Bain vs top bb

Managed to thankfully receive a full time offer at Bain and also a return offer from top bb (GS/MS) after my internship.

I applied for consulting afterwards my banking internship feeling quite puzzled that I might not have been that intrigued by the work during ibd internship and the crazy work hours, though I preferably enjoyed my time during previous pe internships.

Any career recommendations?

My goals are possibly applying for jd/or business school afterwards, working in pe. Or possibly an executive leve l position at corporate dev

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This question just says I have options which should I do, you haven't given us enough info to really advise. If you know you really don't like IB then you shouldn't go down it as a career path, but if the complaint is hours/stressors it's not like consulting isn't that much better once you control for being on the road all week as junior.

IB is of course better to end up in PE - but again if hours/stressors are the complaint - neither finance (IB/PE) nor consulting is a great option. 

Your answer will become clear if you define what you want and work backwards. If all you can define is what you don't want, don't go back to a job you didn't like when you have another interesting opportunity on the table.

 

Bainie here - agree on the above but hours are going to be substantially better at Bain. You actually aren’t going to travel that much if you don’t want to. In BOS/NY and average person does NOT travel for their case and if they do, it’ll be like every other week for a few days - not every week Monday through Thursday

 

I have a similar question as well -- if your goal isn't PE then which makes more sense

 

Similar to the other user, I'm not really seeing where advice would be beneficial without more information.  It's very simple.  You have two options.  I'll preface by stating the obvious: If your dream is PE, accept the return and go into IB.  Sure MBB sometimes places into PE (mostly kids from top targets) but it's certainly not the norm nor as prevalent as in IB.  If this is purely a WLB argument, then Consulting will have less hours on average but will still require some 3AM nights/weekend overload + travel aspect.  If your looking for what will be more intellectually challenging/require strategic problem solving, nobody here can give you a straight answer on MBB vs BB IB, but I wouldn't base that off the assignments from your 2.5 month Summer Analyst (Intern) position.  As far as JD/MBA admissions go, assuming you will achieve a 170+ LSAT/710+ GMAT + 3.7+ GPA, either way you're very competitive for all the T7 programs.  

Option A:(if you value PE/Investing exits and money over WLB) Accept the return and don't look back

Option B: (if you value WLB and the ability to think more strategically/operationally in the business context over PE/earnings potential) Accept the Bain offer

It's purely up to what you value most.  If it were me, however, (unless I absolutely disliked my team over the summer) I'd stick with the team who saw enough value in me to give a return offer to.  

 

Strat and ops roles are obviously going to favor consultants lol, especially at start ups

Not that you can’t get in with a banking resume but your job as a consultant is much more similar. You’re required to be an independent thinker and do things without people telling you what to do next which is a great skill set for these types of roles

 

You can honestly get to your goal in both paths. Bain has a cool option for post undergrad hires to take 6 months to work outside of Bain to explore interests. Not sure if this still exists though.

I also really liked the MBA classmates I knew that ended up in Bain. I know at least one of them had goals to go into PE Ops eventually. I regret going for IB in my first year, I wish I focused on consulting as a backup to my preference which was going straight to industry. Ended up striking out at a few MM / boutique banks during internship recruiting. Now, at a low quality consulting firm post graduation and I sometimes wonder if I could have landed a consulting internship offer at a more reputable firm.

 

How do people get offers like this? IB / Consulting are two different recruiting processes, each taking months to prep for...

 

At Analyst/Associate level, view this decision like this: In banking, you become a master at executing transactions—Once you get reps for an M&A sellside process, you know how to replicate that process and know exactly what needs to be produced and become an expert in the industry you cover and the products you work on, especially anything related to capital structure analysis. Do this if you know for sure you want to exit to PE/HF or want to be a career banker.

For consulting, you get high level exposure to many different industries and become good at using certain tools to find out how to solve your client’s problem. Your skills are much more widely applicable to roles in various industries if you choose to exit. Also, once you hit EM/PL/TL, you are much more marketable for a leadership role for a corporate or startup while IB it’s hard to market yourself with leadership experience at the senior associate/VP level because consulting managers are much different from IB “managers.”

 

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