Day: October 8, 2025

• Business Insider’s Rising Stars of Wall Street hold important yet complex jobs.
• We asked them to break down what they do in a way anyone could understand.
• See top responses from Rising Stars at firms like Blackstone, Moelis, and Goldman Sachs.

Credit solutions, secondaries, private capital advisory.

Business Insider’s Rising Stars of Wall Street have impressive but complicated jobs. This year’s list features investors, traders, and dealmakers working in the hottest finance fields, from private lending to data center mergers.

So what do they actually do all day?

We asked this year’s picks to break it down by explaining how they describe their jobs to non-Wall Streeters at dinner parties. Here are 9 of the top responses, edited for length and clarity.

Lamar Cardinez, Blue Owl

Title: Principal with Blue Owl’s HomeCourt Partners Fund

“I find interesting investment opportunities in the world of sports, media, and entertainment.”

“And then after the investment has been made, keep them informed about the performance of the investments that we collectively own. And then after a certain amount of time, we do our best to return that original investment, that principal to the investors along with an additional amount that hopefully exceeds their expectations and leave them desire to partner with us continually.”

Jackie Shepherd, Morgan Stanley

Title: Vice President, Separations and Structured Solutions

“My partner is a physician, and I feel like I have to do this all the time because if I say anything that’s not a simple sentence, eyes glaze over.”

“I would say we’re helping our clients tackle their biggest strategic questions of — ‘What do I want to be when I grow up?’ So, what businesses do I want to be in? And if there’s a business that isn’t the right long-term strategic fit, what’s the most efficient way to separate that?”

Benson Kane, TPG Angelo Gordon

Title: Vice President, Credit Solutions Group

“We’re like a bank without the depositors. We’re working with kind of hairier situations, more complex financings — but we’re kind of like a bank, as people think about it. We make loans to companies and try to help them invest in businesses or whatever else they’re trying to do.”

Patrick Kearney, Apollo

Title: Principal, Private Equity

“The shortest answer is just buying good companies and trying to go from good to great, or buying great companies and trying to go from great to greater. And at its core, it’s about thinking critically, not only about the company itself, but macro trends, industry trends, and specific initiatives you can implement. The core of the job is thinking critically to tackle challenges and find the right solutions in a really, really dynamic environment.

Aman Mittal, Moelis & Co.

Title: Managing Director, Advisory

“I try not to. I work in finance and I do investment banking, and that’s good enough. These days it’s easier, I work in data centers, that’s the topic of the moment. But in general, what I say is we help companies find their path through the financial possibilities. And that includes sometimes selling the business, sometimes buying businesses, sometimes finding new capital partners.”

Josef Menasche, Goldman Sachs

Title: Managing director, Global cohead of Secondaries Advisory

“Sometimes, as a private equity investor, you have a company that you really, really believe in, and you think it’s fantastic, and you don’t want to sell it necessarily because you think there’s more upside — but you have to deliver cash back to your investors.

So what my team does is help private equity funds in that position find new investors to buy out the old investors, so that they can continue managing the business going forward.

Maybe they love the management team. Maybe they think the industry is at an inflection point where it’s going to grow really fast for the next five years. Whatever the reason, they want to hold on to the business longer.

We’re very transparent about that with the original investors. We give them the choice to reinvest going forward, because there’s a reason the actual investment team doesn’t want to sell.”

Mohini Chakravorty, Blackstone

Title: Principal, Blackstone Infrastructure

“I have dinner with non-Wall Street people all the time. It’s not very complicated. We raise money from large institutions, and then we use that money to buy companies in the infrastructure space. Think industries like digital infrastructure, data centers, transportation businesses — airports or toll roads. The last big category is energy or energy transition businesses. We buy these businesses. We try to improve them. We put in additional capital, or we spend more money to help grow them, and the ultimate goal is to help generate a return for the investors.”

“People outside the industry would be surprised by how much of our jobs revolve around interacting with people. To get deals done, it’s not always just about paying the highest price. It’s about convincing people and making relationships with management teams to get people comfortable that you are the right long-term partner.”

Florian Plath, JPMorgan Chase

Title: Executive Director, Mergers & Acquisitions

“I help companies find the right partners. When a company’s owners are thinking about buying, selling, merging with another company, my team and I really help the leaders try to figure out whether it makes sense and guide them through the entire process. We look at everything — not only numbers, but also the strategy, the culture — to make sure these combinations are a good fit.

