I was invited by my alma mater, Nanyang Business School, in October 2018 to give a presentation to a class of (mostly) penultimate year undergraduates on the management consulting industry. In this presentation, I try to demystify the broad industry of consulting, talk about the good, the bad and the ugly, and share tips on how they can get their foot in the door.

1. MANAGEMENT CONSULTING
AS YOUR FIRST JOB
bolong chew
class of ‘16
Deconstructing the industry and getting your foot in the door

2. who is this guy?
what is management consulting, really?
and what’s in it for me?
how do I get my foot in?

3. some ground rules:
let’s have a discussion
ask me the tough questions

4. how I started out in consulting
NTU Sports Club
discovered consulting + GPA was a mess
P&G summer intern + LOA for Ipsos BC and PwC Strategy
exchange semester (just travelled / had fun)
Conjunct Consulting
Conjunct Consulting + full-time applications
year 1
year 2 sem 1
LOA
year 3 sem 1
year 2 sem 2
year 3 sem 2

5. what I did in consulting

6. what is management consulting
management consulting essentially exists to help clients solve
problems and improve the performance of organisations

7. using Accenture’s organisation structure as a framework
operating model
organizational design
change management
system integration
market entry
digital strategy
mergers &
acquisitions
operations strategy
cost reduction
…
technology
implementation
agile transformation
devops
application
management
data & analytics
digital strategy
marketing strategy
UI/UX design
supply chain
operations
business process
outsourcing
ILLUSTRATIVE

8. what consulting looks like on the surface

9. pros and cons
pros
smart & interesting people to work with
dynamic work, fast-paced
C-suite interactions
plenty of exit opportunities
travel
impact (?)
cons
long hours
steep learning curve, high expectations
just OK salary
travel

10. plan out your roadmap towards management consulting
2. case interview
getting your foot in the door:
time to shine:
1a. solid CV
strong GPA + decent internships
1b. networking
events / referral
all others (to varying extents)

11. your CV
basically 2 touch-points:
1) first human cut (HR, consultants)
3-5 seconds
3 piles: great (10%), OK (50%), no-go (rest)
don’t give recruiters a reason to put you in the
no-go pile (p.s. consultants are a lot more harsh)
single page, no photo (waste of real estate),
neat formatting
2) detailed look-over: discussions, pre-interview
GPA (and educational background)
internship or relevant CCA experience & brand names
key skills to call out on JDs: analytical/quant,
initiative/achievement/oomph, team work,
communication, leadership – score your own CV
formatting & phrasing indicative of communication
personality / are you cool?

12. “networking”
your first thoughts? eww, gross, uncomfortable, shady, feels fake, anxious?
reframe your mind around it: a stranger asking for directions on the street
it is probably not mutually beneficial - but that’s ok
have a genuine conversation, be prepared but curious
action items:
build out your sales pipeline – drop-off rate exists
pro tip: find consultants on the bench

13. the case interview
most respectable firms do 2-3 case interviews
work backwards from your case interviews (sorry final years): max. 25% time studying,
rest practicing with actual people (friends, online, network contacts)
practice makes perfect (nearly)
don’t be fixated by frameworks!
interviewer’s psychology: long day of interviews / squeezed out 1 hour for this chump
interviewer’s assessment:
a) am I confident enough to put this person in front of the client?
b) am I happy to spend >12 hours working in the same room with him/her? (airport test)
bring a personality

14. lastly, if nothing else works…

15. questions?
linkedin.com/in/bolongchew
bolong.chew@gmail.com