Q&A: 2nd year BA/A/AC at MBB going to UMM/MF in 2020

To answer your questions:

1) I'd put UMM/MFs into 3 buckets of consultant friendliness (I'm in consulting, so naturally I talk in threes): - Rarely touch consultants (BX, Carlyle, KKR) - Good mix of bankers and consultants (H&F, Bain Cap) - Very consultant friendly (Sycamore, Golden Gate)

Without disclosing too much, I will be joining a firm in the 2nd/3rd bucket. In my opinion, consultants are set up for failure if they join a firm in the 1st bucket since they will mostly be doing modeling and can't leverage their operational / softer skill set from consulting. As such, I focused my recruitment efforts on firms that were open to hiring consultants and networked with alumni from MBB with a fairly high hit rate.

2) Your interview process will almost always be dependent on where the firm fits in the aforementioned buckets. The banker-heavy MFs will give you a full 3 hour model, the 2nd bucket will either give a shorter modeling test (Ex: This year, Bain Cap gave a ~1 hour model test that was more operationally focused) or give paper LBOs, and the 3rd bucket will only give you paper LBOs. Outside of modeling, I was asked some technicals but they were fairly light (how do you calculate LFCF, walk me through the 3 statements if D&A goes up by 10, etc.)

In terms of initial headhunter interviews - I received no paper LBOs, but many of my friends in IB were given a paper LBO by some of the HHs like CPI.

Hope this is enough detail, happy to elaborate if needed!

For clarification - I'm ~1.5 years into my career at MBB, and leaving for PE in ~1.5 years.

Types of projects: I have exclusively done strategy cases since I joined. I've worked across a few different industries - have mostly done work on 5-10 year strategic plans for companies, growth strategies, etc. Day-to-day is very similar to banking (slide creation and excel work), but we do get a tad more client exposure than IB.

Lifestyle: MBB lifestyle is worse than I thought, BUT it is still a good lifestyle. I usually work ~60-65 hours per week. Compared to banking, this is substantially less. However, I believe that consultants work more intensely during the work week. My friends in IB sit at their desks for hours going on Reddit, go to the gym, and then finish at 11pm after getting some comments from their associate/VP. In consulting, you have a set of deliverable every morning that you have to complete by EOD, and you rarely have time to go to the gym mid-day. On (huge) pro is that your weekends are protected 95% of the time. Monday-Friday hours are relatively similar to banking, but the discrepancy in hours is largely due to the absence of weekend work in consulting.

Why the switch: A few reasons ultimately led me to recruit: - I love investing/finance --> consulting is a lot of strategy work, building frameworks to help shape decision making, building roadmaps for a company-wide transformation etc. There's also some modeling involved, but it's not financial/valuation modeling. I wanted to spend more of my time looking at a company through a financial lens and consulting doesn't offer that.

• Responsibility: In IB and consulting, you have very little responsibility until ~6-7 years into your careers when you make VP or equivalent. In PE, you're expected to meet with the CEO/CFO of portfolio companies or target companies on a fairly regular basis. You're expected to perform amazing quality work, but you're given more autonomy to map out your day and see where you can add the most value to your firm.

• Comp --> Just like any job, compensation plays a large factor. Post B-School roles in consulting pays ~200K all-in, whereas UMM/MF pay 275-400K.

• Personal --> I don't like the city where i'm currently living, and wanted to move to a bigger city where there's more opportunity for finance roles going forward.

This year was a huge blessing for consultants since the process kicked off first thing on Sunday morning for most firms. Fortunately, I was able to catch a flight early on Sunday morning, and didn't miss any of the process. Since it was on Halloween weekend, I heard hilarious stories of people who were blacked out at parties in their costumes and were scheduling interviews with head hunters. Personally, I was very lucky to find out at ~8-9pm that recruiting was potentially kicking off and left my night plans to go pack, and eventually stay up for another 4-5 hours scheduling interviews with HHs.

Regarding your second question - I have done ~4-5 cases over my first 1.5 years in consulting. As mentioned above, I'm a 2nd year BA/A/AC, and didn't recruit in my first year.

Your first question is fairly broad - it's hard to describe how every firm runs their process, but i'll try my best to give you an overview of my process. Also, on-cycle and off-cycle are fairly different in terms of interview scheduling, so I'll restrict myself to the-cycle process.

