Position OverviewMorgan Stanley Outsourced Chief Investment Office, or OCIO, and Morgan Stanley Family Office, or MSFO, partner with Morgan Stanley Financial Advisors across all channels to deliver portfolio management solutions to clients of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management.
Position SummaryThe Institutional Portfolio Solutions, or IPS, team is uniquely situated between two fast-growing and strategically important client channels within Morgan Stanley Wealth Management: OCIO and MSFO. These programs partner with Financial Advisors to offer discretionary and non-discretionary portfolio management services to institutional and private clients, including defined benefit plans, endowments, foundations, ultra-high-net-worth families, family offices, and other sophisticated investors.
The IPS team provides customized portfolio solutions across alternative and liquid investments and is responsible for making recommendations on portfolio construction, asset allocation, and manager selection across a broad spectrum of asset classes.
This Vice President role will focus primarily on
alternative investments (hedge funds and private markets). The successful candidate must have significant experience in
both:
- Sourcing, evaluating, and conducting due diligence on alternatives managers across multiple asset classes (hedge funds, private equity, private credit, private real assets, etc.); and
- Constructing customized hedge fund and private markets portfolios for institutional, family office, ultra-high-net-worth, or other sophisticated client portfolios.
The role requires the ability to identify compelling alternatives opportunities, evaluate managers through an institutional-quality due diligence process, and translate those views into client-specific portfolio recommendations across strategy allocation, manager selection, sizing, liquidity profile, risk management, and implementation sequencing.
Candidates with experience only in manager research or only in asset allocation / portfolio construction are unlikely to be a fit for this role.
Core Responsibilities- Serve as a subject matter expert and portfolio manager for alternative investments within OCIO and MSFO client portfolios
- Source, evaluate, and conduct due diligence on managers across alternatives strategies
- Maintain and expand a relevant network across the alternatives ecosystem, including investment managers, allocators, consultants, prime brokerage contacts, capital introduction teams, and other market participants
- Build customized alternatives portfolios for institutional, family office, ultra-high-net-worth, and other sophisticated clients, including recommendations on strategy allocation, manager selection, position sizing, liquidity profile, implementation sequencing, and portfolio-level risk management
- Evaluate portfolios in the context of total client asset allocation, including public markets, private markets, liquidity needs, concentration risks, client-specific constraints, and existing portfolio exposures
- Partner with OCIO and MSFO client segment teams and Financial Advisors to support prospective and existing client engagements, including new mandate opportunities, portfolio reviews, investment proposals, and client-specific alternatives recommendations
- Participate in recurring OCIO and MSFO investment meetings to discuss asset allocation, alternatives market views, manager selection, portfolio positioning, forward pipeline opportunities, and potential portfolio changes
- Prepare investment analyses, manager recommendations, market updates, portfolio reviews, and client-facing materials related to private markets and hedge fund allocations
- Monitor performance, exposures, liquidity, risk characteristics, factor sensitivities, attribution, manager-specific developments, and portfolio-level contributions across OCIO and MSFO client allocations
- Actively participate in meetings with external managers and represent OCIO/MSFO in manager diligence, portfolio monitoring, and pipeline review discussions
- Help drive strategic initiatives to enhance alternatives portfolio construction, manager research, analytics, reporting, and implementation capabilities across OCIO and MSFO
- Liaise with key internal stakeholders, partner groups, and control functions to support business initiatives, investment implementation, governance processes, and client solutions
- Develop, enhance, or automate analytical tools, financial models, reporting processes, and data workflows to support due diligence, portfolio construction, monitoring, and reporting
Required Qualifications- Bachelor's degree in Finance, Economics, Business Administration, or a related field
- 7+ years of investment-related experience with a significant focus on alternatives, preferably at a fund of funds, OCIO platform, institutional investment consultant, endowment, foundation, family office, alternative investment platform, or other allocator-oriented investment organization
- Demonstrated experience sourcing alternative managers and maintaining a relevant network across the manager universe
- Demonstrated experience conducting institutional-quality due diligence, including analysis of investment process, portfolio construction, risk management, performance attribution, liquidity, terms, operational considerations, organizational quality, and alignment of interests
- Demonstrated experience building customized hedge fund and private markets portfolios, including manager selection, strategy allocation, position sizing, liquidity design, risk budgeting, portfolio monitoring, and rebalancing recommendations
- Strong understanding of hedge fund strategies (including equity long/short, event-driven, credit, relative value, global macro, multi-strategy, systematic, and other liquid alternative strategies) as well as private markets (private equity, venture capital, private credit, and private real assets)
- Strong understanding of global capital markets, asset allocation, manager selection, modern portfolio theory, portfolio construction, performance analysis, risk management, and the broader alternative investment landscape
- Ability to evaluate alternative investments at both the manager level and the total portfolio level
- Ability to translate complex strategy, risk, liquidity, and portfolio construction concepts into clear recommendations for sophisticated clients, Financial Advisors, investment committees, and internal stakeholders
- Strong analytical and quantitative skills, with the ability to assess fund performance, exposures, drawdown behavior, liquidity, correlation, factor sensitivities, attribution, and portfolio-level risk
- Excellent verbal and written communication skills
- Strong organizational and project management skills, with the ability to manage multiple priorities in a fast-paced, collaborative environment
- High degree of professional accountability, attention to detail, intellectual curiosity, and judgment
- Proactive, hard-working, collaborative, and comfortable operating within a close-knit investment team
Preferred Qualifications- CFA, CAIA, MBA, or other relevant advanced degree or professional certification.
- Experience managing or advising fund-of-funds portfolios, customized alternatives mandates, OCIO portfolios, family office allocations, or institutional alternatives portfolios
- Experience presenting hedge fund and private markets recommendations, portfolio construction views, and manager selection decisions to investment committees, sophisticated clients, or senior internal stakeholders
- Experience working with portfolio analytics, exposure reporting, factor analysis, liquidity analysis, risk management tools, and performance attribution frameworks
- Experience analyzing co-mingled fund-of-funds portfolios, customized separate account portfolios, or multi-manager programs
- Advanced Excel skills; experience with Bloomberg, FactSet, VBA, Python, APIs, portfolio analytics platforms, or similar tools is a plus
Technical and Analytical SkillsThe successful candidate should be comfortable working with quantitative and qualitative investment information and should be able to synthesize complex alternatives data into actionable portfolio recommendations. Relevant technical capabilities may include:
- Performance and attribution analysis
- Exposure and factor analysis
- Liquidity and terms analysis
- Drawdown and stress scenario analysis
- Portfolio construction and optimization tools
- Manager comparison frameworks
- Excel-based modeling and reporting
- Bloomberg, FactSet, VBA, Python, APIs, or similar tools
LicensesSIE, Series 7, Series 63, and Series 65, or Series 66, will be required for the role. Candidates who do not already hold these licenses will be required to obtain them after being hired within a reasonable timeframe.
Expected base pay rate for the role will be between $115,000 and $205,000 per year at the commencement of employment. However, base pay if hired will be determined on an individualized basis and is only part of the total compensation package, which, depending on the position, may also include commission earnings, incentive compensation, discretionary bonuses, other short- and long-term incentive packages, and other Morgan Stanley-sponsored benefit programs.
