What Is Management Consulting? Firm Types, Levels and Case Interviews

Updated 2026/10/16

What is management consulting?

Management consulting is advisory work that helps companies solve business problems. A consulting team analyzes the problem and makes recommendations, and on some projects it also helps the client put the plan into practice. The field splits into strategy, operations, risk, tech and other areas. McKinsey, BCG and Bain (known together as MBB) work in it, and so do the consulting arms of the Big Four accounting firms.

Consultants work project by project. On the London strategy team of Andrew, my guest for this piece, a strategy project runs three to six months on average, while commercial due diligence might take just one month. A typical staffing is one partner, one principal and one manager, plus two or three consultants and business analysts.

The first half of this article covers the types of consulting firms, the career levels, and how interviews work. The second half is my podcast guest Andrew Lee on consulting in the UK. He graduated from the LBS MiM in 2023 and works as a strategy consultant at Arthur D. Little in London.

Types of consulting firms: MBB, the Big Four, boutiques and in-house teams

In our interview, Andrew roughly divided consulting firms into “large firms that do everything” and “small firms that specialize in one area.” Add the Big Four consulting practices and in-house consulting teams, and the common types look like this:

Type	Examples	What they mainly do	Andrew’s take: who it suits
MBB strategy consulting firms	McKinsey, BCG, Bain	Large and broad. Mostly strategy, sometimes implementation too. Offices differ in their specialties; Andrew mentioned, for example, that Bain has many consultants working on finance	People still exploring who want exposure to many industries in a short time
Other generalist consulting firms	For example Arthur D. Little, where Andrew works	Much like MBB, with dedicated teams for strategy, operations, risk and tech	Same as above
Big Four consulting practices	Deloitte, PwC, EY, KPMG	On Deloitte’s website, for example, consulting services are grouped into Strategy & Transactions, Enterprise Technology & Performance, Business Process Solutions and more. Andrew’s observation is that projects run longer, mostly with long-standing clients, and the industry or focus is more fixed	People who want to build expertise in a specific industry or area
Boutique consulting firms	Common in big markets such as New York, London and Singapore	Specialize in their own field; Andrew’s examples were defense and AI technology	People who have already found an industry or direction they care about
In-house consulting	A company’s own strategy or transformation team	Handles strategy or transformation projects for its own company, which is its only client	Not covered in this episode

Andrew also points out that joining a large firm doesn’t lock you into being a generalist. Once you’re in, you can tell your manager which kinds of projects you want to specialize in. Which type to choose depends on your plans for the next three to five years and whether you’ve found a direction you want to commit to.

Consulting career levels: from Analyst to Partner

Titles vary by firm, but the path is broadly the same. You start as an analyst (Business Analyst, Associate Consultant and so on), then move up to Consultant, Manager and finally Partner. Some firms add levels in between, such as Principal, Senior Manager or Associate Partner. Bain’s consulting careers page, for example, lists these stages (descriptions summarized):

Level	Bain’s description
Intern	First-hand experience of consulting work
Associate Consultant	Works directly with clients and owns part of a project
Senior Associate Consultant	The next step after strong analytical work and deeper client relationships
Consultant	Starts leading parts of a case, which means starting to lead people
Manager	Leads a case team
Senior Manager	On the path to leadership
Associate Partner	Fully trusted to handle complex client projects
Partner	Helps steer the firm

Level also sets the billing rate. Andrew says business analysts have the lowest daily charge and it rises with each level, so a partner might bill a client only a few days on a project while an analyst bills a whole month. For whether to keep climbing after Manager or move into industry, see Andrew’s answer on promotion and exit options in consulting below.

How consulting interviews work: the case interview and the fit interview

Consulting interviews usually have two parts. The case interview tests how you solve a business problem, and the fit interview (a behavioral interview) asks about your motivation and past experience. Most of the interviews Andrew had in London and Dubai were Fit plus a 30 to 40 minute case, with 10 minutes of Q&A at the end.

What does a case interview test?

The three MBB firms describe it in similar terms. BCG says the interviewer gives you a real business problem and you break it down step by step: build a structure, ask questions, analyze data, do quick calculations and find the key drivers. There is usually no single right answer; what counts is how you approach the problem and how well you reason. Bain also says it isn’t looking for one correct answer but for how you think, and suggests confirming the question first, walking the interviewer through a clear structure, and talking through your reasoning and math out loud. McKinsey calls the case a problem-solving interview, also stresses that there is no single solution, and recommends organizing your thoughts and starting from the big picture.

Official case prep resources from MBB

• McKinsey: the website has practice cases (such as Diconsa and GlobaPharm) with the reasoning and suggested answers. Besides the case, there is a Personal Experience Interview, where you talk about specific past experiences.
• BCG: the website has a case interview prep page and recommends OneDay@BCG, a free job simulation.
• Bain: the website offers two practice cases, Coffee Shop Co. and FashionCo., and lists outside resources such as Crafting Cases, the site Andrew and his LBS classmates loved. According to Bain’s interviewing page, applicants for consulting roles usually take a digital assessment first and then move on to case interviews.

