What do the top consultants say about a career in
consulting? A look at thesecrets they reveal to becoming great management
consultants.
Strategy
consulting is a dream careerfor many graduates, no matter their disciplines –
management, business, finance, marketing, and even IT.
Most new as well as experienced business professionals
target MBBs. However, as high are the numbers of aspirants in the consulting
industry, the exit rates arecomparable. Reasons? The career can be very
different than the shiny world one imagines, and enormously challenging, and
even boring sometimes.
Breaking into the industry is just the first step. Most
senior business strategy professionalsbelieve a long-run successful consulting career
is quite a lot about maintaining a rich routine, and healthy habits.
This article is about what you do after you get into consulting.
The Strategy Institute explores what the
seasoned professionals have to say about becoming better at consulting.
Top 5 Habits of Great Strategic Consultants
1.
Read more
and more.
Why?This makes the difference between engaged and
disengaged management consultants.
As senior
business strategy professionals at
consultancy firm’s rise in hierarchy, or consultants from IT come to pure
strategy, they start to lose meaning in the work.
Reading, keeping yourself updated, and reskilling keeps
consultants ahead of business, tech, psychology, and leadership trends, and
contextualize every move the firm makes.
Magazines, daily newspapers, and authority blogging
websites should become a staple for you. Follow stories from senior strategy
professionals at big brands like Coca-Cola’s Gill McLaren’s Think. Plan. Live.
This habit keeps consultants on top of the new
developments, keeps them engaged with the community, and helps them network.
2.
Chisel your
business skills.
Why?Communication, negotiations, backroom skills,
knowledge of finance, and a few of these skills are indispensable for thriving
in strategy consulting career.
Great consultants are good at juggling internal and
external relationships – meaning with people inside and outside the firm.
Knowledge and skills play a central role in
determining how good and confident you would be at saying what you intend.
Strategic certificate programs can provide a solid grounding in pertinent
business lexicons, and give rich insights into management consulting, how to
deal with stakeholders at different levels, latest tools and frameworks, among
others.
3.
Grow to be
an expert.
Why?Specialization opens long-term vistas in consulting,
which is rare for many senior business strategy professionals to envisage.
Strategy consultants are afraid of being “pigeonholed,”
i.e. getting too deep into a project or industry. Their tendency is to
generalize and stay that way. Take up a project, build a robust model, train
the team, and roll off. A unicorn consultant.
That said, at some stage, it’s important for
consultants to specialize. This is why it is common among senior consultants to
join Boutique consulting firms down the line. Specialization can be connected
with your education or industry experience. Either way, choose, and choose
something that you have worked in, have a network, and gained a reputation as a
guru.
Becoming an expert and demonstrating proficiency in
the chosen areas is what earns senior consultants the title of great. A few
remain unicorn, if at all.
4.
Nurture
right relationships.
Why?Good relationships with the right people have an
impact on people’s behavior toward you, your reputation it the firm, and the
projects you get.
The best way to be a superstar consultant is to create
the right network from the beginning. For instance, partners who get sales are
respected company-wide and get their pick of desired juniors when it comes to
staffing.
If you are at the beginning of your career, buddying
up with the right person will pay dividends – not just in financial terms, but
knowledge of people skills within consulting industry. If you are a senior
business strategy professional, make sure you gain the trust of the right
leaders to rise and get promoted, and as you go up, maintain your network.
5.
A bit of
economics and a bit of finance.
Why?The knowledge of finance, business, and economics
bring one’s profile way up for it reflects one’s ability to be able to take up
a macro view of things.
Knowledge of basic accounting, finance and economics
does a world of good to great strategy consultants. Especially because it can
be intimidating to many. Most strategic certificate programs involve basic
know-how of understanding financial position of a company and assess overall
market swings.
The value of a person rises exponentially – if she comes with a mix of strategy and finance skillsets and knowledge.
