Product Control vs. Big 4 Consulting Internship when Planning for MBB/IB?

Hi all,

I'm doing one last summer internship before entering full time. I'm planning on (or hoping for) MBB after I graduate, however I wasn't able to get it this year. Instead I have an offer from a major Canadian bank for Product Control and an offer from EY advisory supply chains.

Which one do you think is better for transitioning into MBB? I heard that MBB doesen't like to see involvement with Big 4 Consulting, so i'm reluctant to join EY. On the other hand, the product control position has a big bank's name.

Also, which one do you think is better for IB? I would say PC, but I heard that it's very difficult to transfer from back-end to front-end like that. Also, EY has a good FA division, which I believe I can access after grad, stay a year, and maybe transition to IB.

Thanks for the help.

3 Comments
 
Most Helpful

I haven't heard of this dislike that MBB has for Big4 Consulting. If you search linkedin for MBB and Big4, you will find plenty of examples of people that made the switch.

PC is considered more of a middle office role, but a transition from there to MBB would be very hard and one to IB front office still hard. Also depends what you mean by IB. If it's M&A/Lev Fin, you won't even be working with those teams, so even networking will not be easy.

On experienced hires, in my first team (part of Big4 audit), a transfer to PC was pretty easy. Recruiters would often reach out to us and some people would move every year. When I moved to Big4 advisory, almost no one took a PC role. You have to consider that Big4 advisory/consulting are front office roles, albeit not thought of as prestigious as IB or MBBs.

So if I were you, I would go for the Big4 job.

 

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