Career Crush: Is Consulting the Right Career for You?

Here’s what I thought it was like to be a consultant: You travel around the world, stay in awesome hotels, and expense all your meals on a company credit card. The salary is great, even right out of college. And you basically get paid to make presentations. Turns out, I was completely wrong. Kristina Kang, a senior change management consultant, shared with me what it’s really like to work in the field. We discussed what the title “consultant” means, the pathways you can take to get into the industry, the skills you need to be successful, and what you can expect to get paid when you’re just starting out. My biggest takeaway: No matter what you’re interested in, there’s a type of consulting out there for you. Working with clients can be challenging, work-life balance can be hard to come by, and the interview process sounds a little bit intense — but at the end of the day, consulting is all about helping others. A lightly edited transcript of our interview is below. Kelsey Alpaio: So, what exactly is a consultant? Kristina Kang: That is a very, very good question. And one that I think a lot of people wonder about. There’s a couple different ways to look at it. At the highest level, a consultant is really just someone who is an expert in something and helps other people — whether that’s a consultant helping an individual, or they’re helping an organization. A management consultant, or a tech consultant, is a person or firm that helps a company with different problems that they might have. And those problems can range. So you can kind of continue to get more and more specific about the types of problems or issues that a person or an organization might need help with. And that’s where the consultant comes in. Tell me more about your job and what the day-to-day looks like for you. I’m a change management consultant. So the way I describe it is, companies are always going through different types of change. For example, they might be going through a merger or acquisition or they might be installing or implementing a new type of system or technology. And so as the company is rolling out that change, my job is to help the people in the organization understand why the company is moving forward with a certain strategy, how it’s going to help them, and how it’s going to help their customers. So I’m very focused on the people-side of change, getting people on board, and helping them understand why the company that they work for is going in a certain direction. How did you end up in your current role? Did you always know that you wanted to do consulting? It was definitely a journey, a non-traditional path, to becoming a consultant. In college, I majored in English. And the only reason for that was just because I like English, and I like writing. I figured I would study something that I enjoyed. And as I was graduating, I decided to go into public relations, just because I had heard that I could use my writing and communication skills. I thought that it sounded interesting to work with journalists and media. So I worked in public relations for a few years, in a couple of different industries. And a year-and-a-half or so into it, I was doing my self-reflection, seeing where else I wanted to go in my career, and I just realized that public relations was not where I wanted to stay for several different reasons. I was interested in consulting because I knew that you get to work with a lot of different types of clients in a lot of different industries, and you’re helping them solve a variety of problems. I just wanted something that would challenge me in that way, and also open up a lot of other opportunities. What I ended up doing was, I decided to get my Master’s in management. I wanted some sort of business degree and foundation since I hadn’t studied it as an undergraduate student. So I decided to do my Master’s, which I did in London, because I also wanted to live abroad for a year. And then I went through the job application process from there. Is a Master’s in management degree similar to an MBA? It’s different than an MBA. Some of the key differences: In a Master’s in management, typically, the students have a little bit less work experience than students that would be getting an MBA. On average, an MBA student might have five years of work experience. But for a Master’s in management, it could range from zero to three years. Another difference is that a lot of the Master’s of management programs that I was looking at are shorter. They’re one-year long versus two years. And also, Master’s in management programs are a lot more popular in Europe and the UK. So there were a lot more options abroad for that as well. What’s the process like for getting into a program like that? The requirements are different depending on the program. So some of them required a GMAT, some required a GRE. Some didn’t require either. I ended up taking the GRE because I could apply it to different types of programs. When I was taking the test, I wasn’t sure yet if I was going to do a business program or a different type of Master’s degree. I wanted a little bit about flexibility. So, what do you love about your job? The thing I love most is that the work I do helps improve people’s lives at work. One of the reasons that I was reassessing my career and decided to make a career switch was I just wasn’t engaged at the places I was working. And that’s not to say it’s because it was in public relations. I think it was just more of me reflecting on how the work environment is such a key part of so many people’s lives. We spend at least 40 hours a week at work. It’s more time than we might spend with our friends or families. I love that the work I do helps people feel engaged in their work and helps them