Hello,
I have an upcoming informational interview/chat with a partner in MBB who is an alumni of my alma mater. I have never spoken to partners before in my informational interviews. What type of questions would you ask a partner and how should I make this conversation valuable and different?
Please advise.
Thank you.
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Don't ask him anything that you can find on their website / Googling yourself.
Try to keep the conversation light and casual. Find commonalities. Do you both like to ski? Garden? Read Hemingway? It can be anything. Talk about what you like to do and ask him or her the same.
Remember to put yourself in someone else's shoes anytime that you're meeting them / trying to make a good impression. This man or woman is a late 30s / early 40s senior leader at a prestigious consulting firm. He or she advises CEOs around the world and is most likely stressed and overworked. Be a pleasant, interesting person who displays traits that all managers or leaders want in their employees -- someone who is enthusiastic, professional, smart and driven. He or she does not owe you anything and you should approach this with an "I want to learn from you" attitude vs. "OMFG CAN YOU GIVE ME A JOB WITH MBB?!"
Don't even thinking about not dressing up for this. You don't need full business formal, but a jacket and buttoned shirt are a bare minimum. A suit, dress shirt and no tie I think is a right balance.
I'm sure there's lots more advice that others can offer, but that's off the top of my head right now.
@"pr4mence" nailed it, but I might wear a tie with the suit.
I would just add a few more things:
Think of an interesting answer to why you're interested in his/her firm. Are there certain industries you're interested in that the firm is a leader in? Do you know anyone there that's said great things about the culture? Prove to him that prestige and the job being a springboard aren't top of mind (especially since all three MBB firms provide that).
Look on the firm's website to see if the partner has contributed to any whitepapers, especially if they focus in an industry you have experience/interest in. I'm not saying you should drop the whitepaper on him like Owen Wilson does to Christopher Walken in Wedding Crashers, but if the conversation naturally becomes industry focused, you could mention that you were doing research and saw he wrote about X topic in X industry and ask a few questions.
Prepare to briefly describe your background. When I was preparing for informational interviews for consulting (as an industry hire), I came up with a 60 second background that broke down in three parts: 1) My background 2) The reason I'm interested in consulting/their firm 3) Why I've asked to meet with that person. If you can do this briefly, it'll set the tone for the entire conversation. It gives them just enough to be able to ask you questions, but also gives them a better understanding of what you want to get out of the conversation from them (which helps, because sometimes they just don't know what you want from them, other than a shortcut to a job at their firm).
Good luck.
@pr4mence and @cvsdjs - Thank you for taking the time to offer advice on how I should approach this interview. I really appreciate it. This serves as a nice guide as I prepare for the chat. It's actually going to be on the phone since the partner is in another part of the US.
I will start my preparation along these guidelines and will let you know if I have any further questions. Thank you so much.
Good advice so far. I found one of the simplest ways to strike up a conversation with a Partner (anyone really) is to ask what they're working on now or what their favorite case has been. Chances are, if they stuck around to this point, they truly enjoy the work and love talking about it.
When they answer, don't move on to your next canned question. Ask whatever followup questions occur naturally. "Oh that's interesting. It seems like you'd have to consider x and y." "How do you present something like that to the client?" "What got you interested in that industry/function?" It's not hard to burn up 15 minutes talking about 1 case experience.
Good luck!
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