I have got a McKinsey offer for September (which I am planning to take) and now I have about 9 months to pass and only 2 courses left in curriculum, and I believe I should spend this time gaining skills that will be useful in BA position. I'm an industrial engineer with OR focus, and my school allows us to take MBA courses. Should I have some of these and/or focus on other aspects. Any advice?
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If the MBA classes give you significant exposure to case studies, excel, or PPT, then it might be marginally helpful. Even then, nothing that you try in these next 9 months will be more productive than 2 weeks on the job.
Do set some time aside to practice Excel though. There's a thread floating around here on the most important commands to be familiar with. Also check up on the news, especially in the industries that your office works most in.
Three recommendations:
1) Make sure you know your way around Excel, as mentioned above. I would also recommend that thread on Excel tips. It's more important to be able to do the most important functions efficiently than to try and memorize every esoteric technique.
2) I'm not sure how much exposure your OR program gave you to analyzing financials, but having some fluency with the various components of a balance sheet and an income statement would be very helpful. If your school offers some type of corporate finance class, that may be worth looking into. However, there are plenty of sources online for learning about them.
3) If you haven't already, try to start making a habit of keeping up with general business news. You don't need to obsessively follow every story every day, just make sure you are up to speed with major events. Not only will this potentially provide you better context for all the things you will need to learn when you begin a study, but there is an off chance you may remember some random fact that you read which could be relevant to your analysis.
On a separate note, congratulations and make sure to try and enjoy some of your remaining free time before your start date. Good luck!
Honestly, become competent in Excel and that is about it- they will train you in most everything else, and I don't think there is a real need to 'prepare' beforehand. Anything you learn right now you'll likely forget over the summer- enjoy your freedom and congrats on the offer.
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