Accepting a job offer as PM or staying in consulting?
Hello Everybody,
I am a consultant working on Customer Practice for a Big Four consulting firm in Europe with around 2.5 years of experience. Since almost one year I have been involved on a CRM transformation project for a leading company in Europe, and now I have been offered a position of Project Manager for this company.
Assuming that my goal in 1-2 years is to enroll to a top 15 MBA program, I am evaluating the chance of accepting the job offer, considering these pro/cons:
Pro of new job as Project Manager:
- Higher responsabilities and salary (almost the double of the actual)
- Interesting experience for my background and with the possibility of learning a new foreing language
Cons of changing:
- Considering that I am elegible for a promotion to senior consultant at the end of FY, I feel like that with a more solid consulting background, I would have more chances to get in a top MBA program.
Any advice would be appreciated :-)
Thank you.
Bye.
.
^Why would you say that? I've seen quite a few project managers in action at my client companies and the job really sucks. You're basically mothering different stakeholders to do shit faster than they want to. The other thing is that it's a very thankless job. When shit goes right, no one thanks you, but when shit goes wrong, you're the first one everyone blames (i.e. slippage because of bad project management).
OP, is this a contract job? Every single PM I've come across has been on contract, and at the banks, these guys have very little job security. Sure they're getting paid 60-100 per hour depending on experience, but the bank doesn't need to honor the full term of the contract. I've seen people get cut lose in under 3 months.
I personally don't think that this opportunity is better than staying where you are. The only case in which I think you should go for it is if you feel you're guaranteed a spot in a M7 b-school and this will just give you the opportunity to save a LOT more cash.
In any case, congrats on the offer and good luck with the decision.
Hello MBP,
Thanks for your feedback. The offer is for a permanent full time position under the Marketing & Customer Service direction, and it is a business PM (not an IT role). From the responsabilities point of view, I think it would be a step ahead from a business analyst role, but as you said, I am not sure that I would be guaranteed a spot in b-school.
This is why I am not sure of changing, in my actual company I have been well evaluated and I guess that after 3-4 years of consultancy with the grade of Senior Consultant I may have more chances to get in a top MBA program.
What do you think?
Any advice is appreciated!
Two things. What are your actual responsibilities at this PM job, and what are your long term career goals?
From what I've read on bschool interviews, they are looking for people with a compelling story, and who can articulate a clear career goal. If you want to do big 4 consulting and then use bschool as a way to break into MBB, then you are going to need to have some really compelling reason outside of your work experience (like community service or published research) that you can sell in order to set you apart from all the other consultants looking to do the same thing.
If your goal, however, would be to move into a business area of software (business development, or product management and the like), then it obviously makes sense to move to ther other role.
hold on- I work at a Big Four and have yet to meet ANYONE leaving to go to a top MBA program. On the other hand, folks from industry get into top programs quite often. If you don't want the new job, I'll take it!
.
Wow :-) Thanks to all!
Honestly, I didn't think that there were so few people from big4 at top MBA programs, just to add more info I work for the strategy unit, and sometimes we compete with MBB for some projects.
So it seems that the PM opportunity could give me more chances for the MBA, this sounds as great news since it was the only reason I was not sure about changing. Having this told, I enjoy consulting and I am sure I would consider to go back to it after the MBA. Do you think that this decision makes sense?
I personally know people who have left at the Consultant level here and gone to Booth, Kellogg, Sloan, Columbia. Don't know anyone who is going to HSW, but that's still not bad...
OP, if it is a permanent full time position, then it sounds like a much better opportunity! Congrats again.
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