Q&A: I Work at Strategy&. Consulting

Jome11:

Do you know how the European business is doing? Are there similar problems? Layoffs?

I have very little insight into the international offices. PwC US is only exposed to profits in the US market because that is our legal jurisdiction. So everything I know about quarterly results, etc, pertains to the US. When staffing sends out a list of projects, it only includes projects in the US. Unlick McK, we follow a domestic staffing model (similar to BCG). Our internal S& directory only lists folks in the US.

I have heard (but cannot confirm) that S& offices outside of the US are allowed to act with much more autonomy than ones in the US. Unlike the US, they are branded separately from PwC, go to market separately, etc. Because of this, I doubt that the layoff problems extended to Europe (and if folks were counseled out, it probably was a normal process).

Honestly, I would reach out to former S& Europe employees on Linkedin to find out.

theman51:

Hey S&, thanks for the AMA.

I guess my major question is: What industry / kinds of cases have you been staffed on?

I have been staffed on 100% FS (Financial Services) cases. Some context:

Unlike MBB and many other consulting firms, when you join PwC / S&, you are slotted to an industry and it is very difficult (if not impossible) to switch. Industry alignment is based on the prior experience you displayed on your resume. So, I see issues with this in both the undergrad and MBA level.

• Undergrad: 1) Most 22 year olds entering consulting have no idea what they want to do with their life. Did you do an internship in IB, hate it, and now want to learn about Oil and Gas? Too bad, you're aligned to FS. Are you from LA, do an internship with some random media company, want to learn about CPG? Sucks for you, you're aligned to TMT. 2) Specifically for Financial Services, I don't see the value prop here for undergrads vs. IB. Hours are almost as bad as IB (see my intro post), comp is lower than IB, and IB places far better into PE / HF. My guess is that our FS practice will get a lot of undergrads who couldn't make the cut for IB.

• MBA: Most MBA students are career switchers. Similar to above, Did you work in FS middle / back office, and get your MBA to switch to Tech? Too bad, you're aligned to FS. Ex-military and want to learn about FS? Nope, you're in Industrial Products.

For certain schools, we even target recruiting by industry. Example: If you were an ex-navy SEAL with multiple tours of duty in Iraq, are student body president, and have an 800 GMAT, BUT we are not hiring at your school for Industrial Products / Aerospace & Defense, you will not get an interview. But the person that did 3 years Back Office at some small regional bank will get an interview if we are hiring for FS.

If you truly wanted to switch, I would even suggest lying on your resume if possible. Not about date / place of employment of course (those are verified via HR), but about the details. HR will not verify if you covered FIG or Pharma as an ER analyst, for example.

So it should be somewhat clear by now that S& goes to market with the advantage of "Our consultants have industry experience so we can give practical answers, unlike the generalists at MBB". Despite this, I think it's more or less BS. I have met a FS manager who didn't even know what an ETF was. And I've met another who didn't know the difference between the buy-side and sell-side. Both of these examples are on the S& side, not the PwC side. Seriously, you have been on FS projects for 4 years and do not know this?! I could step foot onto NYU's campus, grab a random undergrad from Stern, and chances are he/she would know this.

theman51:

How are you / your colleagues enjoying your time at S&? You said its almost like a sweatshop so was interested in your satisfaction

On a scale of 1-10, it's definitely below a 5. For me, it's closer to a 1 by far - the main reason will be in my reply to snakeoil's 2nd question.

It appears that there are two camps of folks at S&, people who were here before the buyout, and people who joined after the buyout. People who were here before the buyout seem to be more content than those who joined afterwards, for two reasons:

• They likely already have established networks within the firm, so it's very easy for them to get staffed to projects / they don't have the lingering fear of unemployment due to low utilization hanging over their head.

• Since they have been here longer, they are more senior and are compensated more than the latter group.

The other big thing to note is that much of leadership has no incentive to fix this culture. It is important to note that May 1st, 2018 is when the ex-Booz / current S& partners get their final payout from the PwC buyout. I'm anticipating that many of them will leave after this payout, which will lead to less business and another round of layoffs.

snakeoil:

1.) How integrated is S& with PwC Consulting? What are the future plans? (Also, any idea on how it's working at EY-Parthenon?)