For how to actually start practicing from zero, see Andrew’s three-stage case practice method. Fit prep is covered in How to prepare for the fit interview.

Andrew’s experience in UK consulting (podcast highlights)

This is a condensed version of the podcast transcript. You can listen to the full episode (in Chinese) here.

If you enjoy it, please leave the podcast a five-star rating on your platform 🌟 (transcripts take a lot of work to put together 🥹)!

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Hi, and welcome to “Jason’s Career Folder.” I’m your host, Jason, and I’ve been sharing content about careers and studying abroad for a long time. Here you can “open” the folder and explore stories, and you can also “edit” it with me: build up your experience, pick up insights and learn new things!

🎤 Guest: Andrew Lee
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-kuanhan-lee/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/moandrewlee/

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In this episode:

📂 What management consulting is and how to get in
📂 Management consulting vs. strategy consulting
📂 The traits consulting firms look for
📂 Working at Arthur D. Little
📂 Management consulting at the Big Four accounting firms
📂 How to practice cases from zero to one
📂 Takeaways for anyone who wants to break into consulting

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J: I’m really happy to have my high school classmate Andrew here today. He’ll talk about what working in consulting is like, what the work involves, what he’s taken from it, and how he got into the industry, including the interview process, how mock interviews work, case interviews, and what to watch for at each stage. If you’re curious too, keep listening!

Yo Yo Yo What’s up! Hi everyone, I’m Andrew. A quick intro: I graduated from the LBS MiM in 2023, and I now work in management consulting in London at a firm called Arthur D. Little.

I’ve done internships in both the UK and Taiwan, and I’ve been involved in Taiwanese student associations, both at my school in the UK and the global network of Taiwanese student groups around the world. Jason and I were high school classmates and have stayed in touch ever since, so today I’m at his mercy.

J: I’m so glad Andrew agreed to this interview! Andrew is kind of my traffic magnet. I interviewed him before for the post “From studying abroad to employment: how an LBS MiM grad landed a consulting offer, plus his London Business School experience and job search tips” (in Chinese), and that one got a lot of traffic. Many listeners are also interested in how to job hunt, how to get into consulting, and what consulting actually is. Let’s start with your most recent experience!

What does a strategy consultant at Arthur D. Little in London do?

J: Which firm are you at now, and what does your work usually involve?

After graduating from LBS, I first did a summer internship at UBS in the UK. Then I joined Arthur D. Little, a management consulting and strategy consulting firm in the UK. We have more than 40 offices around the world, including one in Taipei. We call ourselves the world’s “first” management consulting firm. It was founded in 1896 or so, anyway it has over 130 years of history.

Editor’s note: according to Arthur D. Little’s company timeline, the firm was founded in 1886.

In the UK I work on a team called Technology Innovation Management. For the past four months I was there as an intern, basically a probation period, and I was recently very happy to be converted to full time. So I came back to Taiwan for a while to work remotely and sort out my UK work visa at the same time. Once I was converted I could finally relax, with no pressure. The firm was open-minded enough to let me work remotely from Taiwan for three weeks, so I came back to see friends and to see Jason.

How to choose a consulting firm: MBB vs. generalist firms vs. boutiques

J: Consulting has many different areas and types of firms. MBB is one big group, and other firms may have their own niches. What makes your firm distinctive, and why did you choose it?

Yes, exactly! Jason is right. Some consulting firms do everything, like MBB, which is what we call McKinsey, BCG and Bain (the three biggest management consulting firms). My firm is actually a lot like MBB: we basically have a dedicated team for every type of consulting, so strategy, operations, risk and tech each have their own specialist group. In some of the bigger markets around the world, like New York, London or international hubs like Singapore, you also see a lot of boutique consulting, meaning smaller consulting firms. They each specialize in their own field, for example defense, or very specialized tech like AI. There are many small, highly specialized consulting firms like that.

Consulting covers a lot of different areas. People talk about strategy consulting, operation consulting, management consulting, risk consulting, financial consulting, investment consulting, so there are many, many kinds. I’ve always targeted strategy consulting. Strategy is what I wanted to do, so when I applied to my firm, part of the appeal was that I could apply directly to the strategy team.

In London my firm has risk, tech and strategy, and the role I applied for happened to be in strategy consulting. It also fit better with my studies, the LBS MiM and my business management degree at King’s College London, and with my past experience. So I’ve always focused on getting into strategy consulting.

As for why I chose this firm, our team’s clients are spread across a very wide range of industries. In four months I’ve been through three or four projects; I’m on my fourth now. So far that’s been one in education, two in food and one in automotive. The firm is really good at this mix of industries, so I get exposure to a lot of different sectors in a short time. That was a big reason I chose it.

