ADC Candidate: Thoughts of R&D vs MBB Consulting. Please help with the risks/downsides

A follow up post on my motivations of considering a move to MBB consulting, since this will undoubtedly come up in the replies.

Yes, I am doing this for the faster rate of promotion and more compensation, I don't deny that.

Let's consider the main aspects of a MBB career.

I'm good at problem solving, and I like working on cases (well, at least case interviews, cause that's all the exposure I have). Before I graduated with my PhD, I applied to the 3 MBB firms, got into final round for 2 of them, but obviously did not make the cut. But, to be honest, I wasn't really serious back then, so it was a "trying out and let's see how it goes" mentality, and I'm confident if I push myself with more serious prep work, I'll stand a good chance of getting in.

Being a team player. I'm ok with that, in fact most of my R&D projects are team-based.

What I am really unsure about is all the politicking BS in corporate america. Sure, I've read MBB consulting is not as screwed up as banking, since we are all supposed to be collegial. But I don't fully buy it. Half of your peers have to go at every level, how can that not foster a hostile working environment? I feel that a career in MBB consulting will be like playing Survivor (yes, that reality TV show) for 24/7 for the rest of my life. To be honest, I don't think I will enjoy that. One aspect of why I continued on with my R&D career is that because scientist and engineers are for lack of better words are "easy to work with". We work in teams to accomplish our goals, but we are also not trying to screw each other. Yes, you have that lazy bum who is not pulling his weight, or the guy with the eccentric behavior, but those are stuff I can deal with. At the end of the day, I can be sure that my co-workers in my R&D team "have my back", so to speak. But with a MBB consulting career, I fear that is not the case. I have to worry about my colleague spreading negative gossip in an effort to tarnish my image so that I don't get promoted at the next level, I have to worry about my colleague stabbing me in the back just because he/she wants the promotion. Since the start of my PhD, I've been working in an environment where I worked as a group against an external "enemy" (competitor, deadline, etc...), but somehow I feel that is not the case even in a collegial "MBB" career since you have to consider the "enemy" from within.

Is my assumptions of the culture of a MBB consulting career correct, or are they so off track that I'm spewing nonsense? Would really appreciate some feedback.

I made pretty much exactly the jump that you are contemplating.

Immediately after my PhD, I joined a very large Fortune 100 company as a scientist. The demand/supply balance of my particular set of skills is very much in the favor of the employees, so I didn't have to bother with a post-doc or the initial scientist position.

Two months into my job, I received a call for an MBB's summer program -- I had forgotten that I had submitted an application several months earlier. At the time I was going to say no, because I had personal plans, it was not very nearby, etc etc. Long story short, I'm very glad I went, prepped for the interviews, and got an offer.

Let me offer some thoughts on your questions. Bear in mind that I haven't been in consulting or industry for 5 years or anything like that.

First, yes, financially, you will do better at an MBB. The pay-scales should be easily accessible.

Second, yes, the work-life balance is a LOT worse in consulting. There have been many days when I've cursed myself for quitting a job that allowed me to work from home weeks in a row if I wanted, where I had the freedom to work on whatever the hell I wanted, 1+-hour lunches with no simultaneous work, very relaxed bosses, office turned into a ghost-town at 5:15, etc etc etc.

Third, the scientist career progression seems correct, but I think you're being overly pessimistic about the percentages. Most companies have senior-manager type positions for people who choose not to join the management track. Trouble with the scientist/technical track is that you eventually become very, very expensive, and hence a target for layoffs.

Fourth, yes, the MBBs have an up-or-out culture. A significant portion of post-MBA/post-PhD folks are in fact asked to leave after about a couple of years. However, the next promotion should be a lot easier, unless you've screwed up in a major way. After the first promotion, you are generally very useful for the firm -- you don't cost a whole lost and have demonstrated that you can run major client engagements with little supervision. After the second promotion, you're selling cases and bringing in revenue, without being paid as a partner, so yeah, they'll want to keep you -- at least until you come up for partner election.

Despite the up-or-out culture, making the cut is not really as hard as it seems from the outside. I'm not at that point yet, but I'm reasonably confident of crossing the line. People think that those who get promoted are simply more capable than the ones who don't. At my MBB, I honestly can't think of anyone from the many people I've met who is not capable of making the cut. The question is whether they WANT TO. The economy plays a role in all of this as well.

So, if you were successful at your PhD, you're probably smart enough to do the job well. Are your communication skills good -- more importantly, are you actually interested in developing them? Are you willing to do mundane work when you're required to?

Fifth, yes, there is firm politics. But there is a heck of a lot of politics in the corporate world as well. Despite having a very good work environment, I saw lots and lots of politically-motivated actions in my industry job. I'd say the politics is actually less at my firm. Mainly because you work with a limited set of people.

Sixth, yeah, going back to pure R&D after consulting might be difficult. Some people will view you as having sold out. A lot of it depends on how you manage your exit. But if your skills are in demand, reasonable managers shouldn't hold the consulting stint against you. The bigger question for me is whether your skills/knowledge base would be current after 2 years or so, and how long it would take you to ramp back up.

Finally, to be quite honest, I think you're missing the biggest difference between the two career paths. Which brings me to why I personally made the switch. Yes, it gets more and more difficult to get promoted in industry, but the most frustrating thing about it is that the promotion chances are much more random. It's not like among the four people in the running for the job, they pick the best performer. I know very mediocre people who got promoted two levels in the span of 1.5 years simply because their managers got poached and somebody needed to that niche job. And I also know people who stayed in the same rank for 7 years despite being extremely smart, very hard working, value-adding, etc etc.

Look at it this way -- you already have an offer for a scientist job. I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that your current job isn't consuming every minute of your time. Apply and start practicing cases -- leave the introspection and comparisons to when you actually have an offer.

Didn't mean to write such a long reply -- but I hope this is helpful.