Your Role

Vogel is building the leading consulting platform for the German medium-sized businesses — by consolidating a fragmented market and simultaneously transforming the underlying structures. Several thousand medium-sized companies entrust us with their tax, commercial, and strategic matters. Every acquisition is both: a grown client base and a lever for economies of scale for the platform. You will drive this buy-and-build pipeline operationally — from outreach to closing.

You bring a transaction background from a large firm — deals or transaction advisory at one of the Big Four, as a Senior Manager or as a young auditor with a transaction track record. You think young, enthusiastically use AI as a lever, thereby replacing what an analyst team would do elsewhere. Above all, you approach independent entrepreneurs with genuine respect and on equal footing — those who have built their company over decades have a life's achievement that one approaches with humility, not with corporate arrogance. You are making a move because you want to build a buy-and-build engine yourself, instead of just passively supporting deals.

You will be responsible for the buy-and-build pipeline as the nucleus of Corporate Development in the CEO Office and will report directly to the management. Consciously lean: no team under you — you leverage AI for many things that would classically require hands. You will conduct seller discussions together with the management at the beginning; ideally, you will increasingly take them over yourself within six to twelve months. You are the mind behind the deals — the final decision on terms and closing remains with the management.

Your Responsibility

Origination and Pipeline

• Identify and screen acquisition targets according to our criteria (including hard qualifiers like DATEV) and maintain the buy-and-build pipeline in our CRM.

• Qualify targets against the M&A filter — client base acquisition, expansion of service portfolio, and economies of scale.

• Build relationships with potential sellers — advisory, patient, on equal footing. You will increasingly accompany discussions, initially together with the management.

Valuation and Financial Due Diligence

• Create indicative valuations (based on the Vogel valuation calculator), the business case, and the data room structure.

• You are responsible for the Financial Due Diligence yourself — you conduct it and present the results. Finance provides capacity within a tight audit window; the execution and lead are yours. A tax advisory FDD is demanding in terms of speed, but manageable in complexity.

Deal Execution and Negotiation

• Manage the LOI and SPA process together with Inhouse Legal, maintain the timeline and closing.

• Increasingly take over structured negotiation management. The final decision on terms and closing remains with the management.

Handover to Integration

• Cleanly hand over each transaction to Adoption & Integration — 100-day plan, synergies promised in the business case, critical handover points.

• Remain the commercial-strategic link beyond closing, without leading the operational integration itself.

Your Perspectives

What you will have delivered after 6 months:

• You will conduct initial seller discussions independently — the pipeline is already running and continuously surfacing interesting targets.

• At least one transaction led and managed.

• Valuation, Financial Due Diligence, and data room independently presented for ongoing processes.

What you will have delivered after 12 months:

• At least three transactions managed — from outreach through FDD and negotiation to handover to Adoption & Integration.

• The pipeline supports several parallel processes without the need for a team behind it — AI-leveraged.

• You will conduct seller discussions predominantly independently.

What you will have delivered after 24 months:

• You will independently manage buy-and-build execution — management will only get involved where the relationship truly demands it.

• Five to ten completed transactions with demonstrable value contribution.

Where the position is developing:

You are building what Vogel aims for: the leading group for medium-sized business consulting in Germany. The role grows with the transaction volume — prospectively into broader responsibility for the group's entire Corporate Development. Beyond cash compensation, there is the potential to participate entrepreneurially in the created added value.

What You Bring

Experience & Track Record

• You have a transaction background from a large firm — deals, Transaction Advisory, or M&A at one of the Big Four — as a Senior Manager and/or as an outstanding young auditor with a clear transaction track record.

• You have conducted Financial Due Diligence yourself — not just assisted — and can independently present valuation, data room, and findings.

• You have participated in negotiations and the SPA process and understand how a deal runs from outreach to closing.

• Profiles that do not fit the above template but possess the required substance are explicitly invited — we evaluate based on contribution, not label. Specifically: outstanding young auditor or manager with a deals track record and a desire to move into entrepreneurial operations; transaction profile from a boutique or corporate M&A with a focus on medium-sized businesses. The advertised range calibrates to the primary profile — the logic behind it is in our compensation principles.

Skills & Work Style

• You master valuation and Financial Due Diligence in practice — and leverage with AI what ties up an analyst team elsewhere.

• You work in a structured manner under time pressure — an FDD condenses weeks into days, and you maintain both quality and speed.

• You communicate confidently on two levels — precise and professional in the data room, warm and on equal footing with an owner who is considering selling their life's work.

• You work with AI as a natural tool — research, valuation, data room analysis, documentation.

