Thankful for the WSO Experience: Non-target to Accenture Consulting

Every now I tend to self-reflect on my career, my life, how far I've gotten and wanted to share some words of appreciation to WSO, specifically being one of the Social Media interns back in 2014/2015 and now I'm currently a Management Consultant (or Level 9) within Accenture's Consulting practice based out of the NY Office.

My background:

I come from a non-target school (CUNY ___) in NY where many of the Big Four loves to hire students for Accounting related jobs, but never the Consulting type of roles, but Consulting is where I wanted to be; back then when I would search on LinkedIn there were probably around 8-12 folks who were from Accenture NY. I knew it would be an uphill battle, but was definitely determined to break into the field and would leave no avenue unexplored until I get to where I wanted to be.

I grew up with a humble background but loving and supportive parents, they wanted to give me the world and felt bad that they couldn't afford to pay for me to go to a State University but that's okay, a support network was all I ever wanted from them and I could and would not ask for anything more.

Non target to Accenture

So what is a non-target school student with an average GPA going to do to break into/get noticed by a firm like Accenture (or any other large Consulting firm for that matter)? Outside of joining other schools consulting club, googling other peoples paths to the profession, networking like crazy on LinkedIn, and mass applying to firms online portals...you join WSO to continue to leverage the available material, and more importantly develop a strong network of supporters (I'm looking at you Patrick & Andy).

How WSO Helped + The Interview process

WSO to me back then was like a wealth of knowledge all at my finger tips: Networking Modules, Consulting reads, success stories, words of encouragement, and what I believe was the most helpful was the strong network that Patrick & Andy introduced me to. I landed three contacts from ATK and Accenture; all of which I ended up getting interviews for a few days later. Two interviewers later I have accepted my offer at Accenture Consulting and have been happy ever since. The final interviewer was an MD within the Product practice (ended up being my career counselor) and told me they don't typically hire from my school but my referral gave such a strong recommendation that he said he would take a leap of faith.

Paying it forward

To this date, I continue to Pay-It-Forward with anyone that reaches out to my LinkedIn and do my best to provide them ammunition to also hopefully follow in the footsteps to breaking into their dream career and always bring up my story with Wall Street Oasis. I strongly believe your life to-date if an accumulation of all the interactions you've had with others/experiences and I can safely say that I'm thankful that I came across Patrick/Andy, the WSO Community, and most importantly the opportunities that the WSO Internship Program made available to me.

A mantra/quote that I always stood by is, "My Mind told me to stop, but my Heart would not let me". I wouldn't have been here if it wasn't for you monkeys, so keep working towards your dreams/goals!