A complete guide to consulting for MBA's in 2020 - Interview with a 20-year consulting veteran

Expert Advice: Interviews with Management Consultants - A complete guide to consulting for MBA's in 2020

For this post, we sat down with a consultant veteran with more than 30 years of professional experience in internal and external consulting for fortune 50 companies. This post will cover the interesting answers we got on topics such as what consultants do, the distinction between consulting and consultants, career strategies, and what it takes to be a good consultant…so, without further ado, let’s find out what he said!

ConsultingafterMBA: What is consulting and what does a consultant do?

Consultant: That’s a great question because depending on who you talk to, being a consultant can be defined as a role, an industry, a profession, a title, or a skillset.

ConsultingAfterMBA: Agreed! In our first blog post, we defined consultants as information ambassadors that link clients to resources that could help them solve the problems at hand.

Consultant: I think that’s a great working definition and one that my experience aligns with. I always tell people that “if you hire me for what I know, you wouldn’t; but if you hire me for what you need to figure out, you would.” So, I help businesses solve problems, however, I am not an answer man. You don't come to me for answers. You come to me for solutions. And I think those are very different.

For example, as an inside consultant, business executives would come to me and my team with business situations that did not necessarily have an answer key. As consultants, we would consider business realities and business objectives to figure out viable solutions.

ConsultingafterMBA:  Why companies hire consultants?

Consultant: From my experience with hiring consultants, there are three reasons why a consultant might be a valuable asset to a team.

1.       A lack of experience in a certain area within the company—At times when companies can’t look internally for resources to deal with new technologies, new regulatory mandates and so on, because the skillset is lacking. In such cases, the company is better off hiring consultants to do it then the best around. Especially, when the company doesn’t have the internal capacity or there is no need for building such capacity due to the characteristics of the project.

2.       Consultants’ experience outside of a company—Sometimes, consultants are hired because of their experience outside of a company. So, let’s say a marketing professor has a great set of resources on his/her campus. The same professor would benefit from accessing resources on other campuses. However, teaching and being involved in all campuses is not practically possible. A consultant can function as a bridge that connects the marketing professor or department to such broader sets of external resources.

3.       Deep expertise—Basically, when consultants have done a lot of projects in certain areas and as a result have gained deep and valuable expertise. For example, at my previous company—a well-established organization with access to tremendous internal experience, there were still projects that benefited from the expertise of specialized external consultants who would help us deepen our ability to do certain things.

ConsultingafterMBA: What are your thoughts on pursuing consulting after MBA?

Consultant: Well, MBA candidates can be divided into two categories: the ones that go straight from undergrad to grad school and rely more heavily on education versus the ones who study their MBA to complement their vast business experience. The former consortium could successfully pursue careers in consulting, however, they should be cognizant of the value that they’re able to bring to the table beside their education. In other words, they should strive to complement their education with relevant experiences and applications of their learnings. A good strategy for recently-minted MBA’s who don’t enjoy vast business experience is to get into consulting as a practice—a discipline that ends in -ing.

You know the backbone of the consulting business runs on the associates, senior associates, and managers. They’re the ones planning projects, scoping out work, engaging clients, and ultimately doing the work of a consultant. BUT, a consultant is only as successful as all the consulting resources—the people on the ground—enable it to be! I think new MBA’s with limited experience would benefit the most by starting out as the “enablers” in this context and from there grow into fully-fledged consultants.

ConsultingafterMBA: What does the career path from “consulting” to “consultant” look like?

Consultant: Well, consulting practices mostly have a defined career path. You come in as an associate which means you do all the grunt work and do 60-80 hours work weeks. Then you become a senior specialist or a manager where you lead other associates. Eventually, you become a consultant and enjoy the title, tenure, credibility, and money that goes with it. Keep in mind that you get there by being in the trenches and truly learning the consulting practice. It may be a 7-10 years journey to build up the credibility, network, and skillset necessary to become a successful consultant.

In addition, you need to figure out whether you are going to be a specialist in an industry, a new technology, a certain geography OR are you going to be a generalist?

As a consultant, you end up picking one or the other because you have to become either really deep in a vertical or really broad in a horizontal. Mainly because it is hard to be broad and deep at the same time. Making this choice/pivot is an important point that MBA’s should keep in mind as they get into the consulting world. This choice is not a limitation but rather what becomes the primary selling point in a consultant’s portfolio.

ConsultingafterMBA: What skills do MBA’s need to become consultants?

Consultant: Personally, I don’t think clients mind working with recent graduates. For optimal results, I recommend new MBA’s to try and supplement their degrees with hands-on experience. Relevant experience can tremendously accentuate the value and credibility of an MBA degree. In reality, consultants are always in a position of having to sell their skillsets through examples of having done similar projects in the past in order to establish mutual trust in business relationships.

You know, the combination of experience—i.e. “having experience solving similar problems in the past”, qualifications, and professional network is what enabled me to succeed, both as an internal and external consultant. At times when I was new to a team or a project, my most valuable asset were my reputation and the positive word-of-mouth from previous business partners.