On the US side, it's becoming more and more integrated. More long-term implementation projects. Later this month, S& NYC is moving to a new office (90 Park Street), - but our FS and Deals team are moving to 300 Madison to be closer to PwC. If I had to guess, the S& brand will not exist in the future. I'm not senior management, so I don't know the future plans. The hiring process and compensation are still different from PwC, however.

From speaking to my peers at Parthenon, those brands are much more distinct. My peers at Parthenon don't have utilization metrics. Plus, they are much more DD focused which doesn't really play well with implementation consulting.

snakeoil:

2.) Can you expand further on your 4th paragraph a bit? This should affect future hiring at S& - I am a nobody, but after reading this post, I'll think long and hard about taking a gig at S&. What about the H1B comment - what do you mean by that?

People talk. When the MBA class of 2017 finds out that their classmates in the class of 2016 are being laid off through no fault of their own, they tell Career Development, and the class of 2018. From speaking to colleagues, applications at some schools are down over 25% year-over-year.

So what we are getting are mostly international students who only care about getting sponsored, and getting a green card. Some of these students have poor social skills, they would not pass the airport test.

As for the Junior staff (Associates / Senior Associates) here, they are leaving for other companies. But who? Not the H1B's. -If you leave PwC before you get the green card, apparently you have to pay them back for all the lawyer expenses (I have heard this is over $50K). -If you do get laid off as a H1B, you have 60 days to find another company that will sponsor you, otherwise you are deported.

Combine all of this with 1) an up-or-out policy, and 2) a massive wave of layoffs that occurred earlier this year, and what do you get? A culture of fear filled with H1Bs willing to work 16, 17, 18 hour days (+ weekends) because they do not want to get deported. Which means they may demand that from you if you work under one of them.

snakeoil:

3.) You seem like a no BS guy - so tell us if S& (after the PwC merger) really does Strategy work or are they doing mostly PMI, Implementation work. (I work at a client - and I only see them on PMI projects).

They do both, but leadership has made it clear to us that they want to trend more towards long-term, implementation work (+ doing the strategy component as well). The Strategy component would be a 100% S& team, with the implementation component being mixed S&/PwC. This means that you can be stuck at a client for a long period of time. I've met junior people staffed to the same client for over 10 months.

(Leadership also claims that this is where the consulting market is headed - if that is true, this may also be the case at other firms in the future)

snakeoil:

4.) What is YOUR perception on the non-MBB consulting firms? How would you rank them in terms of the type of work they do?

Tier 2: ATK/LEK/OW/S&/Parthenon

For general strategy, I'd still say S& is at or near the top of this list. However, for specialized niches, I would choose other firms (e.g. LEK / Parthenon for PE DD, OW for FS)

I don't know enough about Accenture strategy to rank them (maybe a bit above Big-4? IDK), but we did have 2 partners leave for ACN in the past 6 months. I would lump Big-4 strategy together and Cognizant / Infosys below that.

Longhorn Man:

Thanks for taking the time to do this. I actually just recently accepted an offer for the deals team at Strategy&, set to start in fall 2018. Do you think these layoff trends are going to continue? I never heard of it until visiting this site recently.

See the end of my reply to "theman51". However, I believe that deals is a somewhat new team within S& (it didn't exist when I recruited for them). Therefore, I'm guessing that many of the Deals partners joined post-merger, and have no incentive to leave after May 1st (as they aren't getting a payout).

Longhorn Man:

What kind of exit opps do you see associates taking at the firm?

For Associates in Deals, I would imagine PE on the operations side. The deals team is somewhat separate from the rest of S&, so I don't have much detail unfortunately. Again, S& deals is a very new team, so I would try to find ex-S& deals people on LinkedIn

Empyreal:

What advice do you have for an intern, who has little to no exposure to consulting, and how can I ensure future job security? What expectations are there for people like me, and how can I make the most of the time I have here to maybe lateral to another firm (assuming that's the best course of action)?

Congrats on your internship offer. Didn't realize that we were hiring interns already! Anyway, your #1 focus this summer should be on securing a full-time offer. Here's what I would do:

• Read the WSJ and understand the FS landscape. A lot of S& FS work revolves around 1) Insurance and 2) Back office clearing / settlement. Familiarizing yourself with those industries would help. It is extremely rare that you will work on a project with a major bank (JPM, GS, etc), as we lost a lot of that business due to conflicts with our audit business - Which client will trust a S& recommendation if there is even the faintest hint that the advice is skewed to protect the audit partners’ recurring revenue streams? The odor of bias is enough to turn away the most discerning client. And after the merger, many banks said no. You can ignore FinTech / blockchain. Startups don't hire consulting firms, and many of the banks that are looking in this space won't hire S& due to the reason I stated above.