“It’s a little bit of detective work, right? At the end of the day, we obviously want to make sure that both sides feel confident and excited.”

Joe Slevin, Jefferies

Title: Managing Director, Private Capital Advisory

“This one’s difficult in secondaries. I try to keep it simple: I say that we find patient new shareholders for exceptional private companies.”

• Naseem Rochette’s life changed after a car accident led to neurodivergence.
• Her new approach to work emphasizes vulnerability and a deeper focus on fewer tasks.
• Rochette highlighted the need for positive bias reframing for her progress after the accident.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Naseem Rochette, a 54-year-old account director at Databricks, based in New Jersey. The following has been edited for length and clarity.

My approach to life drastically changed in 2018 when I was hit and run over by a car. By that evening, the multitasking woman who thrived in chaos for so long vanished, and she has never returned.

I’ve been in tech for 25 years, and before my current position, I spent most of the last decade in different leadership roles at Google and Microsoft. Since getting run over, I don’t operate in the same way.

I have a traumatic brain injury now, and I’m neurodivergent. So, much of day-to-day life can be a trigger for me or make me uncomfortable.

I thought my condition would be a disadvantage for my career. However, my ability to be more vulnerable, share my journey, and connect with people in ways I hadn’t before gave me a stronger foundation to solve harder problems, and I became a better leader and advocate for myself because of it.

I worried how I was ever going to be good at my job again

It took a while to recover. I went back to work at Microsoft after a few months, which was too early, but I felt like I had to rush back because we had a big conference coming up.

Over the course of a year or two, I realized how my abilities were shifting. One of the things that really changed was that I could no longer manage a hundred things or thrive in that type of chaotic workflow. I became much better at focusing on five things in a deeper way.

I was really worried about how I would ever be good at what I do again. I couldn’t see the rewards of focusing on a few bigger problems instead of a ton of little ones. I had to accept that I was different now and navigate explaining that to those around me.

My neurodivergence changed the way I ran meetings

Most people, myself included, haven’t been made aware of the need for neurodivergent sensitivity. I had never thought about it until I was neurodivergent.

I transitioned into a leadership role at Google after Microsoft. There, employees made user guides to explain the way we work, and when I got to Google, I made a before-and-after one to explain how my working style had changed since my accident. Once I was able to articulate and understand that there was a change, I could talk more easily about it.

It was interesting to see the differences between my before-and-after user guides. Some of the main ones are that I don’t like phone calls and can’t listen to voicemails anymore, I can’t multitask, which used to be a strength of mine, and I don’t like attending big conferences or late-night networking events anymore.

When I ran large meetings in the past, I always told participants to just jump in with questions; I never realized how hard that could be. After the accident, it became hard for me to do that. Now, I always give multiple ways people can jump in, including sending a text or a note afterward that we can follow up on.

At the beginning of meetings, I also share that I don’t communicate or operate the way I used to. This opens the door for other people to share with me some of the unique ways they work, so we can figure out how to best communicate ideas.

Recognizing how my work needs differed from the norm made all the difference

There would be meetings at Google that started with loud music to build excitement, and I couldn’t engage because it suddenly hurt to be in that environment.

Whenever something like this happened, it was anxiety-inducing to decide whether to ask to turn the music down or take the time to explain why it bothered me. I didn’t want to change the environment for everyone, which made it hard to navigate.

In those meetings, I started explaining that I couldn’t kick off the call with loud music, so I’d join three minutes after, but I wasn’t late or forgetting about the meeting.

I can’t go out with a client to a jazz club or stay out late for drinks anymore. I won’t be at those conferences or on work trips that require that type of interaction. If I have to be at these events now, I always want people to know or be reminded that there are sensitivities.

I celebrate the day of my accident as a holiday; we call it Unbreakable Day

I decided that my story would be a happy one. That positive bias reframing was so important for my progress.

Neurodivergence gives people unique qualities and abilities, and being proud of those and owning them can be hard. Maybe there are some things I can’t do, but there are some things that I’m more comfortable doing now, and I own that. I wasn’t comfortable sharing my vulnerabilities pre-accident, and now that’s a huge strength of mine.

I’ve had the opportunity to mentor young people and help other people navigate what they’ve been through, whether it’s a trauma or a divergence. I always bring up having an inventory of wins. What are the things that you’ve navigated? What are the things that you can draw strength from, and what are the things that are hard for you?

