compensation as a structural issue for firms. Matt argues the survey exists in part because "there is a ton of different approaches to compensating business development professionals out there," and firms benefit from benchmarking data as they design roles (Ep. 11 (The Ultimate Guide to Deal Sourcing Compensation, Part 2)).

  • Recruiting-side view of sourcing talent. Matt's work placing BD professionals across PE firms gives him sustained exposure to what distinguishes successful BD hires, which he brings into conversations with guests across the show.

Notable Quotes

"This is something we do annually. This is the second time we've done it. And it's probably one of the most influential things for our business. As you can imagine, a recruiting business, knowing market compensation is table stakes to be an effective recruiter." — Matt Rooney, Ep. 11

"There is a ton of different approaches to compensating business development professionals out there. And this is a resource for firms thinking about it and people evaluating those roles." — Matt Rooney, Ep. 11

Cross-References