The second reason is how global the firm is. Like I said, we have offices in over forty locations, so it’s relatively easy to work with different offices and meet different people, or later do a short-term exchange at another office or a longer-term relocation.

J: I feel like that’s really different from risk advisory, and it shows the difference between consulting and advisory. In consulting you go through many different projects in four months and face many different clients. In risk advisory, the engagements I work on over a year or two are all the same kind, and maybe eighty or ninety percent of the clients are the same type. So we keep taking on repeat work. We probably become more specialized in one service, while you build broader experience.

I think strategy consulting is a double-edged sword, and it depends on what you like: whether you’ve already found a direction you’re passionate about, or whether you still want to keep exploring. If you still want to explore, strategy consulting suits you well. If you’ve already found an industry or direction you care about, you can choose a smaller specialist firm and build project experience in one industry or area. Or you can choose a large firm, and once you’re in, tell your boss what kinds of projects you want to specialize in. So it really depends on your career plans for the next three to five years and whether you’ve found what you’re passionate about.

What traits does a management consultant need? Do you have to be an extrovert?

J: What traits do you think consulting firms value when they hire, and what kind of personality? Do you have to be an extrovert to be a good fit for consulting?

I don’t think it’s about being extroverted. A friend asked me a couple of days ago which traits suit the job, so I can answer from that angle, because being suited to it is basically what firms are looking for too. If you want to stay in consulting a long time without burning out or getting bored too quickly, then enjoying talking with people, learning new things, even liking travel are all traits that help you last.

The nature of the industry is that every three or four months you might switch to a new project, a new industry and a new group of people. Your clients come in every personality: difficult or easy, extroverted or introverted. You have to adjust yourself to deal with each client. So whether you can adapt easily, in your mindset, your manner, the way you talk or the way you interact with people, and whether you can adjust quickly, is a big part of whether you’ll enjoy this job. Most important, I think, is whether you genuinely enjoy fast-paced change at work and in your life.

Something many of us felt once we actually started, especially as new grads, is that a big adjustment is that your work is never the same from one day to the next. You might picture what tomorrow will look like the night before, but then A suddenly calls you, B suddenly calls you, and a meeting gets squeezed in. So you keep adjusting how you work and how efficiently you work to fit the people around you. In the UK we’d call it adaptability. If you can adjust yourself easily, I think you’ll find it easier to enjoy this job.

As for hard requirements or background, like whether certain internships, work experience or academic training make it easier to get into consulting: as far as I can tell, consulting firms generally don’t look for students from a particular field or major. As for which major or internship helps you build up experience, I think every internship gradually helps you build toward your ideal job. It just depends on which market you want to work in, because internship experience in the local market matters more. That’s something many of my peers have felt over the past few years. For example, if you want a good job in London, you probably need some London experience on your resume from last summer or recently, so London firms are more likely to notice you.

It also depends on what kind of consulting you want to do. If you want to join a firm with deep expertise in finance, M&A or risk, you probably need more finance internships, or at least be able to show them some relevant finance work experience, financial modeling skills, or at least an understanding of how they work.

So it depends on what kind of consulting work you want to focus on. For general consulting, though, the most important thing is international work experience; otherwise everyone’s internships look about the same. Having a previous consulting role is also great, because it at least shows your interest in consulting and your motivation. People will also trust that you have the basic skills: that you can handle clients on your own, make slides, and at least know how to use Excel. So landing a job at a consulting firm of any size, big or small, helps with your later interviews.

What does a management consultant do every day? How long are projects?

J: What does day-to-day consulting work actually look like? You mentioned four projects in four months. Are consulting projects generally short, wrapping up within a month or two?

Purely in terms of length, it depends on what each firm specializes in. For strategy, we generally hear three to six months per project. It also depends on each firm’s staffing model, meaning how they allocate their people. Some firms keep one team on a project for the full three to six months. Others split a project into phase one, phase two and phase three; one team finishes phase one, then moves off to another project, and a different team takes the next phase.

So the model differs by firm. At mine, we often split projects into phases one, two and three, and the same team doesn’t necessarily stay for the whole project. That ties back to one of the biggest advantages of consulting: you work with lots of different people and really learn teamwork and how to adapt to other people’s working styles.

Back to project length: for us it comes down to the nature of the engagement. Commercial due diligence, for example, is shorter, maybe just a month. A strategy project like market entry or business modeling might be two to three months. So it depends on what kind of consulting your firm focuses on; for strategy, three to six months on average.

How are consulting teams staffed and billed? Do partners do the work themselves?

J: Clients come with all kinds of problems. As long as a problem falls within your area or your team’s services, will you take it on?

I’d say it has to fit our partners’ expertise. If a partner thinks they can take it and deliver, who says no to money? Of course we’ll take it.

J: Do the partners work on the projects themselves?

Since you’re selling to the client, you need to put at least one or two partners on the initial proposal, so the client feels they’re getting the partners’ expertise and experience. In practice, at my firm a team is usually one partner, one principal and one manager, plus two or three consultants and business analysts.

