Are you thinking about what to do after an MBA? If you like to solve problems and work in various industries, then a management consultant job could be a good choice. The Consulting sector is one of the largest recruiters of MBA graduates, consistently tying up the top spots with Finance, Energy, Health Care, and Manufacturing, according to the annual GMAC Corporate Recruiter Survey.
It is pretty competitive yet full of opportunities. The high pay grade is one of the primary reasons why many MBA graduates choose this career.
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In this blog, we will be discussing the role of a management consultant and its career choices.
What does one do in a management consultant career path?
Management Consultant’s primary responsibility is to come up with solutions to real-world business situations or problems. Organizations often face difficulties in their business and are unaware of the issues; this is when they hire Consultancy Firms that help them in their critical situations.
A management consultant helps an organization improve its business performance, solve problems, and maximize its growth. A wide variety of consulting firms such as McKinsey & Company, Boston Consulting Group (BCG), KPMG, and Deloitte & PwC cover various industries.
Types of Management Consulting
You can choose various domains, such as strategy, operations, IT/Technology, HR, etc.
Strategy consulting
The role of a strategy consultant is to advise management teams on high-level decisions such as prioritizing new markets to enter, developing price strategies, mergers, and acquisitions, the amount to invest in research and development, organizational structure, and how to deal with competitive threats.
IT/Technology Consulting
IT Consultant deals with technology. A firm might want to have a central repository of data, and that might require a whole lot of technological leg work, reviews, possible outcome research, and more.
And IT consultancy can swoop in with solutions to factors such as data volumes, types, size of customer base, details to be captured, integration with upstream and downstream systems, etc.
Operational Consulting
Operational consultant advice relates more to implementing the strategy, for example, how to improve the efficiency of the recruitment process or implement a new commercial strategy.
HR Consulting
HR Consulting helps companies frame employee-friendly HR policies, guidelines and mandates, employee feedback, rewards, appraisals, and performance improvement initiatives.
Marketing and Sales Consulting
Consulting firms, dealing with marketing, assist companies in organizing and promoting their products across various channels and within a defined budget.
Requirements to start a Management Consultant Career Path
Bachelor’s Degree
You should have an undergraduate degree in any related field but, it would be better to have a degree relevant to the industry if you want to go into a specialized consulting field, such as engineering or IT. However, most employers require that consultants have at least a bachelor’s degree with a major in accounting, business, finance, marketing, management.
After completing your graduation, you could enter a company as an “Analyst” and work for about 2 to 3 years. The work would usually be data gathering for the analysis.
Master’s Degree
You can opt for an MBA / PGDM. Most companies prefer a consulting experience of at least two years. But would recommend that you choose an MBA you want to pursue a consultancy career in.
Some of the top Indian colleges that offer MBAs in Consulting/Business Analytics are IIM Ahmedabad, IIM Bangalore, IIM Calcutta, XLRI Jamshedpur, etc. After completing the MBA, you can join a firm as an Associate Consultant.
Additional Courses
There are few courses to prepare for a management consultant career path that could help you to specialize in tools such as Excel, Power-Point, R, Python, Tableau, and SQL. Each company has a unique management structure with particular problems.
Management Consultant Career Path
Consulting firms hire some of the best management graduates. You get to work closely with clients, leading to significant exposure, connecting with good networks, and getting good pay.
As you will move to the higher designation, your perks and salary will also increase. Entry-level consultants, or Analysts, are required to spend considerable time doing research and data gathering, making PowerPoint presentations, or working on Excel spreadsheets.
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According to Payscale, the average annual salary for entry-level general management consultants is about INR 8 Lakhs in India which is reasonably high for an entry-level position. Fresh out of college, consultants in the USA make about $70,000 a year. While in the UK, it is £40,000 for entry-level, followed by AU$70,000 in Australia and €50,000 in Germany.
Career progression from being an Analyst to being a Partner in a company requires 7 to 10 years of experience, depending on the company’s size and your field.
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Top Companies
A management consultant career path is becoming one of the most preferred careers in India. Top companies hire consultants as business advisors who look after the critical decisions of the organization and can help the organization reach new heights. Some of the leading Consulting firms are:
McKinsey & Company
They specialize in Strategic, administrative, operational, and technological areas of consultancy.
Boston Consulting Group (BCG)
They specialize in Retail, health, care, and chemicals areas of consultancy.
Bain & Company
They specialize in Corporate strategy, mergers and acquisitions, private equity investments, market analysis, and finance areas of consultancy.
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Deloitte
They specialize in Audit, tax, financial advisory, enterprise risk areas of consultancy.
PwC
They specialize in Assurance, financial advisory, tax l areas of consultancy.
KPMG
They specialize in financial Audit, advisory, and tax areas of consultancy.
Best MBA schools for a Management Consultant Career Path
Here are few top MBA Schools for consulting:
London Business School (LBS)
LBS is one of the best MBA schools for consulting, and the recruiting companies are large consultancies like Boston Consulting, McKinsey, Bain, and Strategy. The school’s MBA offers various options for students to improve their consulting chops, including a summer consulting project.
INSEAD – Europe Campus
The percentage of INSEAD MBAs going into the consulting sector generally ranges from between 30 to 40 percent. In 2020, it was 51 percent—the highest rate of all schools surveyed by FIND MBA. INSEAD remains a leading school for large consulting firms in Europe, with hundreds of Instead graduates going into firms like McKinsey, Boston Consulting, Bain, and others.
Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University
Although the school does not offer an MBA in Consulting, it does provide a major in Managing Organizations. In 2020, three of the top hiring companies of Kellogg MBAs were consulting firms McKinsey, Bain, and the Boston Consulting Group, which, combined, recruited over 100 Kellogg MBA graduates.
University of Virginia (UVA) – Darden School of Business
Forty-one percent of 2020 Darden MBA grads went into the consulting field, working for firms like A.T. Kearney, Deloitte Consulting, and Bain & Company. Darden offers an MBA concentration in Strategy Consulting.
MIT Sloan School of Management, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Over 31 percent of Sloan’s MBA graduates went into the consulting industry, with many getting hired by either McKinsey, Boston Consulting, or Bain. Almost 40 percent of all MBAs get jobs with a consulting or strategic planning function.