Vulnerability is my new strength at work

This year, I joined the software company Databricks as an account director. If you go into any new job or interview, having a better sense of yourself and your limits, it’s going to be a lot easier to put yourself in a position for success.

After my accident, I had to be more deliberate with my communication. I also had to be kind to myself and not judge myself, or I would never make progress. I now see the benefits and value of the new me and have learned that vulnerability is a huge part of good leadership. Pretending that you can do something you can’t isn’t good for anyone.

Do you have a career story to share? Contact this reporter, Agnes Applegate, at aapplegate@businessinsider.com.

• Permits were filed for 54 new data centers in Virginia in the first nine months of 2025, per a BI tally.
• Tech giant Amazon filed permits for the most new planned data centers this year so far.
• The permits reveal developers are increasingly building larger, more power-intensive data centers.

Virginia is for data centers. Big ones.

Big Tech companies filed permits for 54 new data centers in the state in the first nine months of 2025, according to a Business Insider tally.

The number represents the state’s single largest spike in planned data centers in any one year, and a 16% increase from Virginia’s 2024 total.

Amazon-built data centers represent the bulk of the new construction, with 28 planned facilities, according to Business Insider’s count. The tech giant had 177 data centers built or in construction nationwide by the end of 2024, according to the analysis. The new planned data centers in Virginia would grow Amazon’s fleet to 205, a 15% increase.

The new Virginia permits also reveal how Big Tech companies are increasingly building larger, more power-intensive data centers. Business Insider previously identified 322 “hyperscale” facilities built or under construction nationwide at the end of 2024 that consume an estimated 40 megawatts of electricity or more each.

The new permits push this count to 370. All but one of Amazon’s new planned data centers are among the largest in Business Insider’s analysis. These giant data centers can consume as much power as a small city and up to several million gallons of water a day.

An Amazon spokesperson said Business Insider’s methodology for estimating electricity use is “flawed and can lead to inaccurate conclusions.”

This recent explosion of Virginia data center construction comes amid unprecedented nationwide investment in AI infrastructure. In June, construction spending on US data centers reached an all-time high of $40 billion, a Bank of America Institute report found. Amazon, Google, Microsoft, and Meta are pouring cash into the rush to build even more. The tech giants’ combined capital expenditures could reach an estimated $320 billion this year, primarily for AI infrastructure, an analysis of financial statements by Business Insider found.

Virginia is historically the epicenter of the data center construction boom in the US, with the most data centers in the country by far concentrated in Northern Virginia, known as “Data Center Alley.” Data centers in the state have emerged as one of the largest flashpoints in a national wave of grassroots resistance from residents worried about their impact on housing, the environment, and quality of life, even as they have promised to bring new tax revenue.

Data centers in Virginia already used a quarter of the state’s electricity in 2023. Business Insider estimated that if all the data centers built or in construction in the state by 2024 come online, at the low end, they would consume around the same amount of electricity as New York City used in 2024.

Overall, the 54 new planned data centers drive Business Insider’s electricity estimate another 26% higher.

Collectively, Business Insider estimates that if Virginia’s 383 data centers already built or in construction as of September 2025 all come online, they will use between 66.5 terawatt-hours and 106.4 terawatt-hours annually. The low end is roughly equivalent to the amount of power the entire state of Minnesota used in 2023; the high end is more power than Tennessee used that year.

To investigate data center expansion across the country, Business Insider filed requests with all 50 states and Washington, DC, for the air permits that regulate backup generators at every data center.

As of 2010, there were 311 data centers nationwide, Business Insider previously found. That number nearly quadrupled, to 1,240 data centers built or approved for construction by the end of 2024, the most comprehensive tally to date.

Have a tip? Contact Hannah Beckler via email at hbeckler@businessinsider.com or Signal at hbeckler.72. Use a personal email address and a non-work device; here‘s our guide to sharing information securely.

• Cybersecurity company Tanium is one of the latest companies enforcing its return-to-office policy.
• Employees who violate the RTO policy can be denied some equity grants.
• Leadership hasn’t announced companywide that RTO would be tied to equity grants, sources said.

The $9 billion cybersecurity company Tanium is cracking down on its return-to-office policy this year in an unconventional way: it is withholding a form of compensation from those who don’t comply.