It depends on the project budget, because consulting is billed like this: at the first level, say I’m a business analyst, my rate is the lowest, my daily charge is the lowest, and it gets higher with each level up. So a partner might bill the client only one, two or three days on a project, and the days increase as you go down the levels. As a business analyst, I might bill the project a whole month. So it depends on the partner and how complex the project is, and then how many days to bill the partner and the manager on it. Usually there’s a case manager, who might be a manager or a principal and is the direct project manager for the consultants and business analysts under them. The partner, meanwhile, comes in after we finish a phase’s deck, marks it up with a pen and leaves a pile of comments, and we slowly revise. They just drop in to check from time to time.

Promotion and exit options in consulting: does everyone leave after Manager?

J: About the consulting career path: do many people get stuck at manager or face sales pressure? Do most people leave once they reach manager? Everyone knows consulting has lots of exit options, so do many people leave? And is it possible to come in laterally at manager level?

OK! I’ll start with the last question because it’s the most straightforward. Yes, it’s possible. I’ve seen quite a few people join at a more senior stage. But it depends on whether you have real expertise. Say you’ve spent 10 to 20 years in the auto industry and become an expert who knows the answer to anything people ask. That’s very valuable to a consulting firm. If the firm has automotive clients and projects, bringing you in as a senior expert brings in a lot of money. You also bring a lot of connections, since you already have many industry contacts, which helps sell future projects and grow revenue. So it’s actually fairly easy.

As for the first two questions, people may feel that consultants change jobs a lot or often switch career direction. I think that’s part of figuring things out: many people join consulting because they aren’t sure yet what they want to do.

After three to five years, you’ve worked on projects across many industries, and you might find you’re especially drawn to one of them. That’s when many people start thinking about switching and joining that industry directly, maybe for better pay, a better work-life balance, or a role that fits their career direction better. That’s the biggest advantage of consulting: it helps you find what you’re passionate about.

When to leave varies from person to person. A lot of the time it comes down to whether you can still handle such an intense work environment, or whether you still enjoy constantly switching how you work and what you work on. Sometimes an opportunity comes along and people want to seize it. There are also plenty of people who stay in consulting from start to finish and rise all the way to Partner.

So the upside is that consulting opens a lot of doors and options for the future. Whether to take one, when, and where you end up are your own decisions, and when an opportunity appears in front of you, you grab it.

How do Big Four consulting practices differ from strategy consulting firms?

J: You interned in the management consulting practice of a Big Four firm in Taiwan before. How do you think a Big Four consulting practice differs from the firm you’re at now?

It comes back to the difference between strategy consulting and management consulting. In management consulting, projects generally run longer. Whether it’s risk advisory or management consulting, it’s like you described: long cycles, with a fixed industry or focus. They work with clients they’ve had for a very long time, so there’s a strong foundation of trust, and the clients keep bringing them similar kinds of problems to solve.

So far, I think the Big Four consulting practices are very good too; the day-to-day work just goes in a different direction. Strategy consulting has shorter cycles and moves faster. Big Four consulting may be a bit slower paced, but you develop your own expertise and specialty. So it really comes down to personal choice.

Do strategy consultants also do implementation?

J: A lot of clients now want the solutions you provide as consultants to be implementable and to deliver real financial results. Has the nature of what you deliver changed, from purely providing strategy to also providing plans that can be implemented?

So far I’ve only worked on strategy; I haven’t been involved in implementation yet. Implementation takes longer, and it may be handled by management consulting firms. Some alumni I networked or had coffee chats with at management consulting firms did more of the implementation side.

That doesn’t mean strategy firms never touch implementation, though. It still depends on the project’s budget and complexity. Say I land a year-long strategy project. Over that year you’ll have done a lot of complex design work, complex analysis and complex recommendations. Bringing in a different management consulting firm, or an entirely different team, to implement it would make little sense, because the next team may not fully understand what was done in the previous phase when the same team produced all that design work and those recommendations.

So longer strategy projects may include some implementation. It depends on how far the client’s budget stretches and how complex the problem is, and that decides which consulting firm they hire, what type of firm it is, and whether it does pure strategy or some implementation too. Implementation is a specialty in its own right, and a strategy firm can’t necessarily cover it.

J: So you’re at a strategy consulting firm right now?

That’s right, I’m in strategy.

MBB count as management consulting firms. They’re huge, with a very large number of people, so their areas of expertise are very broad. They sometimes do implementation, though mostly strategy, and they may also cover some management consulting work, which is why they call themselves management consulting firms.

What they do is extremely broad. Bain, for example, has many consultants who focus on finance. So every office around the world, and every firm, has different kinds of consultants.

Work culture in UK consulting: anything fun?

J: During your time in consulting, has anything stood out as especially fun?

