Daryl Morey slinks away to a secluded weight-room with two muted TVs broadcasting the tipoff of his beloved Houston Rockets, the team he created. As general manager, he had the power to build the team to exactly his desires. But how did he attain this power in a league where two thirds of GMs are former players? Daryl Morey took the path less travelled, the path that began with academia and consultancy. Through sheer desire (and a strong talent for analytics), he achieved a top spot in an industry with no room for the gangly and physically lacking among us. Consultancy has the power to open doors where no doors are present. Morey’s tale is only one of the more unique and interesting paths taken by former consultants in the world today.
Consultancy has staked its claim on being one of the most popular career destinations for the best and brightest among us. By accepting graduates from a broad range of majors consultancy is a field full of a diverse range of talent. Behind many of the world’s top politicians, CEOs, and opinion leaders is a background in consultancy. This is because consultancy is an open-ended field, and develops very transferable skills like communication, leadership, and strategic thinking. I personally have a love for soccer and would love nothing more than to be a professional player. I know that I do not have the ability for that conquest, but inspiration from former consultants like Daryl Morey shows that I have the potential to work in any industry, and to get involved in the game from the top level.
Morey knew there was no point faking it. Although reasonably tall, he had no hope of playing basketball even at a college level. But he knew that he wanted to be involved in the sport. Thus, he thought, the only way to be involved without playing experience was to earn a boatload of money and purchase a team. He worked his way towards earning an MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management, which he hoped to follow with a successful career in entrepreneurship. Instead, he took on a job at the Parthenon Group as a principal consultant where he worked on a variety of strategic and operational improvement projects. Morey’s consultancy work developed his analytical skills as he worked under STATS Inc., the firm that developed much of modern baseball analytics, and he led the valuation analysis of the Boston Celtics. This combination of developing the right skills and meeting the right people through his consulting work eventually led to him getting the opportunity to work in his dream job, no boatload of money needed.
Over to the political spectrum, top politicians such as Mitt Romney and Susan Rice started as consultants. Rice began her career as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company before serving in the Clinton administration, eventually moving her way up to being the United States Ambassador to the United Nations. Rice had only a few years as a management consultant before deciding on a career switch, but her time in consultancy was the platform upon which she was able to leap into her political career. Romney on the other hand spent ten years as a management consultant for the Boston Consulting Group and Bain & Company before co-founding a private equity firm. Fifteen years later (with a brief run for senator in between) he became dissatisfied with the never-ending quest for wealth accumulation and oversaw the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City. He never regained interest in business and ran a successful campaign for Governor of Massachusetts before running for President in 2008 and 2012, narrowly losing to Obama in the 2012 campaign. Again, management consultancy taught him the skills he needed to succeed in business and in politics. The confidence in dealing with business leaders as a young person helped Romney thrive in his later roles.
Many Fortune 500 business leaders also have a background in consultancy. Naturally, working with businesses from the outside with the intent of improving their operations gives one a strong business acumen. With all the bright young people going into consultancy there is minimal room for rapid internal promotion so many of these individuals choose to leave for top positions at external companies. Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook COO started her career at McKinsey & Co, as did former Boeing CEO James McNerney and former President and COO of Chrysler Wolfgang Bernhard. The list of business leaders such as these mentioned goes on and on. The formula repeats itself. Join a consultancy firm, work there for a number of years, gain wide experience, and jump to a top position at a given firm. Of course, the work is very difficult, and the individuals involved are some of the most talented university graduates around, but it is a well-travelled path.
Other career paths that former consultants have pursued include becoming authors, academics, and activists. And that’s just the a’s.
Consultancy firms accept applicants with a wide range of degrees, and there are many possible paths post-consultancy. Learning about the life of Daryl Morey gave me hope that my aspirations of working in sports are not nullified by my lack of athletic ability. So, to you out there who have developed a passion for cars but do not possess great talent in driving, to those that have become enamored in politics but are years into a business degree, fear not, because at the end of your path you may be a chief at Chrysler or a candidate for President.
Dean Franklet is a third year economics and finance student at the University of Canterbury where he is President of the largest commerce society on campus. Spending his life in Texas and then New Zealand with a few other stops along, he gives a unique global viewpoint to portray in his writing.
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