As of this summer, Tanium employees who violate the RTO policy risk not getting an “equity refresh,” according to three people familiar with the matter. Tanium employees typically receive shares as part of their compensation package when they first join the company, and they may be eligible for an “equity refresh” or additional equity after a specified period of time at the company.

While Tanium CEO Dan Streetman has said at companywide meetings that going to the office was important, leadership hasn’t verbally or in written communication announced to the company that RTO may be tied to equity grants, sources said.

Stock options and other forms of equity-based compensation are a crucial part of the startup ecosystem. They entice early startup employees with the promise of owning a stake in what could be the next big thing. Those shares can lead to a big payday down the line if the company goes public or gets acquired. Not receiving additional equity grants can significantly reduce a startup employee’s compensation package.

Tanium did not respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

Many companies across the US, including AT&T, Microsoft, and Amazon, have been attempting to reduce remote work. Some companies have terminated employees who don’t comply with their policies. Withholding a form of compensation for those who don’t return to the office is relatively rare, experts say.

“Most companies will say, ‘Look, you need to come in,'” said Nicholas Bloom, a Stanford economics professor who conducts research on remote work. “They’re sanctioned, and then later they’re terminated.”

Bloom said he had not heard of companies denying employees additional equity for balking at RTO mandates. He said that some law firms have cut pay for those who don’t come into the office.

Tanium was founded in 2007 by father and son David and Orion Hindawi. It offers a range of cybersecurity products for securing and managing devices on an organization’s network, serving customers from large businesses to government agencies. It has nearly 2,000 employees worldwide.

Tanium first announced its RTO policy in late 2023, stating that employees within a 50-mile radius of an office are required to work there on Tuesdays and Wednesdays, with a third day to be determined by their team leaders. Initially, this policy was loosely enforced, said people familiar with the matter.

The company’s latest policy reduced the radius to 35 miles, a current and a former employee said. To determine how often employees are going to the office, Tanium is reviewing badge scans, according to the sources.

This is not the first time Tanium has found its stock-option practices under the spotlight. In 2020, Business Insider reported that Tanium used a “clawback clause” to buy back employees’ equity in the company, whether they wanted to sell or not. Bloomberg had also previously reported that Tanium fired employees right before their stock vested.

Prior to Tanium announcing its RTO policy, the company was known for its remote-friendly culture. In recent years, the culture has shifted to an in-office-first approach. New hires are expected to be within commuting distance of the office, three current and former employees said.

Have a tip? Contact this reporter via email at rmchan@businessinsider.com, or Signal at rosal.13. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here’s our guide to sharing information securely.

• Heidi Health just nabbed a $65 million Series B for its free AI medical scribe.
• It’s competing with ambient tech from hot startups like Abridge and formidable incumbents like Epic.
• Heidi wants to build an AI medical search tool to compete with the likes of OpenEvidence.

The medical AI scribe space has been red-hot this year, with new unicorns emerging and incumbent giants digging in. Startup Heidi Health just raised fresh funding in a late bid to take them on.

The Australian healthcare AI company raised $65 million in a Series B round led by hedge fund manager Steve Cohen’s Point72 Private Investments. The round values Heidi Health at $465 million post-money and brings its total funding to about $97 million to date.

The Series B raise comes just seven months after Heidi raised its $16.6 million Series A, led by Headline and including Anthology, Anthropic, and Menlo Ventures’ $100 million partnership fund.

Heidi is gaining traction despite how crowded the ambient documentation space has become. It’s competing against AI scribe startups like $5.3 billion Abridge and Ambience Healthcare, as well as behemoths like medical records company Epic, which said in August it would release its own AI clinical documentation product.

Cofounder and CEO Dr. Thomas Kelly, a former vascular surgery resident, founded Heidi Health in 2019 under the name Oscer with tech to help medical students study for their exams. Two years later, seeing a bigger opportunity to ease doctors’ administrative burdens, he rebranded the company and pivoted toward automating clinical documentation.

One of Heidi’s biggest differentiators, Kelly said, is prioritizing physician adoption over rigid integration with electronic health records.

Roughly half of Heidi’s sales come from physicians signing up for its product directly, Kelly said, rather than through outpatient clinic or health system contracts. Heidi offers its core AI scribe product for free, with a $70-per-month premium tier that gives clinicians more personalized features like custom clinical note templates.

That “open plan” approach, as Kelly puts it, isn’t popular with other AI scribe startups.

