GE FMP, ACN MCDP, or GS Ops??
Out of the three different jobs, I'm having a very difficult time deciding so please help!!!!
I'm especially concerned with:
1) Reputation/Prestige
2) Growth Opportunity --> How much will I earn say in 5, 10 years in the above programs? And how difficult is it to advance within the organization upwards (getting promoted)???
3) Exit Opportunity --> Say, I discover it's not for me and want to switch job after 2 years...what can I do???
4) Which one would lead me to MBA??? Or something that would make me more attractive to big strategy consulting firm like McKinsey in the future??
My long term goal is to work for either government or businesses with international exposure.
Your inputs would be appreciated!!! Thanks!!!
DISCLAIMER: I am a senior in college and do not jerk off to GS TMT/MS M&A/exit opps before I even did a summer analyst stint. This is just what I think.
I have heard that GE FMP is a great stepping stone to B-school as well as a potential entry into IB after the program, given solid networking with people in banking and success in the program.
Accenture, while a global brand, is still consulting; not sure if your end goal is IB or B-school or the latter followed by the former, but this too will open up B-school. I think consulting to banking without getting the MBA is a bit of a tougher road relative to GE FMP --> IB, but I can be, and very possibly am, wrong.
GS, while it is GS, is still ops, and is still Asia. Should probably not even be considered, IMO, unless you know about opportunities to move from ops to FO, or if you really want to be in Asia.
You'd probably earn the same at GE and Accenture pre-MBA. Not sure about ops pay. Ranking in short:
That's a actually quite well organized advice there. But I don't think IB is exactly my goal. I'm more interested in doing consulting or strategy work for big multinational firms/governments/NPO in the long run. 1) And GE's long-established tradition of grooming leaders was attractive - although I dunno how ppl outside GE will view it, and I dunno how difficult it's to actually move up GE's hierarchy to do more strategy work in the future, or if I decide this is not the place for me...what can I do after FMP? 2) Accenture was appealing in itself...well coz I think I'm most interested in consulting work...though it's reputation lags behind GS and GE, I thought the consulting experience would put me in good shape for opening up more doors. And finally I thought GS ops is more like internal strategy division for the bank helping to improve process to make everything happen (But I'm probably too optimistic there)..
Take GS Ops out of the picture completely, not worth pursuing.
Not familiar with GE. Good brand name, great program, etc. Not sure about upward mobility. Heard you do a lot of corporate audit (or that's what the majority end up doing). GE publicly doesn't support people leaving for MBA.
For Accenture, it's not MBB, but people still know the name. If you were in System Integration, I'd say no, but with MCDP, you will be in good place. In particular, they are refocusing the MCDP hire by targeting mostly top schools and have a very new approach on how the analysts will be handled. Work: You won't have opportunity to change the direction of how P&G does their business, but doing some sort of growth strategy or operational improvement in distribution should be easy to come by. You will have to avoid projects that have flavor of IT in it, but not impossible. Growth: You will get a good amount of responsibility by end of year one. If you are a decent performer, you should be promoted within 2 years, which comes with 18-20% raise. Annual bonus can be pretty high depending on performance. Exit Opportunity: Most people either jump to other consulting firms of similar tier (e.g. Deloitte, E&Y) or industry MBA: Probably not as high as MBB as a whole because MC analyst pool used to cover a wide range of background, But if you are good enough you will go anywhere from Harvard to Emory.
If you have additional specific questions, PM.
Your long-term goal is phrased so broadly that it's hard to say between GE and ACN. If you're more interested in govt, ACN could facilitate that, or lead you to somewhere like BAH. If you're interested in financial-related work, do GE. If operational, ACN.
There was a thread on here this summer about Accenture and a program they have where they pay you for grad school and all you have to do is guarantee them two years after graduation. Not sure if its for all Accenture employees or just specific groups, but I would recommend doing a search through this forum to find it.
Thanks everyone - So let's assume I'm taking out of GS out of the picture. I'm leaning more towards ACN too...but there are a few things I can't get my head around. Although I think spending a long time in management consulting may be suitable for me, I'm just not sure how much impact I'll be making especially when so many people join consulting w/ a goal of joining the industry of their choice sometime in the future. Then, wouldn't it make sense to join the industry first (especially if they value the internal leadership training program more who actually understand their businesses)???? The only counter argument I can make is that if I'm not ready to dive into one industry, then consulting is a better route. But since GE is a multinational conglomerate, and the FMP program will allow me to rotate between divisions and different roles, that would also offer me a breadth of experience, while also giving me the depth (perhaps consulting can't provide) in finance/accounting.
Any further thoughts?
Consulting will speed up the responsibilities and growth opportunities you get, resulting in a steeper learning curve. For example, at my level, I have 2 years of experience, doing the same thing as industry hires with 6-7 years of experience (and they were high performers there).
If your not ready to dive into anything...and would like to go for MBA for sure, and would like to be placed into HYP, take GE FMP - 99% placement rate.
Agree with the above on taking out GS Ops out of the picture.
Downfall with taking Accenture offer: you will be doing the entry level work like a banker, perfecting presentations making charts doing entry level analysis, you are at bottom of the rung. GE FMP however like you said will allow you rotate and see more of the company, and if you decide to go to B-School and go for Mgmt Consulting, it will place you very well to land that job.
GE FMP let's you do 4 6M rotations in a division (e.g. Cons Fin, Com Fin, Energy, etc).
Basically, you have 2 options you complete your rotation: 1. Finance career path - work corp fin and your way up to CFO roles 2. Corporate Audit Staff (CAS) - internal consulting group that does variety of operational / financial consulting
GE tends to groom their finance leadership from FMP (they like to present a stat that 80%+ or something of BU CFOs etc were FMPs). However, CEO / business lead roles tend to come in from other paths.
GE does not like MBAs, does not encourage FMP to go move on to Bschool. If you plan on going to Bschool, don't count on any GE support.
Comments on the Accenture MCDP -> MBA route:
Sure, you could leverage the Accenture -> top MBA -> MBB. I think the part that you would want to focus on in Accenture MCDP is the strategy work, so if you really network with the people/management in that practice, you can hopefully establish yourself there. The ACN management consulting side does have a sponsorship program (very limited) for going back to get your MBA. For that you would want to network with a lot of senior management as well.
Check on linkedin and I think you'll see that Accenture Strategy placed pretty well, good number of people in the top 15 MBA programs. Not sure how the MCDP program will compare to that though, time will tell.
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