The work itself is pretty fun. Like I said, what you do each day is never quite the same. The UK is also quite special in that people really respect your time after work. About once a week we’ll go for a quick drink after work, but after that everyone goes off and lives their own life. They respect your weekends too and basically won’t bother you unless you’re on a very tight timeline. I think that’s a good thing about the UK and Europe: they respect your personal life.

Right now, for example, I told the firm I wanted to go home to see my family and sort out my visa, and they let me come back to Taiwan and work flexibly. I think that’s a great part of the work culture in Europe and the UK. As for fun stuff, there are lots of company events. We had a year-end party that ran from 11 a.m. to five or six p.m. at a restaurant, and they had me dress up as Santa and hand out presents. That was a lot of fun. There are plenty of different company activities.

My firm also sends everyone to a training every year. It can be anywhere in the world, depending on how they plan it that year. You spend a week there and meet people at your level from different offices. Next year, for example, it might be Spain or Austria. I think that’s one of the nice things about consulting: you get a lot of chances to travel, whether for projects or training. Or you can simply plan your own time flexibly and schedule vacations to travel, so it’s a very flexible job in that respect.

How long are a management consultant’s hours? What time do you start and finish?

J: What are your usual working hours?

It depends a lot on how senior you are. My firm really respects personal time, so if you have plans, or want to go to the gym or rest after work, that’s basically fine, as long as you get your work done.

But for the past four months I was an intern, a worker bee on trial, being judged on whether I’d be converted to full time and get to stay. So I gave it everything, 120% effort, and my hours over those four months were pretty long. I’d often work until quite late, then check my laptop again after getting home. Sometimes I had to work weekends too. But that’s all in the past now; things are much better since I started full time.

J: Time to take back your vacation days…

Right! You have more bargaining power because you’re a full-time employee now. And they go back to their default of respect: they really do respect you. So they let you manage your own time, and your hours are whatever it takes to get the work done. Some days you might finish at 6, but on a tight project you might need to work until 10 or 11, or do a bit of work on weekends. Over a year it all follows the project cycle and the nature of each project.

You’ll definitely get some lighter projects and some tighter ones, so there’s always room to breathe. If you’re on a tight project, you look forward to the next one being lighter so you can catch your breath, or you schedule a vacation between two projects to unwind. So it’s about whether you can personally handle short bursts of intense work. If you can, there will always be breathing room; it won’t be high intensity all year round.

How should beginners practice case interviews? Three stages from zero

J: Do you have a recommended way for a complete beginner to start practicing cases from zero?

J: We’ve talked a lot about the inside story of consulting, or at least the features of the job and what the daily work is really like. I think many people will want to know how to get into a consulting firm. How do they get their foot in the door?

There’s a website that all of us at LBS preparing for consulting loved, called Crafting Cases (https://www.craftingcases.com/). It was set up by two former MBB consultants, and we all found its free 7-day course very thorough. It walks you through case interview prep, what a real case interview looks like, and how you should talk through it.

I don’t think you need 7 days, because he talks pretty slowly, so if you speed it up you can get through it in a few days. After the free course you’ll understand what a case interview looks like and which areas you need to work on. They have paid courses that help you strengthen those areas, and whether you need them is up to you. But just following the free course gives you a pretty good understanding of what a case interview looks like.

So our general advice is: if you want a consulting job, go through that course first, then start finding peers to practice cases with. Quickly recapping what we covered in our earlier interview (From studying abroad to employment: how an LBS MiM grad landed a consulting offer, plus his London Business School experience and job search tips): for your first 10 to 15 cases, you only need one or two people who you’re sure are really good at cases. They might already work in consulting, be an alumnus, or simply be further along in their prep than you, but make sure they really understand how to do a case. For those first 10 to 15 cases, just practice with them! One or two case coaches are enough. They’ll help you build your approach to cases and a solid grasp of how to do them. They help you turn the most basic things you should be doing into a pattern and a habit, and fix the most basic mistakes.

After 10 to 15 cases, diversify your case partners. After 15 cases, I’d still recommend finding experienced case partners if you can. At LBS, we’d go to alumni from the LBS MBA, because they used to work in consulting and there’s a good chance they also interview candidates for these firms. An hour of case practice with them helps you polish the details you need to adjust, express your ideas more naturally, and present your thinking with more structure.

So after 15, you look for these more experienced or more varied case partners. I’d put the dividing line at about 15. Before 15, you build a solid foundation for doing cases. After 15, you polish the areas that can still improve, going from 99% to 100%.

J: OK, so before 15, I find an experienced person to help me, a bit like a mock interview. They act as your interviewer?

Yes, one or two people. To sum up, there are three stages:

• Finish Crafting Cases
• Do 10 to 15 cases with one or two case coaches
• After 15, diversify your case partners

During those first 10 to 15, when you’re just starting out, the format is basically this: book an hour with the person. The case itself takes about 30 to 40 minutes, and in the remaining 20 to 30 minutes they give you feedback, teach you how to do it, and discuss how you could have answered certain questions better. So you book an hour, and at the start it’s like: I run the case for you and guide you through it, asking questions the way an interviewer would. Afterwards, we go over the feedback.

