A large and growing number of private-equity firms have at least one full-time deal originator on staff. But it can still take the skills of a consummate originator to break into the field at the junior level. All told, 59 percent of the 144 private-equity firms that participated in this year's Deal Origination Benchmark Report have at least one business development professional, or originator, whose full-time job is relationship-building with deal intermediaries or business owners. That's up from 47 percent in the 2017 edition. The report is produced every year by deal-sourcing platform provider Sutton Place Strategies.