This question goes out to current consultants. What was your overall success rate on applications when you were going through recruiting? By "success" I mean receiving the invite for a first round interview.
How Hard Is It To Get A Consulting First Round Interview?
Unfortunately, there is not one right answer to this question. First of all, the likelihood of getting an interview is impacted by your school, your GPA, and your resume. With that in mind, even if you are an ideal candidate it can still be very difficult to get a first round interview and eventually a job offer simply because of the number of candidates that apply to these positions.
Two users shared their experiences below.
My firm had 1420 applicants-->80 phone screen interviews-->20 in person interviews-->8 offers
At my firm we receive 4000 applications->40 offers. Don't overestimate the competition though - a lot of those applications are shit and the good ones get offers from multiple companies.
With all that being said, if you want to better understand your odds - you should look at your school's track record with recruiting and compare your credentials to those that have been successful from your school in the past.
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95%?
I kind of think your asking the wrong question. This question is largely personalized to each candidate target / non target status / gpa / ecs.
I think a more telling statistic is the percent of first round interviews that led to offers...
+1
I agree with run4run.. It would be interesting to know stats for MBBs Something like 1000applications->100first round->50second round->20 offers.
Interesting. Source?
Too optimistic. More like 4000 applications->40 offers. Don't overestimate the competition though - a lot of those applications are shit and the good ones get offers from multiple companies.
^ I have no source, but i would like to know..
a quick scan of glassdoor interview section for BCG makes me think success rate of the first round is about 10-15%.
FYI - for my firm (MBB) at my school (target), the success rate from applications to first round interview usually hovers around 10%. After that cut, it varies too much year to year to give accurate success rates from first to final and final to offer.
Sorry to jump on the bandwagon here, but it would also be interesting to get acceptance rates (IE application -> offer) for both MBA applicants and undergrads.
Dimension, do you know the full cycle %? Like how many people apply every year from your school vs. how many actually end up with a job?
Last cycle, the number of extended offers / the number of initial applicants yielded 3%.
my firm had 1420 applicants-->80 phone screen interviews-->20 in person interviews-->8 offers
wow a 0.005% chance of getting an offer...
... please tell me your joking regarding the math. Ironically this kind of thing would get you dinged pretty quickly in an interview
two extra zeros
Math aside, the 0.005 probability is wrong. For the people with 3.1 GPAs or no work experience or whatever, the probability was 0.000. For the people who had everything (and who got to the phone screen), the probability was probably closer to 50%. Looking at the number as a whole is useless: there's plenty of totally unqualified people there who deflate the acceptance rate but never had a chance, and there's plenty of super-qualified people whose chances were relatively high, regardless of the number of applicants.
I just tried to find out what it was for my firm, but i couldnt find the presentation so from memory something like ~7000 applications for ~700 interviews for ~100 offers for 80 person class
These overall numbers are totally pointless. Yeah, the overall rate might be in the low single digits, but you only use overall numbers to gauge individual probabilities if you know absolutely nothing about the individual In question. For example, everyone who accepted an offer with me (undergrads and MBAs) had a 100% success rate in getting first-round interviews, a pretty high percentage of second-rounds, and then varying rate of converting that to an offer (though none of them had 100% final-round conversion rates).
The point is, if you're the type of candidate that these firms hire, you'll get most of the first rounds that you apply for, and then your interview skills will take over, though if those skills are good you'll likely get a bunch of second rounds.
On the other hand, if you have a 3.2 GPA and not much else going for you, or if you go to a school where you have to network your ass off to even get your resume looked at for a first-round interview, your numbers will be lower. The first-round interview rates are much more binary than you might think: either you look good on paper and you get almost all the first-rounds that you apply to, or you don't, and you get a few, if any.
2х2 One of the reasons I was asking is because I just had an interview with BCG. I am not from a "typical" background, from top 30 MBA program (non-target), but top 1% of my class and high GMAT. I think i did reasonably well in the first round. Wanted to gauge my chances.
Harvard -> McK
~750 resumes ~100 1st round interview ~20-30 2nd round interview ~5-7 offers
numbers are from an acquaintance of mine who went through the whole application process...
"Math aside, the 0.005 probability is wrong. For the people with 3.1 GPAs or no work experience or whatever, the probability was 0.000. For the people who had everything (and who got to the phone screen), the probability was probably closer to 50%."
No.
Through various means I got a hold of 200+ (Masters/PhD) resumes/CVs from an "elite" university. As with any large sample size, some are more impressive/substantial than others, but there isn't a single "bad" resume in the mix. Just about everyone has done at least 3 internships. However, not too many academics have substantial leadership experience (at least from what was listed on their resumes), so I would guess it becomes the determining factor for most of these applicants.
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