Does MBB office matter significantly for post-grad recruiting/long term career growth?
I'm a college junior doing consulting this summer for a MBB out of Chicago. How big of a difference does office location make for MBB, primarily with regards to future career opportunity? I'm considering PE or hedge funds long term.
What factors should I consider weighing Chicago vs other offices (SF, NYC in particular)?
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Perhaps some more experienced consultants can shed more light, but from the people I've spoken with in Chicago, the projects and clients are geographically segregated. For instance, OW finance clients are primarily tied to New York and Aviation clients are tied to Chicago. Since the average project will be based on that client exposure, it limits specialization options a little. I can't speak for the impact on MBB.
Depends on MBB
McK is the least geographically siloed (generally no trouble getting on client projects in other regions of the US)
Bain is very keen about its “home office” model that will tie you to your office’s region
BCG is somewhere in between
For future career opportunities, very little if any. You will be able to find a role on east coast/west coast no problem. Same headhunters will hit you up. They will give you the same opportunities. It may be slightly different if you went to a small office (e.g., Detroit/Charlotte, etc.) but even then I've seen plenty of people end up wherever.
The only time it may get a little weird is for something like PE in NYC specifically. This more so stems from NYC PE having a bias to take NYC bankers over Chicago. Even still, I knew plenty from my firm who went to PE in NYC and were not a part of the NYC office.
It may also get a little weird with smaller VC/hedge funds who will want multiple and often informal rounds of interviews. They (pre corona) would often want to do in person type meetings when possible. Still this would not prevent you from getting a job if you were qualified.
Agree mostly with the above on how the three firms work with staffing. I don't think it is quite as cut and dry. People at McKinsey still will have to prove themselves if they are in an office like Chicago to get to work on tech (SF) or media (NYC) and that may take a while. Similarly, while Bain is office-centric, a Chicago partner may have clients all over the country/world that you would be able to work on.
As someone in NYC at an MBB and who received offers at all three:
Bain/BCG Chicago is a bit cut off since they are more regional.
McKinsey Chicago means you can work on whatever you want since McKinsey uses a global staffing model. Chicago was also McKinsey's first office (unlike Bain/BCG in Boston) so it's a bit more special to the firm.
In terms of exits, Chicago is a major office (along with NY/SF), and is the 2nd/3d biggest office for each of MBB. So, Chicago is considered one of the top offices in that sense, and also more competitive.
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