After 15, once you’ve worked with experienced people and built your own approach, you might practice with peers, a bit like a study group. It really is like a study group. The point is that before 15 you don’t need to diversify your case partners, because you might get pulled off track by too many different ways of doing cases. Everyone does cases their own way, so the most important thing in your first 15 is to build your own approach and a way of presenting that feels comfortable to you. It has to be clear, logical and well organized, of course, but it also has to be a pattern you’re used to. Only after 15 do you take in different input. I do encourage everyone to practice with peers, but that takes two hours, because I do a case for you and you do one for me. The most efficient approach is to find a working consultant, book an hour, and have them run a case for you one way.

How many rounds are in a consulting interview process? Examples from London and Dubai

J: Apart from the case interview, what happens in the first, second and third rounds? Do you need to pass a resume screen first? Does HR screen people out early? Overall, what are the stages of the recruiting process?

OK, first I should say that my job search was mainly in London, the London market, and the Middle East, in Dubai. So my experience and what I’ll describe are based mostly on those two markets. I know less about Asian markets, but if you’re interested, you can reach out to me and I’ll connect you with friends I know.

That said, I know Asian markets have an HR screening round, maybe because they need to filter out a larger volume of applicants. After you submit your resume, there’s a 30-minute HR call. Usually it isn’t a case, though there may be a bit of one: some firms in Greater China have HR run a very simple case of about 4 minutes. Only after that come one or two rounds of standard interviews. In London and Dubai, most firms have a very standard first round and second round.

Most have four interviews: two in the first round and two in the second. Each interview in a round is one hour with a different interviewer, and every hour is Fit plus Case.

Fit means the motivation questions we always talk about: whether you’re a fit for consulting, Why Consulting, Why this market, Why this company, or questions about your past leadership and teamwork experience. Then there’s a 30 to 40 minute case, plus 10 minutes of Q&A.

We can talk later about what matters in each step, but in general it’s four interviews, two in the first round and two in the second, though it varies by firm. In my year, 2023, more and more firms tried different formats, especially in the London market. Some firms, which I went through, do it all in one day: two interviews in the morning and two in the afternoon. After the morning two, they tell you on the spot whether you’re moving on to the afternoon, and after the afternoon round they tell you on the spot whether you got the offer. It’s all over in a day, sometimes even an afternoon.

Some firms don’t use the four-interview format at all. At my firm, Arthur D. Little, my first round was a standard interview, Fit plus Case, but my second round was a two-and-a-half-hour session that wasn’t really an interview anymore. It was more of an assessment center or super day. In the first hour I did a financial modeling case: an interviewer gave me a case where I had to key the numbers into Excel, do some work on them there, then present back to the interviewer and explain my logic and any inconsistencies. That was followed by 10 to 20 minutes of Fit and Q&A. The second hour was a 30-minute presentation that was open to anyone in the UK office, so I presented in front of 15 or 16 colleagues, followed by 10 minutes of Q&A. The last half hour was a 30-minute conversation with a partner or principal. So firms are starting to design different interview formats, not just the traditional Fit plus Case, but practicing the traditional Fit plus Case is still the foundation.

Whatever variation you run into, it builds on Fit plus Case, so practicing them only helps. Practicing Fit and Case also helps a lot if you’re applying for corporate graduate schemes or entry-level roles, because more and more companies now use case interviews. Other industries are bringing in case interviews too. People may not understand why, but more and more of them do it. So in general, we think practicing for consulting interviews can’t hurt.

Are there group interviews in consulting?

J: Did you ever have a group interview?

No. All my group interviews were at banks or corporates.

J: So banks abroad do group interviews too?

Yes, yes, they do, and basically all of them have one. Most of my bank interviews included a group interview, but it only takes 30 minutes, or an hour at most. They give you something to discuss: maybe you have an hour to put together a quick presentation, or quickly analyze a problem and discuss it together.

It’s a teamwork exercise, and they watch what role you play on the team. So four or five interviewers might join your Zoom room at once and watch how you divide up the work and discuss. It’s worth practicing, because people will be thinking about what to say to make the assessors see them as a certain kind of leader.

I’ve only experienced group interviews at corporates or banks, never in consulting. Maybe the consulting work environment doesn’t call for it as much, or they can learn the traits they need from other stages, so there’s no need to add a group interview. If you’re building variations on case and fit, it’s probably hard to turn them into a group format. Most interviews are still one-on-one. And put most simply, the biggest factor in whether a consulting interview succeeds is whether the interviewer likes you and whether you click. I’ve had interviews where there was no rapport at all and the conversation was really painful, and you can tell right away it’s not going to go well. So the feel in the moment is very subjective and very one-on-one, which may be another reason group interviews don’t fit consulting.

