Horbach began her career in private equity as the sixth investment professional hired at Forstmann Little & Co. in 1987, which she joined after earning an MBA from Stanford University. Before Stanford, she had been an analyst at Morgan Stanley. “I was very intrigued because I’d worked in M&A and thought it would be much more interesting to be on the principal side,” she told Buyouts.

Today she leads the consumer and retail group at Carlyle Group, which she launched in 2005; the group has nine investment professionals and has completed five investments. Horbach’s advice to women interested in private equity is to choose a firm devoted to developing and maintain a diverse pool of talent. “I wouldn’t be discouraged by what you see,” she said. “The world is increasingly diverse and global, and any firm that doesn’t keep up with that will not be as competitive.”

Leichtman, who oversees deal origination at her firm, which manages more than $5 billion, believes woman can sometimes bring a cooler approach to contentious situations in private equity. “Sometimes I think women—and this has been said many times—have a less heads-on confrontational way to resolve things,” she said. “Sometimes that’s better, sometimes it’s not.”

Generally speaking, though, Leichtman thinks women have plenty of opportunity to get into private equity today. “It shouldn’t matter at this point in time, in terms of getting started,” she said. And don’t expect any preferential treatment from her if you are a woman. “I hire the best people available,” she said, when asked if she tries to hire women.

As a woman in private equity, Palmer said one challenge has been finding the common ground that men often find so easily via sports. “I can’t walk into a meeting and talk sports like my colleagues can,” she said. Conversely, though, she said it can be easier to gain people’s trust as a woman at the bargaining table.

She said private equity is also a good career for women raising a family. “You’re controlling the checkbook, you’re not working at someone else’s whim,” said Palmer, who has three children. “If I say I need to be at my daughter’s dance recital at 7, so let’s get on the phone at 9, everyone’s getting on the phone at 9.”

Richardson couldn’t recall any instances in her career in which her gender wasn’t anything but an advantage. For that she credits supportive mentors, such as Jimmy Lee, the legendary investment banker at J.P. Morgan and Jonathan Nelson, the CEO of Providence Equity. “CEOs meet so many male private equity professionals,” she said. “It’s easier for them to remember you and for you to make an impression.”

In 2003, Nelson asked Richardson, who was an investment banker, to establish a New York-office for the firm. Today, the office has 19 investment professionals. Richardson has helped lead high-profile investments including the $11 billion consortium buyout of SunGard Data Systems, in 2005; the $1.4 billion buyout of Open Solutions Inc., in 2007; the $1.5 billion buyout of Altegrity, in 2008; and the $1.8 billion buyout of SRA International, in July.

“Being the only woman can be an advantage. No one ever forgets your name,” Wheeler told Buyouts. “When you’re the only women on a board of 15 men, often times what you say gets noticed more.”

Wheeler was an analyst in Goldman Sachs’s private equity group when she got the call from Texas Pacific Group in 1996: would she join the firm’s San Francisco office? Fifteen years later, Wheeler is now the head of TPG Capital’s retail and consumer group, which she helped build out. As such, she’s led some of the Fort Worth, Texas-based firm’s most well known buyouts, including the $1.7 billion buyout of PETCO, in 2006; the $5 billion buyout of Neiman Marcus Inc., in 2005; and the $3 billion take-private of J. Crew earlier this year.