How Important are Quant Degrees in Management Consulting?
Basically the title. How disadvantaged are finance/accounting majors compared to math/physics/engineering majors in management consulting? Also, if I study math on my own time (unfortunately, there is currently no room in my schedule to take them), is there a way to demonstrate this on my resume? Also, which ones would you recommend I self-study?
EDIT: Also, are there any good books you'd recommend for consulting? I've read built to last and really enjoyed it, thinking about buying "Good To Great", but is there anything else you'd recommend, particularly case books or maybe some good strategy books?
Thanks!
how do you compare an internship at blackstone vs published scientific paper on quantum physics vs won X prize for efforts on AIDS in africa
whether you have finance, science, or humanities background, just show that you have the leadership and skill sets necessary to excel
If you're an undergrad, you don't need any quant. Seriously. All you have to be able to do is demonstrate you can do simple addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division.
As for books, check out Competitive Advantage by Michael Porter.
Hi,
First off thanks for the replies and sorry if this sounds like a stupid question. I was talking to a friend at McKinsey and he says that I should look at I-banking because I don't have an engineering degree and MBB love people with quant backgrounds because they have good problem solving skills. I really enjoy consulting more than banking though, so I was just curious if MBB will still take a finance and accounting major, or if they basically hire engineers and take few vaunted majors. Furthermore, I was wondering what I can do to demonstrate problem solving ability and otherwise improve my chances. I enjoy reading about business strategy, so are there good books to read casually, any subjects I can study on my own time, and what a good way to study for case interviews is?
Thanks again!
....
Definitely haven't met any "religion studies" majors...do I wish I had done more quant in undergrad? Sure...but if I could go back, I'd definitely do some excel practice instead of real analysis, for example.
The problem with not being an engineer is getting the first round interview. Hands down, consulting favors engineers.
If you do actually get an interview, then your degree matters about as much as your interests.
You need to kill the case questions and demonstrate a "creative drive."
Case analysis takes nothing more than high school math, as some people have eluded to. This being said, at a consulting superday you will get some rape case questions. If you can come up with a creative solution, you're in [PERIOD].
Example of a behavioral question: What gets you excited?
Example of a "rape" case question: How many elevators should a building with 6,000 people have, if any one person will only wait 3 minutes in total to get to their destination?
^Just out of curiosity, how the hell can you answer that without knowing how many people each floor can handle and a WHOLE LOT OF INFORMATION?
I guess if I were to go about answering this, I'd do this:
The key variables affecting this problem are: capacity per floor (1st floor does not need an elevator), elevator movement rate (i.e. how long does it take after including the time to reach each floor, the wait time and then come back down to the ground floor), how many people are waiting in line for the elevator during the busiest time. After that, some other important considerations include what alternatives are and how much time the alternatives will take/regular users of the alternatives.
Once you identify the variables, you have to essentially solve for the busiest time starting with the total elevator demanding population (6000 - number of people on floor 1 - people who take the stairs or other alternatives all the time) and then assume worst case scenario which would be how long the person in the last group to board the elevator at its peak time that needs to reach the top floor would have to wait. Once that happens, you can keep adding 1 elevator as needed till that person no longer has to wait more than 3 minutes to reach the top floor while also taking into account how many people will be able to take the stairs or other alternatives as well.
I think that's the general process for doing it, but I don't see how you can solve it just by knowing the total number of people and how long they can wait. Am I right or wrong?
100 people per floor, say.
Sounds like you've heard this one before.
^No, I swear I've never heard it before, and I'm legitimately curious as to how one can solve something like this with no other info? I'd estimate that, unless the building is huge, there will be around 100 people or so per floor, but who knows?
Just use estimates. Allot of case questions require you to make some pretty strong assumptions.
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