3 ms·

I think some of your points are a little off the mark. A bit about my perspective: I used to be (and still am) interested in business (vaguely defined), and did

I think some of your points are a little off the mark. A bit about my perspective: I used to be (and still am) interested in business (vaguely defined), and did lots of research and talking to people and I used to see consulting as the best option for my career after college. But now I'm an engineer at a startup. 1) They do take MIT engineering grads (see my own comment) 2) Consulting pay is actually not very good. We're talking $80k and not much bonus. Google pays more (STEM roles). Finance pays even more. STEM people don't go into consulting over finance for the money. The exception might be liberal arts majors for whom consulting does pay the most out of all their options. The reasons they go into consulting... 3) The reason people (like me in the past) want to do consulting is because it's a "career supercharger". If you get into McKinsey/Bain/Boston you have not only that pedigree on your resume and near guaranteed entrance into a top 10 business school, but you also get a very broad set of experience working with (and connecting with) CEOs/executives and working in multiple markets and with multiple business models and analytical models. You get to work in many projects and with many different teams. Consulting has a multiplicative effect on your career. 2 years in consulting has the equivalent effect on your career as, say, 4 years in a biz dev role at a Fortune 500. A lot of people who know they are interested in "business" but don't know what they specifically want to do in business also go to consulting to figure that out. Finally, for any business position you apply to, nobody ever questions whether your consulting background is relevant experience. Consulting basically keeps all business doors open. The same does not apply for, say, finance. 4)Whether consulting is value-adding is a mixed bag. Sometimes it can really help a company. Oftentimes consulting is just used politically to cover an executive's ass and is used to tell the other executives what that executive already knows.

MrFoof 14y ago
>If you get into McKinsey/Bain/Boston... Fun fact: If you are a college dropout and apply to these places, they will at best politely rebuff you. However, if they need you, and you run your own consultancy, they have no problems being your customer in in order to get a job done. How you handle the awkward inevitable conversation at lunch about your lack of degree is up to you, though personally I always try to have fun with it.
- acchow 14y ago
  How do you get them to contract out to your consultancy?
  - breckenedge 14y ago
    Same as always: have something they need. I've worked for a top-three consulting firm (only because they bought the consulting firm I worked for at the time). Surprise: their expertise is Excel and PowerPoint (mostly PowerPoint). These are not the ideal tools for all projects. Much better to just buy what you need when you need it (and mark it up 400%).
strlen 14y ago
It just seems seems bizzarre that someone who has invested many years of their life into a hard science degree (much less a graduate degree in hard sciences) and has the intellect and work ethic required to excel in a scientific field would genuinely be more interested in "business" than in advancing their field. I mean that in the pure sense of puzzlement rather than judgement: I understand the value of business people (more-so having been in a few startups), but it seems like a role much better suited for economics, political science, or some of the liberal arts majors; I just don't understand that why it would appeal to someone who took pains to study a scientific discipline. To quote Democritus, "I would rather find a single causal law than be the king of Persia." I can understand a scientist or an engineer doing "business" work in the context of a startup -- usually their own (as there's simply no one else to do it, or no one else who understands the product and is capable of doing it, etc...) -- but choosing to do "business" when given the choice between an engineering role and a generic "business" role is what I just don't get. As a side note, I also find pursuit of power and status (not saying that is what all those who enter management consulting have -- but I am sure at least some see it as motivation) to be far scarier than pursuit of money: if an unscrupulous character is hungry for money they'll be satiated quickly as money has diminishing marginal returns. Desire to have power over others knows no bounds.

MrFoof 14y ago

>If you get into McKinsey/Bain/Boston... Fun fact: If you are a college dropout and apply to these places, they will at best politely rebuff you. However, if they need you, and you run your own consultancy, they have no problems being your customer in in order to get a job done. How you handle the awkward inevitable conversation at lunch about your lack of degree is up to you, though personally I always try to have fun with it.

acchow 14y ago
How do you get them to contract out to your consultancy?
- breckenedge 14y ago
  Same as always: have something they need. I've worked for a top-three consulting firm (only because they bought the consulting firm I worked for at the time). Surprise: their expertise is Excel and PowerPoint (mostly PowerPoint). These are not the ideal tools for all projects. Much better to just buy what you need when you need it (and mark it up 400%).

strlen 14y ago

It just seems seems bizzarre that someone who has invested many years of their life into a hard science degree (much less a graduate degree in hard sciences) and has the intellect and work ethic required to excel in a scientific field would genuinely be more interested in "business" than in advancing their field. I mean that in the pure sense of puzzlement rather than judgement: I understand the value of business people (more-so having been in a few startups), but it seems like a role much better suited for economics, political science, or some of the liberal arts majors; I just don't understand that why it would appeal to someone who took pains to study a scientific discipline. To quote Democritus, "I would rather find a single causal law than be the king of Persia." I can understand a scientist or an engineer doing "business" work in the context of a startup -- usually their own (as there's simply no one else to do it, or no one else who understands the product and is capable of doing it, etc...) -- but choosing to do "business" when given the choice between an engineering role and a generic "business" role is what I just don't get. As a side note, I also find pursuit of power and status (not saying that is what all those who enter management consulting have -- but I am sure at least some see it as motivation) to be far scarier than pursuit of money: if an unscrupulous character is hungry for money they'll be satiated quickly as money has diminishing marginal returns. Desire to have power over others knows no bounds.