Is traveling fully back?

I have been out of consulting for a few years, so cannot comment specifically on how it has changed post-Covid. From working with consultants / talking to former colleagues, my impression is that there is somewhat less travel than before, but the pattern is highly variable depending on client preference.

In general though, travel used to be heavily sector- and office-dependent even pre-Covid. For example, if you covered financial services out of Paris, there was basically no travel as all the banks are located in Paris. Zurich may be a bit more variable (some banks located in Geneva), Dubai depends as the Dubai office may function as a hub for the region (covering as well Katar etc.). The worst sector in terms of travel would generally be industrials (with travel to plants located in some backwater towns).

Now, you may not be able to / want to specialize in a sector immediately. Also, the way staffing works slightly differs between the different MBBs (with M being probably the most preference-based). Realistically, you may not be able to avoid travel altogether, as that will limit career opportunities. However, from my past experience  (M), there were quite a few colleagues from Paris who had a clear no-travel preference and were able to pull it off.

Mostly replying so I can follow the thread.  It’s an interesting question.

Never been a consultant but have nearly hired management/strategy consultants (including a long talk with McKinsey once) in the last few years, for portfolio companies I work with.

Have also followed WFH a bit more than most.  Always trying to figure out how it will affect XYZ industry.

My sense is that it will be hard for MBB to retain the added remoteness that came from Covid.  Their high fees are justified by the fact that this is a “bet the company” or “no expense spared” situation, i.e. major strategic review where the impact is big enough to make MBB’s fee small by comparison.

Against that backdrop, it’s hard to see the client cutting the corner of having the team in person.  Or to put it differently: it’s hard to not see a competing firm offer to work in person if another firm won’t, and position that in-person work as advantageous somehow.

Pretty speculative I know.  Definitely listen to people in the industry before you listen to me. But if any industry would emphasize being on-site, I’d think it’s the industry that was *already* flying people from their home cities to client sites as a normal business practice. 

Travelling definitely has returned, but in a lower capacity. I can only comment about Bain EMEA and BCG Paris (having applied to the latter and asked many questions during the process).

Two factors that are key at Bain are (1) we travel less than our peers to begin with and (2) we tend to staff very locally. Now, that unfortunately becomes more tricky with two of these offices, Zurich and Dubai. Zurich tends to staff with other DACH and so you can easily have travel to Germany / Austria / the other side of Switzerland. Dubai will have projects across the whole Arabic peninsula. So, you could easily end up staffed on a project in Riyadh. Paris won't be an issue, you'll not only stay in France, but the vast majority of clients are Paris-based in France anyway (some exceptions of course, but rare ones).

At BCG Paris, I was told (and happy to have someone from their office confirm or challenge) that similarly to Bain Paris, they staff you mostly on France-based projects, which means inherently Paris (for the same reasons as above for Bain). So, you might have to go to clients' offices, but those will be basically the same as commuting. Also, I think they are moving offices from Rue St Dominique to Avenue de la Grand Armée (around now or next year, can't recall).

One way to counter that, regardless of location is join the PEG / PIPE group. These have virtually no travel (unless you're colocating with your team based elsewhere, but you don't have to and it would be 1-3 weeks, max). Part of the reason why I joined Bain (and PEG in particular) was the travel aspect (other career-oriented reasons too, but this was definitely on the list).