• Familiarize yourself with Excel and Powerpoint. Knowing how to effectively use these programs (with minimal mouse usage!) will impress your team members.

• Find good places to eat lunch / dinner around your home office. As an intern, you will be handling food orders, and the firm will try to staff you locally.

• Have a positive attitude, and be coachable.

Securing a FT offer should be your #1 priority. It will also be a positive data point for FT interviews, should you try to lateral somewhere else.

Future job security is TBD. You graduate after May 1st, 2018, so I don't even know which partners will be remaining after that date.

Hope this helps!

yessir1:

you may have answered this ... I apologize if you did. If so, let me know if you recall who asked a similar question...

You mentioned that your satisfaction level is close to a 1 ... what's kept you at the job? Do you enjoy what you do THAT much? Strictly out of necessity? Paychecks? all of the above?

I've hated a few gigs before, and still showed up, cus that's what I had to do. And also cus you gotta protect the story, so to speak, haha but are you considering exiting?

I guess I could see how a person who is miserable simply would still like to keep their job while simultaneously lookin elsewhere. It's pretty uncommon to one day say screw it, quit without a plan, and then start figuring things out from there lol

What's kept me at the job is another offer. I have currently shopped my resume around and am case prepping (with other S& colleagues, actually)

I know of 3 folks who quit in the last 6 months without anything lined up. 2 of those 3 quit before bonus payouts.

Rufus1234:

First, thanks for doing this post. It's helpful and refreshing for the monkeys who are considering MBA and consulting.

- I never did consulting recruiting, but lot of my classmates and friends are in consulting. It seems like there is a YUGE gap between MBB and the rest, in terms of prestige, cool projects, exit opps. My best friend is now a principal at a MBB firm, and he said they get so much work that they can't hire fast enough. Have you found this to be the case as well?

Rufus1234:

- Are your MBA classmates in MBB happy with their jobs, or is it a mixed bag?

Rufus1234:

- Do you see consulting becoming consolidated into a handful of firms doing actual meaningful strategy work while the rest are relegated to operational/middle office type work?

Yes. High-end strategy consulting is pretty price inelastic - if you're going to make a decision that will shape the future of your company, the recommendation has to be right. For a decision that will affect potential billions in future revenue, do you pay a couple hundred thousand more for a premium firm, or do you hire those idiots that screwed up the Oscars (not that S& had anything to do with it, but you get the picture)? It's the corporate equivalent of penny wise, pound foolish.

Rufus1234:

It seems like there is a YUGE gap between MBB and the rest, in terms of prestige, cool projects, exit opps.

Not true at all. It's like banking. The fact that there are GS/MS/JPM doesn't mean that Lazard or Credit Suisse are shit.

T2 firms are mostly almost as good as MBB. I would say that almost all T2 firms have at least one industry practice that beats at least 2 out of 3 MBB firms. Exit opps are on average a bit better at MBB, but there is a huge variance; I've seen an ex-MBB become yoga teacher and an ex-T2 consultant join a megafund.

bylaw16:

Would love to hear what the salary progression at S& has been like for you and how that compares to your peers either at that firm or other consulting firms? For context, I've generally heard that part of the reason for MBB over other consulting firms is that despite pay starting off similar at all the firms the YoY growth at MBB is much higher. Thanks.

Associates enjoy pretty substantial pay increases. I would imagine it's similar to MBB.

For Senior Associates, the salary progression is very bad. You start out at 147K. 2nd years get 152K, and 3rd years get 157K. If you do the math, you're barely beating inflation. MBB will win in this regard, hands down.

MBB also contributes a substantial portion of your salary to 401K, no match required. We're at 3%, I believe. Our 401K match is also terrible - 25% of the first 6%. Both vested over 5 years (obviously few people get the full value of this).

Quint101:

Do you feel VC and growth equity exit opps are available to T2 consultants in abundance as they are for MBB?

No

whawha202:

What do you recommend to an incoming associate (FA18) in tech strategy in FS? What exit opps should I be trying to explore and do you have any advice for what I can do to make sure my utilization stays high from the beginning?

