Hey everyone. Was looking into McKinsey/BCG offices and was wondering whether your office heavily impacts the kind of projects you’re put on. I know that the firms have a global staffing model and that you have say in your projects, but where would it be easiest to work on projects in media? I assume the usual suspects (eg LA or NYC), but is it relatively easy to do so from different offices too?
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BCG doesn't really have a global staffing model. McKinsey's is more global.
Check out the partners at each office, either on their office website or on LinkedIn. Should give you an idea of the range of industries each office covers (there's some variance firm to firm).
If you want projects at a distant office or a less represented industry (ie media) you can totally get staffed on them at BCG/McKinsey, you just have to do a bit of leg work. For example, I have a friend at a McKinsey Southern office who wanted to do something in the Caribbean. She had to proactively network with partners to get staffed, but was successful in doing so because she was very motivated to get staffed there.
both companies have regional office systems, so whichever office system you are in dictates which projects you have access to. they comprise all of the projects that partners within that office system have sold (note that these projects may take place outside of the system itself, which is how people end up traveling across the country or even abroad)
it's far less common to be staffed on a project outside of your system, though more possible if you happen to work on a project with partners outside of your system that you then develop a good relationship with
basically, this means that you don't have to be in LA/NYC to access media projects. you just have to be either in the west coast system or the northeast system.
True of Bain and BCG, not McKinsey. McKinsey allows you to staff in any office, even globally. There's occasionally even interns who work in other countries if they express interest in that.
Not true of bain - you pretty much only have access to your own office. there are no regional systems in place like mck/bcg
the "global staffing model" is misinformation. my friend is a BA at McK NJ and they are limited to "mid-atlantic" cases (nj, dc, philly). they've found it fairly difficult to get staffed on nyc cases since that's the northeast and not mid-atlantic
note that the projects themselves can be anywhere in the world. so yes, i'm sure interns have gone abroad for projects, but that's because they were assigned to a case that was sold by a partner within their office system that happened to be abroad
Your friend at McKinsey NJ has a very uncommon experience that is likely due to limitations driven by the pandemic.
McKinsey allows you to staff in whatever city you want, but it may take a little proactive effort if nobody in your office is even connected to the space. BCG keeps you constrained to your regional system so I wouldn't go there based on what you're looking for.
Yes
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