Clueless College Kid into Management Consulting

I'm currently an undergraduate student at UCLA with major interest in MGMT Consulting (graduating next year). I've had about 6 months internship experience in both a national non-profit organization as well as a very early stage private equity firm.
My concern is how I should go about gaining experience relevant to management consulting to increase my odds in gaining an internship opportunity within the MC field. My GPA is not the greatest and there's no way I can solve that problem overnight, so does anyone out there have any recommendations on what I should do to create an opportunity for myself despite my GPA and what I feel is a lack of experience in more relevant fields?

 

Just to clarify: you'll be in your final year of undergrad this upcoming fall, correct?

Also, try to share your GPA range at least. Below 3.5? Below 3?

For full-time recruitment, there's not a WHOLE lot you can do at this point in what is really just one summer until interviews begin.

At a high level, you need the following to score an interview: - Good school - Good GPA - Professional experience / internship(s) - Good EC / leadership involvement

You have #1 covered via UCLA. #2 looks like a weak spot, but it depends on where you stand. If you're like 3.2-3.4, that's doable at some firms with networking.

You have some internship experience also, which is expected. The better your impact and the better the brand names of your internships, the better off you are. Hopefully you have had meaningful impact at the non-profit and PE firm to make up for the GPA (and likely lack of brand name).

EC involvement is another key factor. How involved are you? Don't overlook this factor. It may be too late to get involved and take on leadership roles if your 4th year is just around the corner.

Depending on your answers to the above questions, make sure you apply broadly for a full-time position. If you can't get one right out of undergrad, you can also do an MBA or try to lateral later on in your career.

If you're graduating next year (i.e. you're entering 4th year in the fall), then you are unfortunately too late for an MC internship at any of the major firms (some boutiques may offer internships to fresh grads).

 

I really appreciate your advice, so thanks a ton for that. My case is a bit unique. I have a 2.9 GPA and this academic year was originally meant to be my 4th, but I decided to withdraw from UCLA for the winter and spring quarters in order to gain work experience and do the 2 internships (non-profit and PE) simultaneously. I hadn't had any internship experience before entering my 4th year, and felt it was imperative to gain that experience before graduating and entering the job market. I figure with that experience, I'd increase my chances of gaining even better internship opportunities next academic year, and in doing so, place myself in a better position with potential employers after graduating next June.

As for leadership experiences, I haven't had much, so I'll just put that out there. Is there any way you suggest I consider handling that part of the package?

 
Most Helpful

Do you have particular firms in mind that you'd like to apply to for a consulting internship / full-time?

To be completely real with you, a 2.9 is a really tough hurdle. Most firms will have a soft cutoff at like 3.3-3.4, so sub 3 is really difficult to overcome. The only path there would be to have jaw dropping referrals and even then, it would be tough.

Good on you for taking the initiative to get some internship experience though. It definitely helps your resume.

If consulting is a serious goal, I'm not sure how feasible it will be fresh out of undergrad. You could start out in another field (ex. PE) and try to lateral afterwards. You could also go to grad school (masters immediately) or an MBA down the road and recruit out of there. If you're in engineering/comp sci/STEM, you could also look towards tech boutiques (or even tech consulting at the big 4). The GPA will still be tough but they're generally much more forgiving on that in tech consulting!

 

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