Mindset & Personality

• You have genuine respect for the self-employed — you know that an entrepreneur who has built something over decades is often ahead of you in their life's achievement. You handle this with care.

• You think young and enjoy building from the ground up — a leanly set-up function appeals to you more than a large apparatus.

• You are comfortable with the dual role of analytical depth and human relationship work.

• You strive to set the highest standard in everything you deliver — not because someone is checking, but because mediocrity personally bothers you.

What You Won't Find With Us

• No deal assembly line in a pyramid. You don't work for a partner — you manage the process from outreach to handover.

• No large apparatus under you. Consciously lean, AI-leveraged. You build and lead the function, you don't manage a large team.

• Not the final decision on terms and closing. That remains with management — you prepare it and negotiate.

• No pure advisory role without implementation. You are responsible for real transactions with real consequences, not concepts.

• No partner company with competing self-interests. We are one company with a one-firm logic — one brand, one culture, one hiring bar.

FAQ

1. What is Vogel — and where do you work?

Vogel is one of Germany's leading consultancies for medium-sized businesses — since 1959, owner-managed in the second generation, with its own capital — and is building the leading consulting platform for medium-sized businesses from this foundation. We work at three locations: Aalen as the established headquarters, Bopfingen in the core business, and Munich as a new hub. At all three, we are looking for people across functions — from tax consulting and advisory to the teams that build the foundation underneath.

2. How should the salary bands be understood?

Deliberately broad — and indicated at each point before you apply. We differentiate based on track record and market value, not on degree: scarce, highly sought-after profiles at the upper end, less scarce ones at the lower end. The indicated range is not a negotiation margin, but a profile scale — two people with similar experience can earn differently with us. What determines the upper end is maturity, not the number of years of professional experience or negotiation skills.

3. How much — and how — do you work at Vogel?

We measure by what you achieve, not by hours. However, it's also true: those looking for 9-to-5 are not our first choice. We are looking for people who work intensely out of their own drive because the tasks are worth it. How you manage your time is largely your business. What we share: we work together in person and usually see each other in the office daily — culture, sparring, and the best ideas emerge from daily proximity. We are not a remote company and do not have extensive home office policies; occasional remote days are not a problem.

4. What is the application process like?

Lean, fast, transparent — and tiered by profile. Typically, it involves four steps: a written assignment where you take a position on eight questions — AI is explicitly allowed, we only ask for a brief self-disclosure about it; a 30-minute conversation; a joint work session on a real problem from our daily work; and an on-site meeting with the team, including a shared meal. How many steps are actually involved depends on the role: for internships and working student positions, the on-site meeting is omitted; for student jobs, a conversation is sufficient; for senior roles, a joint afternoon work session is added. In advance, you can book a ten-minute call where you only ask questions. Typically, you will hear back from us within 48 hours after each step.

5. How does variable compensation work?

Tied to performance quarterly, qualitatively assessed. The scale increases with the level: up to 20% Associate, 27.5% Manager, 35% Senior Manager, 42.5% Director, 50% VP. The expected value for good performance — you meet the requirements, set your own priorities, pass the keeper test — is around 50% of the maximum; the maximum bonus is not the norm. The focus is on a holistic assessment by your supervisor based on six criteria: Impact, Judgement, Communication, Execution, Growth, and Values.

6. How do I develop — what are the career paths?

Two active paths: the IC career (technical depth, expert career) through the stages Expert, Senior, Lead, and Principal — and the management career (leadership, personnel responsibility) through Manager, Senior Manager, Director, and VP. Both are equally compensated, and neither has to lead upwards: those who stay at one level and continue to deepen their expertise are just as welcome with us. You choose the direction after onboarding, usually in years 1-3. Starting your career is not a separate path, but the early part of the same journey — from working student or intern to Associate, for the best without a new application process.

7. Team, culture, vacation?

The communal lunch is the daily anchor point — those in the office eat together; expected, not controlled. Dinner is the same offer without any expectation. Both at no cost to you. In addition, social events and offsites at regular intervals — not as a mandatory program, but because a good team also shares time outside of work.

Benefits with us are not the icing on the cake, but what makes intensity sustainable over years: exam support with a €25,000 qualification budget and three months of leave, 100% coverage of childcare costs, EGYM Wellpass, company pension plan, job ticket with a 90% subsidy, home office equipment and a device of your choice from our catalog, one book per month from the Vogel canon — and AI tools without token limits and without budget caps. Vacation: 28 days.

Compensation: €115K – €145K • €34.5K – €43.5K Bonus

• • Fixed salary €115K – €145K • €34.5K – €43.5K Bonus

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