Am I Student or Experienced?

So when applying to all the consulting companies, they break it into two groups: Student or Experienced. As a recent college graduate in economics, with little experience in the industry + more experience in sales (job I took out of college), what category am I?

Thanks

5 Comments
 

I met a girl at a recent consulting second-round dinner (OCR) who has a degree in literature and nothing more...and who has been doing public sector/charity work for maybe a year. Evidently she was competing on a level-footing with me (or at least with the target school business undergrads in the room)--so anything can be "spun". And it seems that there are always a few non-students who are in OCR.

I'd emphasize that you've been successful in the work force so far (hence less of a risk than an undergrad straight out of school) and your selling skills (which will come in handy later on in consulting).

 

Definitely not sales skills per se - i'd reframe them as client interaction skills.

More importantly, I'd think about it as a consultant, with your book as a business. Which segments are saturated? Which are growing? Which are most profitable? Where are the margins highest? What are these segments looking for? How do you target these segments? What can you do differently to reach other segments?

I'd focus on this thought process as the bulk of your story, and then the result (increased sales blah blah blah) as a final bullet displaying the results of your approach.

 
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