1. Getting into Management Consultancy
Vinny Potter
LSHTM Careers

2. What is Management Consultancy?
Analysis of a business or area of business to suggest solutions and improvements Specialist expertise or objective viewpoint A definition of management consultancy from the Institute of Consulting The provision to management of objective advice and assistance relating to the strategy, structure, management and operations of an organisation in pursuit of its long-term purposes and objectives. Such assistance may include the identification of options with recommendations; the provision of an additional resource; and/or the implementation of solutions.

3. Types of Consultancy services
Strategy HR
Marketing
Change
Process and Operations
Org design IT
Management consulting

4. Types of firms in the industry
Accountancy firms offering consultancy
Large non-accounting consultancies
Small specialist boutiques
Gurus
Independents
Management consulting has grown quickly, with growth rates of the industry exceeding 20% in the 1980s and 1990s. As a business service, consulting remains highly cyclical and linked to overall economic conditions. The consulting industry shrank during the period, but had been experiencing slowly increasing growth since. In 2004, revenues were up 3% over the previous year, yielding a market size of just under $125 billion.
Currently, there are three main types of consulting firms. First, there are large, diversified organizations, such as Accenture and IBM Global Services that offer a range of services, including information technology consulting, in addition to a management consulting practice. Second are the large management and strategic consulting specialists that offer purely management consulting but are not specialized in any specific industry, like McKinsey & Company. Finally, there are boutique firms, often quite small, which have focused areas of consulting expertise in specific industries or technologies.

5. Major consultancies Bain & Company Boston Consulting Group
McKinsey & Co
Deloitte EY
A.T. Kearny
KPMG
Arthur D.Little
Marakon
Mercer
PriceWaterhouse Coopers
Accenture
IBM

6. Some smaller or specialist ones
Prederi PPL consulting Berkeley partnership iMPOWER Transform Crown Agents IMC worldwide Social and Scientific systems inc Social Sectors Development Strategies HLSP (part of Mott Macdonald) Taysha consulting

7. The Career Structure
Analyst: £28,000 These are roles for raw graduates or those with some sector specific post-grad work experience. As recruiters we are rarely asked to find candidates at this level, so the figures come from the consulting firms themselves. Consultant: £50,000 Consultants at this grade typically already have three years delivery experience in consulting, or are fresh recruits into consulting but with a recently obtained professional qualification or comparable level of competence e.g. ACA, CIPD, blue-chip management training programme graduate. Senior Consultant: £65,000 At this level the backgrounds of consultants start to diverge. Examples include: mid-tier strategy house/boutique-experienced consultants with delivery experience; average performers with delivery experience at a systems integrator or a full-service consultancy and some field management responsibility; MBAs entering consulting for the first time. Managing Consultant: £90,000 These tend to be consultants with deep project leading experience in the full-service consultancies, or engagement managers/project leaders in boutiques. Sales involvement was claimed by about 60% of the consultants we surveyed at this level. Director/Salaried Partner: £195,000 These experienced consultants ranged from those with extensive delivery responsibilities at a boutique to client relationship duties in general consulting.

8. Experienced Hire? Consulting or research and analytics?

9. What they look for
Experience? Communication skills People skills Problem solving Analysis Confidence Impact Initiative and motivation Commercial awareness

10. What they look for
Commercial awareness means having a good general understanding of the business world, how consulting fits in, how it's affected by political and economic issues, and a firm grasp of what's currently going on in the consulting industry. It also means knowing how to approach situations in a commercially practical way.

11. Getting in
Case studies Interviews Psychometric Tests

12. Case Study Interviews
‘When answering case study style questions, make sure you communicate your thought process clearly so your interviewer can understand how you got to your answer.’ - L.E.K. Associate, Durham Alumni. ‘Find a case study partner to practise with. Real-life interviews are a rather different experience to what you read in interview guides!’ – L.E.K. Associate, LSE Alumni. ‘Practice, practice, practice. Get comfortable doing cases and with multiplying and dividing.’ – L.E.K. Associate, Imperial Alumni. ‘Be ready to be confronted with questions about industries you have probably never heard about. It is all about asking relevant questions, showing good reasoning and being confident.’ - L.E.K. Associate, Stockholm School of Economics Alumni.

13. General – Specifics- General

14. Useful resources
– search for Management Consultancy