I am a recent grad who will be starting at a t2 strategy consulting firm this January. I have already spent time travelling and relaxing over the summer and would like to make some professional progress between now and January. If you were in this position, what times of opportunities would you look for?
Some of my ideas include taking the GMAT, working for a startup, and learning some rudimentary coding skills.
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Busy afternoon so i'll make my response quick and directly geared towards your thoughts.
GMAT - Do not take the GMAT just because you have a free time. If you genuinely wish to go back to business school (which I assume a lot of consultants end up doing), then YES this is the ideal time to study.
Working for a startup - Good idea on paper. Why would I company hire you if you're going to leave in 3 months? It takes 3 months to train anybody for most jobs and startups already have limited resources....Maybe you have a connection and are willing to intern for free?
I started out at a tech startup.....the last thing we ever wanted was having somebody not in it for the long haul.
Hope this helps.
Thanks for the feedback - very helpful! One of my long term aspirations is to work in VC so I was thinking along the lines of things that would make me more marketable to transition into something tech-related after consulting. I have heard that coding ability can be helpful even for not-programming roles in tech.
In terms of the GMAT, my thinking here was that I will likely need to use bschool to lateral into VC since I am not starting at MBB.
Rudimentary coding is useless. No company or VC will hire you based on the fact that you finished the Codecademy course on Python or Java. If you end up working in those roles, it'll likely be in a business-y role anyway. The level of coding ability of people in technical roles is so much higher than this level that simply being able to understand data types, dictionaries, lists, arrays, etc. isn't going to really get you far.
Additionally, I don't see how coding will really benefit you in consulting. If it's needed, they'll teach you R/SPSS, but even this isn't really necessary. I would do the GMAT.
I had a break before starting full-time as well...here are my recommendations;
If you want to go to B-School, study for the GMAT. However, really take the time to think through this decision--it is a lot of time and you cannot half-ass it.
Learn what in your firm you find interesting/areas you would like to explore. Begin reaching out to people and introducing yourself--set up 15 minutes calls, etc. This can save your ass when you join with little previous experience, and you are looking to get staffed, especially in an area of interest.
Do something interesting. If you have already traveled, pick up a hobby or enjoy the ones you currently do. Work part-time in an interesting job. Volunteer...you get the point. You will more than likely not have this much free-time with so little responsibility, so do something interesting/take some risks. You really can't go wrong here...
A few things to note...if you are interested in gearing up for your career, take some online courses in PPT/Excel/Tableau/SQL, etc. Excel and PPT will be your bread and butter so understand the tool's functionality prior to walking in the door--you can always learn something more in these tools, and your first few months will be intense, so ramping up on one/two less things will help and prevent long nights.
Also, hold yourself to a plan and set goals which you actively track. It is easy to fall back into a slump when all your friends are working during the week, and you are hanging out without starting. Discipline yourself to keep pushing forward.
Oh, and start going to the gym earlier in the morning...getting a 30 minute workout in prior to starting the workday is great, and I wish I started doing it earlier.
Thanks for the advice. In terms of connecting with people at my firm that align with my interests, what level (engagement manager, entry, partner, etc.) do you recommend I reach out to?
First things first, my wife is the consultant; my company is a client of her firm (not a client of hers, however). These are just my observations from being on the other side of things (no direct experience).
1) Don't worry about coding. You're going into strategy consulting for god's sake. My strategy colleagues on the Corporate know nothing about coding. My wife's colleagues who are not IT-specific consultants know nothing about coding (except for maybe a little VBA.....maybe). Even then, I'm not sure her colleagues in the IT practice know a whole heck of a lot about coding.
2) Know Excel and Powerpoint cold. So cold you have nightmares about it. (I'm only half kidding). My strategy colleagues on the Corporate side know ONE thing about Excel and Powerpoint -- my phone extension. (You need slides/a model? I'll call Birdo...) Otherwise, they trust the consultants that come in to handle all of this.
3) Is there a particular industry you will be focusing on? If so, start brushing up on the goings on of that industry.
4) If you're going to go the MxA route, start thinking about studying for the GMAT/GRE.
5) Relax and enjoy yourself. My wife rides her first years hard (and slaps them around for trying to over-bill projects). This is done to make sure you can handle yourself appropriately when the time comes that you are in front of/on the phone with a client by yourself.
6) Develop some sort of interesting tidbit. It makes connecting with clients a lot easier (and makes you a lot easier to remember when the time comes that you're actually trying to sell work). Learn to cook/travel/volunteer/read books about the Wild West etc.
I think the two key things I read from above and would second:
1) Take the GMAT if there's at least a 40% chance you're going to B-School - I did this at the suggestion of people I respected back when I just graduated. Everyone I talk to going through the b-school process now regrets that they did not do it earlier.
2) Take some time off to do some fun travelings / etc. - Don't take life too seriously.
Same situation due to graduating early (so for me its Jan-June). Thinking about teaching English somewhere to try to get things in perspective but don't really know where to start. Also gonna take some fly fishing trips and hopefully some track days. Besides that, don't have a clue but the last thing I want to do is crash at my parent's place.
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