I went into big 4 consulting after school, and literally kept my heads barely above water for 3 years. I was slapped with low ratings for asking a bad question during my first month. I opted for being a contractor for 2 years after to give myself a break. Then I built some solid experiences with another company and wanted to give consulting another try. 3 years at an internal consulting role, I am shown the door discreetly. I worked super hard for those years and something just wont click.
Consulting is all about kissing ass. Not just delivering
Consulting is all about being discreet. Shut up and build slides until you have a revenue quota.
what do you think went wrong ?
The only people that fail in consulting are the consultants who stay! Everyone else is winning (except the clients who pay $1M for a 22 yr old fresh out of school).
I wonder what share of their ideas is actually being successfully implemented? I heard only terrible experiences from real/close life (not mentioning business cases)
Need more info. There are too many factors, but there are three scenarios: 1) you are not qualified to excel in these types of roles, 2) you got unlucky and were in terrible situations, 3) both. Which is it?
Let's wait for OP's consultation
OP here, mostly 1). I wish the reason for my failure was slacking off or not being able to suck up. I am actually great at managing relationships, as seen by being able to get jobs that I don't qualify for. The environment is too fluid - changing priorities that require me to read a new research paper and recite all the details within an hour before a presentation. Balancing the need to be critical and not offending the stakeholders - I am either too hard or not being able to bring valuable opinion to the table. Consulting matters to me because my alternative is to work in depressing back office for 30k/year.
A big 4 recruiter said I will be surrounded by a d working with type A people at the firm. Turns out A aka assholes*. You have to be a pro at kissing ppls ass. Doesn’t matter if you are lol skills (technical, soft skills) I was hired as an analyst even after I had 3 years experience and did not get to consultant level because my lead was an ******* who joined the firm from cognizant and was insecure all the time. Barely had any skills at all but was so good at drinking the Coolaid. Ps. Am no longer with Deloitte
Spent some weeks at Deloitte and didn’t like it. Was mostly talking and presenting slides to the client with no real tech work. The projects can be boring. Left and went to faang.
It’s not looking good. OP failed to provide a structured analysis that was hypothesis driven and certainly didn’t express a compelling narrative to persuade the audience either way. Shit, I should work in consulting but my TC is too high.
This one cracked me up!
I love you!! Hahhha
It also depends the type of consulting, as a former technical marketing consultant (marketing automation) the relationship built with the client were great and rewarding. We were highly considered and listened because we were there to teach them and ultimately we had a great impact on their revenue. I have almost only good memories from those years and kept in contact with many clients.
Consulting is all BS no value. I left consulting because my long standing respect and desire to be a consultant was broken into a million pieces by my firm. It's funny how people hold consulting on such a high ground when, in reality, it the extreme opposite. I just couldn't lie to the client on their face for another day. Couldn't respect, left. In past 6 months in my current firm, I've created more value than in 4 years of consulting. And guess what.. here I am accountable for my recommendations. And I love that! Bottom line OP - stop chasing consulting.. it's just not worth it .
Where are you now ?
Why were you lying on their face? Sounds uncomfortable even for a short time
What kind of consulting are you in? Tech or management?
Are you a BA at COF? Are you saying you want to go back into consulting? If not, then COF is a decent landing spot even for people post MBB. They’ll likely just skip a level or two than internal promotes.
I failed the BA track (an internal risk consultant role). I need to go find something I am more qualified to do.
What’s COF?