Hey everyone - I'm an ex-Management Consultant turned Corporate Strategy Manager at a Tech company. I don't have the most traditional background, nor did I do consulting at MBB or Big 4.
Wanted to make a post and share what I know because I love my current role: the work-life balance is excellent, compensation is strong, and the work itself is generally interesting. Would be happy to answer any questions around moving from Consulting to Strategy (internal consulting-type roles), how skills transfer, what you should expect from interviews, or anything else!
I can't believe I'm on this forum everyday and somehow missed this!
Thanks a lot for doing this and congrats on the transition!
I did have a few questions actually (I'll try not to sound too much like I'm asking Chat GPT :D ):
It's already a fair bit, so I'll stop there! But also any words of wisdom on exiting, transferable skills you've observed, things that surprised you perhaps, are all welcome :)
Thanks!
Thanks for the questions and the engagement! I'll also try to sound human in my response (lol), and I hope that anyone who reads this remembers that my responses are based on my experience!
1) Wait to reach a certain level: I left consulting pretty early on (before people Manager level). After a short period, I was confident that the consulting life style was not for me. The least appealing aspect of consulting at my boutique was how much Senior Staff (Manager and up) performance was based on Sales - I want to use more time and effort shaping strategy rather than selling projects. Further, I felt and received ample feedback that I had sharpened the skills I call my "consulting toolkit." In other words, I was confident that I could contribute at a high level in an internal consulting position.
In terms of exit opps, I'd imagine there would have been more opportunities requiring people management skills if I had stayed longer. However, because my stint was relatively short (<2 years), hard for me to comment on exactly how big differences in exit opps would be.
2) Additional credentials: I don't have an MBA, but graduated from college with a BBA (doesn't make a huge difference in my opinion). However, I did a short stint in banking (rotation program) before consulting. That, in combination with my Finance degree from college, helped open up more finance-related opportunities, including PE gigs.
3) Tech skills: I was fortunate enough to have built tech-related skills (SQL, data manipulation, Tableau/Qlik, Python) during my time in consulting. However, none of those skills were required when I was interviewing for my current role and/or other similar roles. That said, having those skills certainly help, both during the interview process, and once you actually have the job. In addition (this part is specific to my firm), having technical skills opened me up to a more tech-related job function (in the corporate hierarchy), which led to a larger RSU (stock) grant (vs. a completely non-technical role).
4) Main concerns / things tested: From my experience, you're likely going to be required to present on a business case based on a past project the Strategy team did (or something to that effect). I was tested on two main things there: business acumen and problem solving.
General business acumen is critical since your team is likely tasked with a variety of business problems. From my experience (both through interviewing and actually working), strategy teams must quickly diagnose business problems, test hypotheses, and arrive at a cohesive narrative. To do so efficiently, strong business acumen is paramount!
This goes hand-in-hand with problem solving / structuring skills. IMO, the best problem solving comes from effective structuring of the question. As long as you can create a structure to solve a problem, you'll be able to reach some sort of recommendation. The aforementioned problems often come with a lot of ambiguity, and as such, structure is critical.
5) Anything else? I put a LOT of weight on WHO I'd be working with when moving jobs. There were many times when I was tempted by money and/or prestige, brand name, but I'm glad I held out for positions where I felt I would enjoy working with my team and would be surrounded by sharp colleagues who would challenge me and keep me learning. At the end of the day, it all comes down to what you value and how much you value those things. If you have a firm grasp on that, I think you'll be happy wherever you end up going as long as you stick to chasing after the things you value the most (for me, those things were a team I love working with, WLB, and flexibility).
Happy to answer any follow-ups or other questions!
Thanks for the detailed answer!
When did you move? Trying to understand what the market is like now - any thoughts?
Thanks for the question! I moved out of consulting mid-pandemic, and into my current role a little less than a year ago.