“For the startups that sell top-down, the open-plan structure can be scary because they’re thinking about clinical documentation integrity and revenue cycle management, where you want some level of standardization. But the problem with AI tools is, you need activation and adoption,” Kelly said. “You can have the best of the best worlds, where clinicians can still build what they like and get the utility, and then structure it as a secondary thing.”

Heidi can afford to stray from standardization in part because its ultimate goal differs from that of its peers: The startup wants to build an all-in-one AI clinical assistant capable of handling some patient care tasks under a doctor’s supervision. Alongside the Series B, Heidi launched a tool that calls patients on behalf of doctors to automate tasks like follow-up scheduling and reminders.

Other AI scribes are digging further into healthcare back-office workflows, a strategy that’s gotten some companies into muddy waters as of late, like Abridge, which has relied heavily on its integration with shareholder-turned-competitor Epic.

“It’s never been our value proposition to be the most integrated scribe with Epic, because we always thought that was the path to short-term sugar highs,” Kelly said of AI scribe startups that prioritized EHR integration. “Yeah, you’ll get lots of adoption, but then you’ll probably just churn everyone and die when they replace you.”

Heidi is also establishing a significant international presence, with physician users in 116 countries. Peers Abridge and Ambience have sold their tech exclusively in North America.

Kelly said the startup plans to use the Series B funding to help expand its office locations and accelerate hiring, especially in the US, UK, and Canada, while digging further into markets where clinicians have already picked up Heidi’s product, like France, South Africa, Singapore, and Hong Kong.

Heidi Health’s next bet will introduce a fresh set of formidable competitors. The startup wants to build AI medical search features in a bid that will pit Heidi against $3.5 billion startup OpenEvidence and public healthtech Doximity.

Kelly said Heidi is still considering whether to partner with another company or build the AI search engine itself. But he said the startup will draw some boundaries that companies like OpenEvidence and Doximity, which let pharmaceutical companies advertise to doctors on their platforms, have not.

“We will never monetize with pharma. I just think that’s a red line, incompatible with being a tool that physicians can trust,” he said.

Check out the 9-slide pitch deck Heidi Health used to raise $65 million for its AI scribe.

• Some AI executives have been predicting big job losses due to the technology.
• Yet, many AI companies are hiring huge numbers of human employees.
• That’s driving an unlikely resurgence in Silicon Valley’s office market.

Eric Simons, CEO of AI startup StackBlitz, recently announced a new office lease in San Francisco. It’s in Levi’s Plaza, a swanky location near the water. The buildout is underway, and employees are expected to move in around January.

A few years ago, this was unheard of. Tech offices across Silicon Valley shut down as employees transitioned to remote work during the pandemic. The region’s commercial real estate market plunged, and vacancies soared.

Now, though, the artificial intelligence boom is fueling a recovery. It’s a strange phenomenon. Generative AI is supposed to automate many tasks, with some industry executives predicting huge job losses. However, if you examine the actions of AI companies, rather than their words, a different future begins to emerge.

The reality is that many AI companies are hiring a huge number of human employees. These are experts at putting AI to work, so they should be shedding staff, right? Instead, it’s a hiring frenzy, and these growing workforces are now being housed in fancy offices across Silicon Valley and other urban, educated locations.

“AI companies are leasing because they’re hiring,” researchers at commercial real estate firm Colliers told Business Insider. “Generative AI is reshaping the workforce, but it’s also fueling new job creation that drives office demand.”

A recent report from Colliers concluded that the tech industry has become a major driver of the US office market.

In Silicon Valley, the average size of these leases has grown consistently over the past three years. So far in 2025, the office market there has reached its highest average lease size since 2020, according to Colliers data.

Since 2020, there have been 5.2 million square feet of office lease transactions by AI and AI-infrastructure companies in Silicon Valley (excluding Apple, Alphabet, or Meta). 2025 has already surpassed the full-year total for 2024 of 1.3 million square feet, according to Colliers’ data.

The firm has seen significant office leasing activity in Sunnyvale, California, for pure AI companies and in Fremont, California, for AI-infrastructure companies, due to the high prevalence of advanced manufacturing in these areas. While most of the companies already have a presence in this market, many of the new firms specialize in robotics.

The takeaway from this activity: Take predictions of an AI job apocalypse with a large grain of salt. If AI companies themselves are hiring a lot of humans, then perhaps other employers will follow suit.

Sign up for BI’s Tech Memo newsletter here. Reach out to me via email at abarr@businessinsider.com.