feel like, “I understand my company’s vision and their goals. And I understand my role in that.” It just brings so much more meaning to work life. What would you say is the most challenging part of your job? For me, the most challenging part is probably just juggling all the different moving parts and pieces. In my role, and the way that the company I work for is structured, we are on multiple projects at a time. In the typical portrayal of consulting or with the “Big Four” firms, consultants are staffed on one project for three to six months or something like that. And they’re always traveling to that one client site. The way the company I work for is structured, we’re on multiple projects at a time. And back, when we did travel more before the pandemic, we would only travel for certain milestones of the project. Like if we’re kicking it off, or we’re doing a working session, or testing something. So that means that I have to constantly switch back and forth between different types of projects, because I could be on anywhere from three to eight projects at a time. Another challenge is making sure that everyone is being brought along on the project. Within a project team, there are the consultants who work with the client, but we also have internal resources that we’re working with. And they’re not involved in every conversation with the client. So making sure they’re brought along. So keeping everything in order, as well as balancing between all the different projects, I would say, is the most challenging. You mentioned the “Big Four” — can you talk a little bit more about what that means in the world of consulting? Yes, so the “Big Four” consulting or accounting firms are Deloitte, Ernst and Young, KPMG, and PwC. Those are the largest accounting firms that also have consulting arms of the business. So when I hear the word consulting, and when I heard about consulting in college, those were the key firms that people were trying to get into. They would go to recruiting events at the beginning of the school year to try and secure jobs — an internship over the summer, or a full-time job. There’s also “MBB,” which are McKinsey, Bain, and Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Those are also large consulting firms that are more focused on management consulting, specifically strategy consulting, whereas the “Big Four” are accounting firms that also have consulting. I’m using umbrella descriptions, so there are little nuances here and there, but that’s the gist of it. What are some misconceptions about working in consulting? The idea that consultants don’t do a lot of work. I think that comes from the fact that many consultants are working on PowerPoint decks. If you’re working as a strategy consultant, for example, you’re helping the client build their strategy. And oftentimes, the best way to share that with the client is through a PowerPoint presentation that has hundreds of slides with all the different details and charts and all of that. So I think the reason there’s a misconception that consultants get paid to “do nothing” is because they’re getting paid a good amount of money to be working on PowerPoints. But it really does differ by the type of consulting. For example, if you’re a tech consultant, you’re probably not making a lot of presentations. You’re helping the company actually implement software, you might be training people, and helping them get onboarded to a new program or software that is being used. Do you work on a lot of slide decks in your role? I rarely work on slide decks. The firm that I work for, which was a boutique consulting firm, but we got recently got acquired by a larger global consulting firm — we have internally a lot of different creative departments. So we have a film department, we have a fine art department, we’ve got graphic designers. And so we work to create really engaging experiences and methods to get people to understand the strategies and the goals of their company. So whether that’s through films, or through workshops, or through other different interactive methods, that’s what I’m usually working on. I’m not building those myself, but I’m managing the project and working with all the different internal and client partners. So what would you say is a good starting salary for a consultant? I want to say it’s like $60,000 for an entry-level position. But that’s just based on what I know from when I was in college, so it might have changed since then. Base salary is also going to differ based on where you live in the country or in the world. So if you’re in the UK, I believe it’s a bit lower, but you have much better benefits in the UK, like healthcare and vacation. And then, if you’re in New York versus Austin, Texas, for example, the salary is also going to vary. What does the career ladder look like for someone in consulting? The typical path that people see in consulting is you work at a big consulting firm for two years, and then you go off and do whatever else it is you want to do, whether it’s go work at a startup, or you want to go in-house at a large organization and be on the client-side. So there’s that path where you kind of get that experience, you work with a lot of different companies, and then you move on to something else. You can also work for a few years at a firm, then go get your MBA and come back to work at that firm. And that way the firm is paying for your MBA. And then you’re also going to see people who just stay for years and years at their consulting firm and progress up that ladder. In terms of what promotions look like, for me, I would say I was very intentional with being communicative with my manager, and my HR business partner. I’ve been very aggressive with going for promotions and asking for pay adjustments when I felt like