My process went something like this (skipping right to process itself):

Phase 1: sh*t it might be starting: Your buddies start hearing chatter. You check WSO and see a mix of comments ("I'm a VP and you're an idiot if you think it'll start before December" and "hearing it'll kick off within next few days")

Phase 2: F*CK IT ACTUALLY KICKED OFF: Heard from multiple sources that some firms started interviews late on Saturday night. Dropped everything I was doing with friends and went straight home.

Phase 3: Calmed down. Spoke to head hunters: Was on the phone from ~9pm to 1am on the phone with a number of head hunters. I scheduled 4-5 interviews from Sunday-Tuesday (Advice: don't schedule more than 2 interviews per day, try staying in the same/target city - most things happen in NY even if the fund runs out of SF/BOS)

Phase 4: Pack. Sleep for 4 hours. Wake up. Go to airport: Fly to NY and start interviewing.

Phase 5: OFFER: Celebrate. I can finally breathe. Sleep for ~18 hours.

Will provide more detail when I give a walkthrough of my experience in a few weeks.

In terms of the interviews, it really depends on what firm you're interviewing with. All interviews will start and finish within a day (or potentially the following morning if you go into their offices late). The day will likely be a few rounds, where the first round is usually a modeling test, technicals, case studies, etc. Most people get cut in this round. Second round is a mix of resume questions, case/deal experience, and behaviorals. If you get told "we'll call you" or "we'll keep you posted" you're likely cut. Basically, leaving their office = cut from process.

In terms of what candidates they're looking for - once again depends on the type of firm. If you're a MF like Apollo, you're looking exclusively at top groups at PJT/EVR/GS/JP/etc. If you're at a fund like Berkshire Partners, you're looking at a mix of bankers and consultants. No matter the firm, you're looking for high achieving, well polished candidates. You're right in saying that firms can be selective on who they hire: even if you are a machine and have been crushing excel since Kindergarten, you have to be a good cultural fit for them to hire you.

Personally, I didn't feel ready to recruit in my first year. I would have to be ready ~3-6 months into my first job out of undergrad, and I barely knew what an LBO was. If you're not in a rush to leave your job (which I'm not), then having 1+ year of experience will help you a lot during recruitment.

Cheers!

I've had case/project experience across three sectors: consumers, financials, and healthcare. I think the projects and industries play a partial, albeit slight role. However, I don't think it'll be the reason you get a job in PE. Of course, if you interview at Sycamore which specializes in retail, you should have some retail experience in your last job.

What's more important is being able to speak intelligently about the cases/projects you've been on, your role on the team, if the company you worked on would make a good PE investment, etc.

Honestly, I didn't really have a preference between banking and consulting... I recruited for both out of college. For my first job, I was optimizing for brand name to open the most doors possible (not necessarily within finance), so I recruited for some EB/BBs and also MBB.

I am fairly lucky that everything worked out, because I probably only factored in ~50% of what I would consider now. I didn't know that there are huge discrepancies between banking groups (Ex: I now know that GS FIG, PJT/EVR RX get the top PE/HF jobs on the street), or that you can't really exit to a HF from MBB.

If I were to do it all over again, I'm not sure whether I would do the banking or consulting route - they both have their pros and cons. I'd be naive if I said MBB is the only way to do it and you're stupid if you choose banking because I landed a great job. I recognize that others from MBB were not successful in getting a PE job and that the stars had to align for me to land mine. Will be sure to talk more about this in my upcoming PE walkthrough.

For MBB, majority of HHs will reach out to you regardless of your office. I believe I was reached out to by almost all HHs. If they didn't reach out to you, it is acceptable to be proactive and reach out to them (don't reach out before your peers have heard from them). However, HHs will only go to a handful of cities to meet with candidates. If they don't come to your city, I definitely recommend you fly to NY and meet with them, rather than speaking over the phone. It is much easier to convey your interests and personality in person!

Are you referring to choosing an MBB office or a target city for PE?

For MBB - this depends on what your personal situation is. City doesn't matter too much since you'll be travelling a lot for projects. There's a small prestige bump for being in NY/BOS/SF/CHI over smaller cities, but it isn't too big of a concern for PE recruitment.

For PE - it depends on what type of PE you want. Houston for O&G of course. Choice between Boston/New York really depends on what firm you want, and your personal situation.