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Experienced IT Manager hoping to transition to a top consulting firm

by | Oct 26, 2012 | Business, career, consulting, mba, McKinsey, Technology-related | 0 comments

The email message below is one that came in waaaaaay back in July 2011 and somehow got lost in my Inbox. I know that I can sometimes take a while to respond to people, but this was just plain terrible, even for me. Even worse, I’ve got several more messages from around the same time period that I need to get to and, when I do reply, I bet the recipients won’t even remember having emailed me at all. hahahaha…

The author is from an Indian IT Manager with 5 years of experience who is hoping to transition into a consulting role with McKinsey or BCG. He asked for my opinion on whether his profile could be a fit and whether he needs an MBA for that kind of role. He may have already transitioned by now for all I know, but I wanted to make sure that I followed up with him, despite the long time since he emailed.

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KB wrote:

Hello Marquis


I have five years of experience in an Indian IT company which is one of the biggest ones in Asia. I have handled various roles from Programmer, Project Leader to Business Analyst. In my current role, I am the Delivery Manager for a Fortune Top 10 manufacturing major with a team of 100+ associates. I have always been a high performer in the company and went up the leadership ladder ahead of peers. I have a Bachelor Degree in Civil Engineering.

  1. Do you think, I can apply for a consultant role in McKinsey or BCG?
  2. To apply for the same, is an MBA degree mandatory?

I liked your blog and it was very helpful. Looking for your career advice on the same.

Thanks in advance

KB

Mumbai, India

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My response:

Hi KB,

I should start by apologizing for taking so long to respond to your email. I have been trying to catch up on my email backlog for a while and I’m just now getting to yours. I hope this response is coming in time to still be useful.

Let me get to each of your questions in order:

  1. Based on what you’ve told me about your experience, I think you could have a shot at a position in a major management consulting firm as an experienced hire candidate, but please know that I’m making that assessment without very detailed information about you. Your work experience sounds like it would have given you some strong IT foundation, which could be a plus, especially for units like McKinsey’s Business Technology Office and Accenture’s Communications and Technology area. That said, you should understand that applying to a top firm as an experienced hire is not an easy process and you’d be competing with a LOT of people attempting to make a similar transition. Those candidates may have stronger profiles than yours, so you should go into the process knowing that you would be facing an uphill battle of sorts.

  2. You definitely don’t need an MBA to make a transition to a firm like McKinsey or BCG as an experienced hire, but, there’s a chance that you’d have to go in at the Analyst or Senior Analyst because you don’t have a graduate degree. Given that you have 5 years of work experience, you may only have to spend a short amount of time at that level, but you should be aware of that possibility.

I hope my comments above were useful. Take care and good luck with your desired transition into management consulting.

Marquis