I'll speak for the Tech market, as that's where I'm at now... As you know, tech companies are leaning down, so the market in general is a lot colder than it was a year ago. Also, internal consulting teams are (generally) pretty tight-knit groups (at least in my experience), so the number of seats available across sizable tech firms is always limited. My opinion, however, is that you should look around (even just browsing through LinkedIn or visiting career pages of target firms) regardless of the market (esp. if you feel like it's time to go). I found it super helpful to do multiple case interviews across teams/firms; there's a lot of value in just going through the process in getting feedback (positive or negative).
Could you shed some light onto WLB + Comp now & also compared to before? Would be interested in learning more about a typical day etc. too, if possible please.
Thanks for engaging! Looks like a two-parter:
1) WLB + Comp (now vs before)
This question is a little tricky since I moved into my current role pre-layoff craze.
WLB. I think this aspect varies greatly by firm, team, what your goals are, and how you personally manage expectations (big emphasis here). My experience is that different teams (and firms) have different expected paces (you can usually try to gauge during interviews). My experiences have been 9 to 5 expectations with the flexibility to move that around as long as you're getting your work done. That flexibility increases with seniority and if your team is spread out (e.g., my team is split east and west coasts). I'll note here that flexibility has certainly decreased with RTO (return to office) - I'm back in the office twice a week now. The bottom line is that you just need to get your work done. How you go about that is up to you (both in your actual execution and how your communicating your progress / expectations). My advice here is: you're in a strategic role, be strategic about how you and your work is perceived, too. My last observation on this point is that hours are correlated with speed of advancement. By this, I don't mean hours spent making it look like you're online when you're not actually doing anything. Hours spent on impactful work lead to advancement. How much time you want to invest into that is ultimately up to you!
Comp. There have been a lot of complaints from Tech employees in regard to compensation over the past year because so much of it is tied up in equity (RSUs - restricted stock units). If you've been following the market cap of large Tech firms, the market hasn't been kind to many of the largest companies - as such, compensation has suffered as much (I won't comment on what's right or wrong; these are just observations). All this said, I don't think compensation has changed all that much pre/post layoffs (it's not good business to reduce comp...). I would imagine, however, that performance-incentive bonuses (year-end bonuses) and stock refreshes will go down as Tech business results suffer (but nothing unexpected - these things are tied to business perf.). Bottom line here is that compensation remains and will remain (IMO) strong in Tech strategy - it's hard to convince ex-MBB consultants to come onboard otherwise.
2) The day-to-day
I'd say my time ends up splitting up like so:
40% Strategizing (brainstorming ideas, narrative building for key meetings, etc.)
30% Analysis & Research (modeling, analyzing data, customer interviews, etc.)
20% Presentation building (making slides)
10% PMO (ensuring projects are moving, checking in with stakeholders, etc.)
What that looks like day-to-day is (as an example):
9AM: Login, check emails and chat notifications, review what I need to get done this week/month and my priorities
9:30AM: Usually a standup Once/Twice a week with team/manager to align on priorities and anything new added to our plates
Heads down work until 11AM
11AM: Meeting (brainstorming, project op mechs, etc.)
12PM: Lunch
1PM: Meeting(s)
2PM: Heads down until 3
3PM: Meeting(s)
Heads down until 4
4PM: Wrapping up (review progress, chat/call with relevant stakeholders, etc.)
5:15PM: Log off
Hope this helps!
Super helpful, thank you! I'm just looking to learn a bit more about careers as I'm interested in IB, but Consulting has always been a field of of interest too - you hit the nail on the head here with the question. The day-to-day sounds quite good; sounds like it's great for being able to have some time to yourself/hobbies/family etc.
If you dont mind me asking, what are the job prospects like going foward from your position? Is it just internally being able to go up the chain of command, & what other roles would be open to you in other firms from here (i.e. people who left your current firm - where did they go?). I've heard from strategy consulting itself people have ended up going to PE roles given they occasionally work with these firms & can develop a rapport to move over - which I found interesting. But I've also heard that some move to big companies i.e. FAANG strategy roles, Corp Dev etc. However, would love to know what it's like from your current position!
Thanks again!
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