After graduating from Georgetown University in 1998, Stephanie McCann went to work on a Wall Street trading desk. “I saw so many broken phones and computer equipment being smashed on a weekly basis, and I decided I don’t want to end up with anger management issues,” she said on this week’s Drinks With The Deal podcast.
Instead, McCann went to the University of Chicago Law School and embarked on a career as a finance lawyer. Now a partner and a member of the executive and management committees at McDermott Will & Emery LLP in Chicago, McCann credited her choice of practice area to a mentor early in her career.
“To mentor well takes the ability to listen to what the mentee would like to learn,” she said. “My mentor listened to my background, to where I wanted to go with my career,” and made sure that McCann had the chance to work on challenging deals and build relationships with clients.
Over the past year in her practice, rising interest rates have given lenders more leverage in setting terms on both new and renegotiated debt, McCann said. As capital has become more difficult to access, she said, PE sponsors are looking to junior capital and mezzanine lenders to fill out the capital structure on their investments.
Listen to the podcast with Stephanie McCann below:
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