Should a consulting resume be one page? Key points of the UK resume format

J: Is there anything to pay special attention to on the resume? For example, does an English resume have to fit on one page? Are there any specific format requirements?

On format, people’s advice varies. I and many of my classmates basically used our school’s template, and there are some basics: most people keep it to one page, and in the UK market you don’t include a photo; you can’t include one. Every market is different, though, so I’m not sure how it works in Asia or Greater China.

In the UK, basically every school has its own template, so following your school’s template is the simplest and least error-prone way. After that, send your resume to some experienced alumni to look over. You could send it to Jason, for example, and if you want to reach out to me to look at your resume, you’re very welcome to.

It’s quick, and from their experience people can easily point out the basic things you need to improve. In practice, no template is especially good or more likely to get noticed. Following your school’s template basically won’t cause problems. Or, if you’re in business, you can download templates from US business schools, or the LBS template. I’m sure you can find them online. Downloading the templates of a few target schools for that market is basically fine.

What’s the hardest part of a consulting job search? How do you get interviews?

J: Did you hit any especially difficult obstacles in your consulting applications? What was the hardest part to prepare for or to break through?

I’d say two things. Case and fit are what you absolutely have to get right, because once you have an interview, those two basics decide whether you succeed.

Setting those aside, though, getting the interview in the first place is the crux. Competition is really fierce right now, so I think getting interviews is a game. You need to understand how the game is played, and the fastest, most efficient way to learn that is to talk to alumni: alumni in the industry and at the firm, or people at the firm you’re connected to.

Networking and coffee chats are the most efficient way to learn how the game is played, including what the firm values and what experience and personality traits they want to see, which you then write into your cover letter and CV. They can even help you get interviews directly. There’s also referrals. So your cover letter, your CV and referrals can all come most directly from coffee chats and networking.

So I spent the most time on networking and coffee chats. I set myself a small goal: for every firm I wanted to apply to, talk to at least two people. Two was my minimum, the bar I set for myself, but I think two people per firm is actually enough, because it lets you shape your cover letter and CV thoroughly. And if a firm uses a video interview, the AI kind where they send you a link and you record yourself talking to your computer, I believe two connections and two coffee chats also give you enough insight. So most of my time went into talking to at least two people at every firm.

If you want to learn more about building your LinkedIn presence, or how to find people on LinkedIn for coffee chats, listen to our next episode. This one mostly covers consulting and consulting applications; the next one will be more general, about things like the whole process of job hunting abroad and studying in the UK!

How to prepare the Q&A and self-introduction in a consulting interview

J: Is there anything else you’d like to share about consulting applications?

There’s one thing I wanted to mention earlier but didn’t. An interview is ten minutes of Fit, then the case, then Q&A, right?

Personally, I think the Q&A is very important! It’s about asking a question well, so the other person can tell you genuinely want to understand it and that you’ve done your homework. For example: after talking with so-and-so at your firm, I learned your office focuses on a certain industry, and I’d like to hear about your own experience. A lot of people just ask, “I’d like to hear about your experience in this area.” You can make the question longer: “After talking with so-and-so at your firm,” or “after reading your firm’s annual report from a certain year, I noticed this issue, so I’d like to understand it better.” Prepare your Q&A questions well. You don’t need many, maybe two or three, or three or four. But you do need to design your questions carefully and show you’ve done your homework. The Q&A is something you need to prepare for, too.

So there are a few things I think people tend to overlook but need to prepare: the Q&A is one, and the self-introduction is another. Every interview starts with a self-introduction, which is your chance to tell them more about your background. I think the self-introduction is a key lever, because it steers which fit questions they ask you next.

In my self-introduction, I usually don’t say much about my past internships or professional background, because they can see that on my CV and will probably ask about it later anyway. Instead, I focus more on the variety in my background.

For example, where I grew up, where I studied, and my experience across different markets. Then I give a lot of time, maybe 50% or 60%, to my extracurriculars: my leadership experience, my time in the student association, or playing on sports teams like baseball and basketball. The point is to bring up things they “won’t necessarily” ask about next, but that you’re very confident answering. Put as much of that as you can into your self-introduction. People may overlook the self-introduction, but it really matters: it lets you set the tone and pull the interviewer toward what you want to share.

Let’s also talk about the fit interview in the middle, the behavioral interview. These behavioral questions aren’t limited to consulting; many industries now ask them, to understand what you care about as a person and how you actually handle difficulties.

How to prepare for the fit interview

J: How do you prepare for the fit interview in advance? (There’s no fixed set of question types.)

Right, it’s just like you said. I’ve never had a single interview without fit questions. Every interview has fit; it might be called motivation, or it might be called fit. So how do you prepare for it?

You “format” and “document” your past experiences, using what we call the STAR method: situation, task, actions and result. Take your leadership experience, internships, projects, whatever experiences you want to share, and write each one up in STAR format. Then practice them over and over: how to turn each experience into a story and how to tell it completely.