it was appropriate. In a larger firm, it’s going to be harder to make sure that you have all the right advocates — you have to be a lot more proactive with your own development. In a smaller firm, maybe it’s a little easier. There are also sometimes restrictions in terms of the promotion cycle — like it being only once a year. But there are things that you can do to make yourself stand out to make yourself have a really good brand. That way, you’re in the right position when it does come time to talk about salary raises or promotions. You were aggressive about pursuing promotions — what does that look like? The way that it works at my company is you put yourself up for promotions. I joined in January 2018. In October of the same year, I put myself up for a promotion. I joined as an associate consultant, which is the starting level at my company, and I wanted to be at the consultant level. I was able to secure that through a lot of support from my manager, my peer coach, and my HR business partner. But really, it was about keeping track of all the things that I was doing and showing the improvement over time. And I was able to show that within a short amount of time. There was a point where I asked for a pay adjustment. I created a case around it, showing a graph of how my pay could increase from my current salary versus if I had come in at another salary. I did all these different comparisons with the market value as well. I also used actual examples of my work, my growth, and my development to support that. And then most recently, in June, I put myself up for promotion again, to senior consultant. I wasn’t planning to do it, but my manager encouraged me to, so I just decided to go for it. I think that’s good, because the worst that can happen is you don’t get the promotion. But then the folks that are going to be the ones that grant the promotion, they know that you’ve got that drive and that interest, so it just works in your favor. Oh, interesting! So you can only put yourself up for promotion at certain times? Yes, so we have two times a year that there are promotions — every October and April. And so in the month prior to that, anyone who wants to put themselves up for promotion, they talk to their manager and create a case. So we would receive a rubric of the things that you should be doing if you want to be promoted to the next level up. And it’s different for each level. That kind of becomes a guide to what to include in your case and show that you are checking all of those boxes. For my first promotion case from associate to consultant, I made a video. I did a whiteboard video where I drew all the different things that had to do with my promotion case. And then my second promotion from consultant to senior consultant, I decided to make a website. I used Squarespace. I’ve seen people do infographics. There are lots of different ways to package a promotion case. What is the typical career ladder that you climb within an organization as a consultant? It’s a little different in every firm. But for our firm, it’s associate consultant, consultant, senior consultant, principal, and partner. And then there are other leadership positions like president, CEO, etc. In other consulting firms, sometimes you’ll enter as an analyst, and then be a senior analyst, and then you’ll be an associate consultant. There’s just all different ways that it’s laid out. The interesting thing about where I work is that regardless of your role, it is pretty flat. So if you’re new or you’re still learning things, you’re probably not going to lead a project right away. My experience has been that everything is very collaborative. But that’s just the culture of our firm. It’s not about sending things up the ladder. It’s more working together as a team, and then working with the client. What are the top three skills I need to have on my resume if I’m going to get attention from hiring managers in this industry? If you have client-facing experience, that is very useful. In consulting, it’s all about serving the client’s needs and helping the client. So if there are any type of experiences you have around that, I would definitely call it out. I also think the ability to analyze things very quickly is important. As a consultant, you get a lot of data, a lot of information, that you have to absorb and synthesize. For example, let’s say I’m helping an organization that’s going through a merger or an acquisition. My role is to help people in the organization understand, “Why are we merging? What does that mean? How is it going to benefit me?” So in order to do that, I need to understand all of the background behind that strategy. There’s no way I can pour over every single word while still moving really quickly. So the ability to absorb things quickly, analyze things, and come to conclusions is important. The last one is just overall project management and coordination. One of the challenging things about my job is that coordination, bringing people along on the team and the client along. So any experience in that arena would also be good to showcase on whatever resume or cover letter you’re creating. What’s the best pathway to get into consulting? Do you need to go to business school to get into it? There are lots of different ways you can get into consulting. I think the most common, at least in my bubble, is to go straight from undergrad. So what that looks like is typically people major in business or economics. But honestly, you can major in anything and get into consulting. As an undergrad, your goal would be to attend recruiting events that are put on by these consulting firms, network and build a connection with these firms. Then you want to get an internship. And then you would want to get recruited into a full-time job. Hopefully, you