As a consultant, you will typically work long hours, and during this time you might find yourself creating slide decks, analyzing massive data sets, and working within fast paced teams to solve your clients’ most challenging problems. To add to the stress, consultants are often travelling long distances for on-site visits with the client or […]
Category: Lifestyle and Experiences
Management consulting is widely known as a highly intense industry. Much is expected of consultants in terms of hours of work, quality of output, and responsiveness to client requests. The sheer intensity of the industry is a big reason why many consultants end up burning out within 2 years, opting to exit into more relaxed […]
As a consultant, you are likely working 60-80 hours during the week. Add in 6 hours of sleep every night, 14 hours for meals throughout the week, and 14 hours for weekly commuting, and there is not much time left for anything else. In order to keep your body and mind functioning optimally, you should […]
If you are transitioning into consulting from school or a job in industry or government, you will likely begin traveling more than ever. Sure, maybe you have gone to a few conferences or travelled to your company’s annual meeting, but once you begin a consulting career you will be on the road much more frequently […]
Ever heard of the saying “take care of your mental health before your mental health takes care of you?” This sums up the fast-paced, highly pressured environment of management consulting. There are a number of reasons why people decide to take up a career in consulting, including: Exposure to a variety of projects and industries […]
As a management consultant at Accenture in South Africa, many students, graduates, and aspiring consultants ask me how they can maintain confidence throughout their consulting journey. Truth is, I am still trying to figure it out myself. As an extroverted individual with a bubbly and outgoing personality, I have always had the ability to bring […]
A manager at Accenture has been known to say that “analysts are often over enthusiastic about the consulting industry”. At first glance, I did not understand what this meant because it seemed normal to take on as many roles and responsibilities as possible. The motto analysts live by is “never say no to managers or […]
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Merry Christmas!
Wishing you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! During this festive season, we scale back our work obligations and make time for friends and family. Christmas is a season of gift giving. If you are a Christian, then this tradition holds special significance because it echoes the story of the gifts given by the three […]
A constantly reoccurring conversation I have heard discussed about the management consulting industry is if the preference for talent is in favor of “poets” (those that come from more of a humanities background) or “quants” (those that come from more of a technical or hard sciences background). Of course, the best position to be in […]
The working world can be an intimidating environment. Problems may arise with your boss, colleagues, the economy, your company’s strategy or business practices. You may have limited control over the source of the problem and little leverage to resolve it. This post aims to provide you with some guidance on how to approach difficulties in […]
Ever since I started my undergraduate degree, I was keen on securing a job in strategy consulting. It is not difficult to see why the job is so attractive to young overachievers. You get the opportunity to work in a fast-paced environment surrounding yourself with smart people and learning about business problems in a variety […]
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Merry Christmas!
This year was a challenging year for many of us. Some of you may have lost your livelihoods, and you may know people who even lost their lives. For those of us lucky enough to be healthy and hard at work during 2020, we had to navigate a new and challenging environment; a loss of […]
When it comes to recruiting, consulting firms have a roster of schools’ from which they source the majority of their summer interns and full-time employees. This dedicated school-based hiring is generally referred to as “campus hiring”. Most firms also hire students from ‘non-core schools’, but these are usually a small minority of campus hires. Students […]
Everyone I know in consulting entered it in large part as a means of career advancement, be it through the ranks of the consulting industry or with the intention to pivot into a different career down the line. Yet, what does it mean to get the most out of the consulting experience for career advancement? […]
By no means do I pretend to see the future, but I think I can take an educated stab at how consulting life may change once the COVID crisis is over. Many prospective consulting candidates are probably keen to know what to expect. I want to highlight that I speak not only from my own […]
During the recruiting process, it was interesting to hear consultants talk about how much of their job is about conducting learning activities. By learning activities, I am not speaking about on-the-job-training. I am specifically talking about structured formal learning events such as classroom learning (including online), instructor led workshops, and interactive lectures. For prospective consultants […]
During both consulting recruiting and the initial months working in consulting, experienced by myself and my friends, the top priority for a consulting career which has been consistently emphasized has been delivering excellent client work. Arguably, the second priority has been persistent learning. Both of these are pretty self-evident to understand and appreciate. However, there […]
This past New Year’s Eve, I was surrounded by people sharing what they were thankful for in 2019. Since then, I have put much thought into thinking about how thankful I am to work for a consulting firm that empowers me to make time for my personal life’s priorities. Maybe I was overly pessimistic about […]
These are a few tips and tricks that I’ve picked up from my own personal experience as well as anecdotes for consultants a few years out. There are a lot of things to note when first starting your career, but these are the most broadly applicable. 1. Be open-minded While not all consulting firms are […]
Amid the intensity of recruiting for consulting, few stop to think what it will really be like once they’ve achieved their mission to get into a top-tier consulting firm. With their eyes on the prize, and a single-minded focus, many gloss over the details of what day 1 and 300 will look like. I’m included […]