Follow STAR and keep practicing how to tell these experiences. Whatever fit question you get, you’re telling these same stories, right? You’re sharing these stories. So the most important thing isn’t guessing what they’ll ask, but learning to use your past stories more broadly so they can answer all kinds of fit questions. So just keep practicing your stories. With more practice you can handle it freely: this fit question comes up, I pull out this story.

Use a story bank to handle fit questions

J: So “practicing stories” is the most effective thing in itself. You prepare a big story bank, and when you’re asked a question, you choose which story to answer with.

These days interviews are basically all virtual, so you can keep your story bank behind your screen.

I got a really good tip: build a story bank where each story is a tab, or each story sits in its own column. Stick it on your screen, and whatever you’re asked, you answer right away with that story. It doesn’t even matter if you’re looking at it.

Writing your stories and practicing them in advance will, I believe, boost your confidence and let you respond freely to whatever fit question comes up. I think your answers need “structure.” Whether it’s STAR, or they ask why consulting, you give one, two, three points. Why this company: one, two, three points. Why you: one, two, three points. You can even give one, two, three points in your self-introduction.

Also, keep practicing your signposting: my first point is, now let’s move to my second point, let’s move to my third point, so they clearly know you have one, two, three points. Add STAR, and I think that’s what matters most in consulting interviews: you must have your one, two, three points.

J: I think this is a lot like MBA interviews. When I did many mock interviews back then, what they emphasized was very similar to what you just described. Including the Q&A: that was where I got hammered the most. My questions felt unnatural, almost like I was interrogating the interviewer, just firing questions at them without engaging. That was an instant wake-up call! I’d never noticed it before: after the other person answers, you need to respond a bit too.

Exactly. It’s about showing your enthusiasm and showing that you genuinely want to understand these things, rather than asking for the sake of asking. And with a lot of questions, like the “learning from XXX” you just mentioned, meaning what I learned in a coffee chat, you can bring it up casually, or casually mention it as a way of saying, “See, I did coffee chats!”

So I think there’s a lot of experience and technique you can draw on in interviews. That includes the fit interview: for why this company, you say “after speaking with XXX company I understand that,” and you really have to mention that. Whether it’s for an MBA, for applying to LBS, or for applying to these firms.

What you most want to get across is: I’ve really talked to your alumni, I’ve talked to people at your firm, and that gave me the most direct insight into your firm. That’s what convinces them why you’re applying to their firm: because you actually looked into it and found that it fits your interests and your future passion. So you need to give some evidence to persuade them.

J: Because I’ve noticed many people’s answers can’t even convince themselves. Then how could you expect that answer to convince the interviewer to spend their money hiring you?

J: Thank you so much, Andrew, for coming on Jason’s Career Folder and sharing about consulting in the UK, including the work itself and, of course, the job search and how to break into consulting. I hope everyone will listen to our next episode too, which covers LinkedIn, studying in the UK, and even how to find internships while studying there, with more general advice. I believe both episodes will help you get more out of this and take a fresh look at where you need to shore up. See you next time, bye!

Management consulting FAQ

What is management consulting?

Management consulting is advisory work that helps companies solve business problems: analyzing the problem and making recommendations, and on some projects helping the client implement them. It splits into strategy, operations, risk, tech and other areas.

What’s the difference between management consulting and strategy consulting?

Andrew’s observation is that strategy consulting projects are short and fast paced, often switching industries every few months. Teams closer to management consulting (such as Big Four consulting practices) have longer cycles, mostly work with long-standing clients, and have a more fixed industry or focus. MBB call themselves management consulting firms, but most of their projects are strategy.

Which three firms make up MBB?

MBB refers to McKinsey, BCG (Boston Consulting Group) and Bain, the industry’s shorthand for the three biggest strategy consulting firms.

What do consulting interviews test?

Mainly the case interview and the fit interview. The case gives you a real business problem and looks at how you structure it, analyze it and communicate; BCG and Bain both say on their websites that there is usually no single right answer. Fit asks why consulting, why this company, and about your leadership and teamwork experience. Most of the interviews Andrew had were Fit plus a 30 to 40 minute case in each session, plus 10 minutes of Q&A.

How many case interviews should you practice?

Andrew uses 15 as the dividing line. For your first 10 to 15 cases, practice only with one or two Case Coaches who are very good at cases, to build your own approach. After 15, switch to more varied and more experienced Case Partners to polish it.

Can you get into consulting without a business background?

Andrew thinks consulting firms generally don’t restrict majors or fields. What his peers have commonly found is that local internship experience matters more in whichever market you’re job hunting in. If you want to join a firm focused on finance, M&A or risk, finance internships and financial modeling skills help.

Do management consultants work long hours?

It depends on the project and your seniority. During his four-month probation, Andrew worked long hours, including weekends. Since going full time he can manage his own schedule more: busy projects may run until 10 or 11 p.m., and between lighter projects he can take time off to recharge.