In this post, I’ll highlight the key steps to take when this happens. Not a fun post – but a necessary one.

The advice applies equally to industries like investment banking

1. Follow-up the rejection and ask for feedback

This is priority numero uno. You’ll typically receive a rejection call after the interview. If the caller is one of your interviewers, politely ask him/her for feedback on your performance. Don’t come across as bitter, upset, or anyway emotional – simply interested in receiving feedback for future improvement. Example questions to ask are:

• “Mark – thanks for the call. Can I get your honest assessment of where I could’ve done better?”
• “Janice – I appreciate the response. It felt to me like I didn’t perform well in summarizing the cases. Were there other areas that were weaknesses?”

If the caller is not one of your interviewers – send an email (another time when business cards come in handy!) to schedule a quick call for post-interview feedback. 8 times out of 10, they’ll agree. The other 2 times, they’ll most likely respond directly to the email with some feedback. Here’s how you should phrase that email:

Hi Yoda, I appreciated the opportunity to interview with you last Thursday. Unfortunately, Danielle at HR just called to inform me that I won’t be receiving an offer. Could I give you a ring to get some post-interview feedback? It would help me in future interviews and to understand how I can improve through this process. Feel free to call me anytime (123-456-7890) or leave a number. Sincerely, George

Short and to the point.

Once you’ve received feedback, take it to heart! Practice will only help for future interviews or next year’s recruiting cycle.

If you don’t make it past the resume stage, don’t ask. It’s rare that they’ll give comments, and if they do it’ll be very generic. Here are some possible criteria for resume rejections

2. Focus on upcoming interviews

If this isn’t your last interview, prepare doubly hard for the next one. No surprise here. Internalize feedback about your shortcomings (”you were unstructured in your approach to the case…you had an insufficient understanding of the underlying business drivers…we didn’t feel that you were a good fit for our company culture”). One of the most common mistakes people make is to practice alone. Do it with another person – it’s 5x more valuable. Ask your family as a last resort.

3. Re-evaluate and broaden your pipeline

Steve Shu is on the mark here when he suggests “casting a wide net”. Applicants suffer from tunnel vision – the whole “Bain or Bust mentality”.

I’ll say it here: getting an offer to any of the top 50 management consulting firms is a major accomplishment

Apply to whatever is available and take interviews even if you wouldn’t accept the offer. Practice is key and options are valuable.

There simply isn’t a consulting firms database comparable to what exists in investment banking. I’m in the midst of building one; until then – Vault has a good starting point here.

As discussed previously, online consulting applications should be a last resort. Networking will be a key differentiator.

4. Explore alternatives such as grad school, finance, and entrepreneurship

Ultimately, you may still be rejected from the industry. But the game’s just started!

There are plenty of other options – ones you should’ve considered from day 1 anyway. If your heart is still set on management and strategy consulting, the best thing you can do is recruit for jobs with the best combination of brand recognition and skill-development. Suggested areas include finance (eg, investment banking and sales & trading) and the corporate track (eg, corporate management and product management). Not a particularly innovative list – but you get my point.

Consider grad school. Particularly if your undergraduate institution is not a “target school” – a top tier grad school can be a solid reset button. Masters programs are shorter and less selective than other alternatives. