If you joined a new high-profile job only to leave after two months, everyone would start asking: What happened? That’s the scene now at Citadel LLC, the $69-billion hedge fund founded by Ken Griffin, after yet another recruiting executive’s abrupt departure.
The story begins in September 2025, when the firm brought aboard Laura Sterner as head of Business Development (BD) for its Global Equities unit. Sterner arrived with a strong résumé ten years at Point72 Asset Management in fundraising roles, and a short stint at a healthcare investment firm. Her hiring signalled Citadel’s intention to bolster its BD muscle during a fierce talent war across the hedge-fund world.
And then, just two months later, Sterner resigned. The reasons weren’t publicly detailed, and both Sterner and the firm declined to comment. But the timing and the context spot put a spotlight on broader issues at Citadel and across multistrategy firms.
Let’s unpack what it might all mean.
What we know
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Sterner joined in September to replace Alex Topkins, who left in April as head of BD in the Global Equities division.
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Her departure comes amid notable turnover in Citadel’s recruiting and business-development ranks: for example, just weeks earlier, another senior recruiter, Ansh Kalra, left Citadel’s Quantitative Services BD role to join rival Balyasny Asset Management.
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Industry analysis emphasizes that the BD (business development) function in hedge funds is no longer just back-office or HR it’s strategic. Finding and hiring elite portfolio managers, researchers, engineers and quant talent is akin to signing a star athlete in professional sports. Compensation for those roles has grown and so has pressure.
Why the turnover matters
In most firms, recruiting and BD roles may be stable, even invisible. At a firm like Citadel, those roles are high-stakes. The firm is competing not just on returns, but on talent acquisition and retention. When someone comes in and leaves shortly after, it raises several questions:
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Fit and expectation mismatch: Did the role not match the firm’s needs? Or did the new hire’s expectations diverge quickly from reality?
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Organizational stress: Recruiting at this level means intense pressure, constant deal flow, and high visibility. Burnout, cultural misfit or internal politics could be at play.
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Talent war dynamics: The hedge-fund sector is aggressively fighting for people sometimes to the point where roles are created or destroyed rapidly. A departure may reflect the fluidity of the market more than any one person’s failure.
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Signalling effect: For outsiders, such a short tenure sends a message either about the firm’s internal turbulence or the realities of the job. For insiders, it may raise concerns about leadership stability or strategic direction.
Context: What’s going on at Citadel
Citadel isn’t alone in this. Over the past year, it has been reporting a string of exits and hires in its BD ranks. Some key factors:
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The fund’s overall performance has been under pressure; through October 2025 it reportedly returned about 6.8 % well off its historical highs.
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With returns moderating, the value of bringing in top-tier talent becomes even more critical there’s less room for error.
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BD executives are being treated like rain-makers. Their compensation packages are escalating, and so are expectations.
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Firms are re-evaluating their talent strategy: how aggressive to be in hiring, how stable to keep teams, how to balance growth vs. cost discipline.
In a way, Sterner’s departure may be a symptom of all those pressures co-existing at once.
Why it matters for you (and the industry)
If you’re in the hedge-fund world whether as a recruiter, asset manager, portfolio researcher or job-seeker this situation offers a few take-aways:
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Short tenures matter: For employers, a brief stint becomes part of the hiring record. For candidates, joining a high-stakes role means you’re stepping into an intense environment with little margin for mis-match.
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Hiring is strategic: The role of BD at major hedge funds has grown in influence. If you’re up for one of those jobs, expect that you’re being judged less for potential and more for proven deal-flow and performance.
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Culture and clarity matter: Firms may promise autonomy, growth, big hires but the day-to-day may feel more like operations under pressure. Get clear upfront about what success looks like and how you’re supported.
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Expect turbulence: With talent wars heating up, firms may rapidly restructure, reassign roles or change strategy. Flexibility and speed count more than ever.
A recruiting executive who leaves after just two months may seem like a footnote. But in a firm like Citadel, that footnote becomes part of a bigger story about competition, talent, expectations and pace. Laura Sterner’s quick exit isn’t just about one person it shows how high the stakes have become in hedge-fund recruitment, and how tiny the margin for drift or mismatch can be.
If nothing else, this moment reminds us: even the most influential firms aren’t immune to turbulence when they’re fighting for the best people in the world. And in that fight, everyone watches the exits as closely as the hires.