can work at the same place that you interned. If not, you have that internship experience, and can use that to your advantage when applying to other firms. That’s the most typical way, and it’s for people who know at a young age that they want to go into consulting. Another way you can get into consulting is as an “experienced hire.” If you’re joining as an experienced hire, you probably have some work experience that is not consulting, but have some transferable skills. So for that, you would really just go through a normal application process and apply online. Or if you’re able to make a connection with someone who works there, get your foot in the door. There’s also people who will get a lot of work experience in one industry, go get an MBA, and then get recruited into a consulting firm. What’s the interview process like in the consulting realm? From my experience with the company I’m at now, I had a couple of different behavioral conversations. My interviews were remote because I was still abroad when I was starting that interview process. Then I had an in-person interview, which was like an all-day thing. I was there from the morning until the afternoon. I would kind of describe it as like a gauntlet where different people would come in, and I had different activities or tests that I completed. One of them was a writing sample. I also got to talk to a peer consultant, and that was more casual. I could ask them questions about the work they were doing. I was also given a case study in advance of my interview, and I had to prepare a presentation on it. With case presentations, I think it’s really important to show your thinking process because that’s what they’re looking to find out. It’s not so much, can I come up with the best strategy? It’s about how did you take this problem or this case study and apply your thinking. Also, the firm I work for is very creative, so I created a video as part of mine. I was trying to leverage all the different skills I had that could show that I could be a valuable and unique asset to the company. That’s another piece of advice — what can you do to stand out in these interviews? They’re going to be interviewing so many different people, so what can you do to make your interview and your responses a little bit different? What is your story? How can you make it really engaging? Be intentional about the way that you craft your story, whether you’re talking about yourself or talking about a case study presentation. With other consulting firms, you can probably expect some sort of test before you apply or as you’re applying. It will test your quantitative and qualitative skills. There might be some math problems, comprehension questions — things like that. It’s sort of a benchmarking mechanism, similar to a standardized test. You can also expect behavioral interviews, but also case interviews, where it’s really them testing how you think. It’s not really about what answer you arrive at, but what is your thinking process? As a consultant, is there a good work-life balance? Or are you constantly working? I think it varies. I have friends who have worked at consulting firms that work crazy hours and stay up really late. I’ve had friends where we were supposed to meet for dinner, but then they end up not coming because something came up at work. There’s also the travel aspect. When travel was more frequent, you would be somewhere from Monday to Thursday and only have the weekend. So maybe you don’t have time for doing personal things or self-care. For me, I feel like I have a pretty good work-life balance. I try to set boundaries for what I like during the weekend. I really try not to do any work. I also prefer not to do work into the evenings. But I will get up really early if I have a lot on my plate. That’s the nice thing with consulting from my experience. As long as you’re getting the work done, you manage your time and how you’re doing it. So I just try to find ways to be really efficient, and I find that working early in the morning is best for me. Were you traveling like that, Monday through Thursday, before the pandemic? I did travel quite a lot. Maybe, on average, twice a week I would be in a different state or city, sometimes country. It wasn’t predictable because it would depend on the different projects I was on. So let’s say I’m on four projects, and I’ve got a design session for one of them, and then for a different project I’ve got a final review at the end of the week. It just depended on when all those different milestones lined up. I could have a week where I had no travel, but I could also have a week where I traveled to three different clients. Last question: Who is your career crush? I’ve been following Kaelyn, and she goes by @theredheadacademic, on Instagram. She has such an interesting story. She is a student who transferred to UCLA as an undergraduate. Then, went to Oxford for her Master’s. Now she’s doing her Ph.D. at Yale. And her story is just so cool because she didn’t really get great grades in high school. But then she really worked to get into these elite institutions. So now, she also has her own consulting firm where she helps people who are applying to college and helps them with the application process, whether it’s for grad school, or a Ph.D., or whatever. I’ve really been enjoying seeing her grow and seeing her journey. And, you know, I’m also someone who has a job but has a side hustle with my YouTube channel. I don’t have any plans any time soon to change my career trajectory or course. But the idea of owning my own business or expanding into something like that does intrigue me. So I find a lot of inspiration by following her journey.

Career Crush: Is Consulting the Right Career for You?

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