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5 lessons from 5 weeks in management consulting
Management consulting is a job associated with slick Powerpoint presentations and complex Excel models. You *do* generally need to know how to use those programs as a consultant. However, after five weeks on the job, I am learning that being an effective consultant has less to do with memorizing Microsoft shortcuts, and more to do with working well in a small, fast paced team.
Here are my five takeaways for how to hit the ground running as a new consultant.
1) Show unfinished work
Imagine this: you’re given an assignment that will take until the end of day to do. Do you plan your day around the assignment, and then send it back by end of day? That’s what I used to do, and it would typically result in me staying late to finish the assignment.
Why? Consulting is a team sport, where everyone has an opinion on the work, and most deliverables go through many iterations before the final product is selected and published.
If you want to deliver something on time, make time for feedback. Plan out how you plan to solve the problem and get feedback on your proposal. Then write a draft, and collect feedback there, too. As you do more work, collect more feedback. It might seem ridiculous to do this for a one-day assignment, but I promise that a couple of 5…
