Should i take a consulting job

Yeah, I want to do a followup post about the questions IT employees should ask. What does success look like at the end of my first year?

What resources will I have available to draw on? What solutions are off the table like hardware, software, training? Brent, this is a good list. And that pushback would be a good litmus test. Tim — absolutely agreed. In London for example, consultancies are often desperate to pull in permanent staff to reduce their reliance on expensive contractors.

Some places consider anyone in their rolodex to be off-limits. Which essential means you would have to change professions or move to a new town. Steven — thanks! Fantastic article Brent. Even worse, you get saddle with a client and they have a senior level resource.

This is a good article. I would also add a question about professional development and learning new skills, since my experience is that consultants need to stay up on the latest technologies and best practices. But I know other companies who expect you to do this on your own time, or keep you so busy that you would never be able to do this during regular work hours. You have to suck it up and take it until […].

Great questions! One more to add to the list is to ask about time booking. Some places book to the quarter or half hour. A former employer of mine booked to the minute which ended up being the most challenging part of the role!

Your email address will not be published. Notify me of followup comments via e-mail. You can also subscribe without commenting. Post Comment. I'm on an epic life quest to have fun and make a difference. Workload Questions For me to keep up with the workload, what hours are expected? Do employees typically work after hours and weekends? Sales and Bench Time Will I be responsible for bringing in new clients for myself?

Travel Questions How much travel is involved with the position? How far in advance will I need to schedule vacations? Young professionals often ask me about consulting as a career option: Is it for them and how can they decide? To answer this question fairly and without the bias of having been in consulting myself , I reached out to someone who oversees the talent development of more than , employees working in consulting to get a well-rounded perspective.

He studied law and his first job was in legal consulting. Consulting is NOT for everyone. Consulting is not a 9-to-5 job. If you envision stability and structure, consider a career elsewhere. To work in consulting, you will need to create your own work structures and be accountable for your impact. Consider the questions below. If you answer yes to most of them, then perhaps consulting is for you. As a consultant, the impact you have is mostly indirect — through the advice you give to your clients.

We spoke about two soft skills in particular: empathy, which comprises listening skills and knowing which questions to ask, and agility, which is the open-mindedness to challenge your own assumptions in the broadest sense. All Big Four firms started out as auditors. Because you need to be able to efficiently collaborate with clients, team members, and management.

You will be meeting a lot of people, and you will have to build relationships, sometimes from the ground up. The archetype of consultants being all-knowing experts is obsolete.

By collaborating with your client — and applying empathy and agility — you explore tailor-made solutions together. So, how do you know if you are good at these skills? I also talk about how much I enjoy working with systems of people, transforming how they work, and making them more successful and impactful. Think about the functions of a new consultant — problem-solving, quantitative analysis, brainstorming as part of a high-powered team, creating PowerPoint presentations that will align the client on a path forward, etc.

What are some examples in your career or education where you demonstrated that passion? It took me a long time to realize that I am a math nerd.

I guess I told my teacher I wanted to do more problems, and she recommended a math workbook to do in my spare time. We were serving their vision. Of course, this varied a bit by personalities. I really appreciated this value and I continue to view my work that way.

Have you known any consultants personally or professionally? If so, think about how they may have impacted your professional life or your work. Think about people in business you admire. Chances are at least a few of them have a background in consulting. Review their stories or watch their Ted Talks to see if anything resonates with you.

Keep track of whether they mentioned how their time in consulting impacted their career. Be sure to link your story back to the recognition that the people you admire were able to make incredible impact in part because of the skills and network they obtained as a consultant. Look for examples of major transformations they oversaw for large companies. Consultants do a lot of transformation work — crafting a vision, communicating that vision, working out all the details of how things will work in the future, and then implementing the new vision.

Those are all core consulting competencies. Like I said earlier, getting a job in consulting is a lot of work. I see consulting as the best opportunity for me to continue to develop P, D, Q. When I read more about their career, I learned that they credit certain skills to their time in consulting, etc. Your interviewer will spend about 8 hours meeting with candidates in a single day.

Go back to thinking about what excites you about the work. Is it problem-solving, communicating, teamwork? For example, McKinsey has a global staffing model and prides itself on having consultants spend 4 days a week on client site so they deeply understand the client organization.

Bain, on the other hand, has a local staffing model. If this article has only made you more excited about a career in consulting, you should check out other articles on Case Interview Prep. We want you to be successful in your consulting interviews too. For example, here is how Tobias was able to get his offer from McKinsey. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

We are sharing our powerful strategies to get your foot in the door, even if you have a low GPA, have little to no business experience, or study a non-business-related major. Why Consulting?