See my response to Empyreal. Incoming associate vs. intern, you'll be doing more or less the same thing when you start your first project anyway.

If I wasn't clear about this in my intro post - New hires cannot control utilization. It is up to the partners to sell projects. So you can get canned for something out of your control. If you want to make sure your utilization stays high, get one of your friends' rich parent(s) to hire S& and request you on the project

iridescent007:

Hi StrategyAndWhat, thank you for your AMA.

I am currently applying for grad schools (Master's, not MBA). What are the target schools for Strategy& ? And are you guys really not giving sponsorships now, starting from this year? Thanks.

We don't really have target schools for Non-MBA. You will probably have to apply through the regular channel. We still sponsor MBA, through PwC's program.

"It depends"

abc989:

Senior Associate in S& here - been with the firm for many years.

I disagree with the majority of what's posted here

I've been staffed ~80-90% on strategy projects, only a couple PwC-joint projects where I've done things like build business cases to go with the implementation work. My focus has been healthcare.

I've had great colleagues over the years, and after the first year I've had very good work-life balance too.

I would say that our HC practice is an anomaly at the firm. Two reasons:

1. Strong pipeline. IIRC, last year your group was the most utilized out of all groups at S&. I met some 1st year healthcare folks that were staffed the Monday right after training ended. Many with over 100% utilization. Not so much for other groups.
2. Much lower proportion of H1Bs to US Citizens (vs. other groups at S&). So that fear of deportation isn't there from staff. This makes sense - the US Healthcare system is extremely unique, as there's just a lot more money to go around. What H1B would want to study healthcare in the US? Most of the industry knowledge is not transferrable to their home country (where HealthCare is more or less free, and senior citizens don't have the looming threat of bankruptcy should they get sick)

abc989:

Yes we have high attrition, no different from any other MBB group.

This is also false. Total headcount is down 20% from a few years ago, while MBB is growing.

Jaxom:

What divisions in S& would you consider to be their top performing groups? And which groups would be ones which you would determine are S&'s areas of speciality. E.g. win alot of work vs. the competition are seen as knowledge experts.

What is meant by top performing? * By size (headcount): Healthcare, Industrial Products * By profitability: Healthcare, Financial Services

To your second question: -Anything involving cost-cutting, operations, legal nonsense (again we are under an Accounting / Tax firm). We did invent supply chain, after all.

Rejected Monkey:

Knowing what you know now, if you could re-do recruiting back in MBA program, would you pick a different consulting firm, or possibly, a different industry? (such as IB, corp dev, etc)

I would have recruited for a Cryptocurrency startup and got all my pay in Bitcoin

Rejected Monkey:

In your opinion, is the demand for strategy consulting getting diminished industry-wide?

Yes. Simple market sizing due to M&A. If number of publicly-listed stocks in the U.S. has fallen by ~50%  in the past two decades, the number of CEOs willing to do a 5 year growth strategy study will....wait for it...fall by 50%.

Rejected Monkey:

Also - given your experience a the firm, what types of exit options would be feasible? (industry, job function, typical comp when you exit)
Thanks in advance!

"It depends". Exit options range from Unemployed to Corporate Strategy at a FAANG. I think exit options are very good at the Associate level, and HBS / Wharton for B-School is not uncommon. MBB will be far better for PE.

monk-br:

would you know how to say how stregy & around the world are? How are you in Brazil? And do they make it possible for you to work in other country offices or are you based only on the local office?

Did you not see my post above about having very little insight into the international offices? Regardless, PwC allows people to do 6 month secondments. This is based on demand and supply, so don't think you can just go work in London for 6 months because you feel like it.

Holybanker:

Just to provide a sight on what's hapenning in european branches (specifically in Spain), I have heard that they are promoting people from other business lines (MC) to join S&, as they are taking a tough time to attract people from other consultancies. Have anyone heard something else on these lines??

A few years ago they promoted a bunch of MC people to join S& in the U.S., and then fired them because of low utilization. It's not a good culture fit, the MC folks work 9-5, which IMO, is not acceptable at S& (or any reputable consulting firm)

rk007:

Can you tell me how strong S& is in the consumer vertical? Especially within Travel and Tourism? What do the exit opps from this practice look like?

Don't know much here. We do some ops / logistics work for airline / transportation companies, I know that. If you want to do airline consulting, go work for Accenture, they bought Seabury Consulting, which I heard was #1 in the industry.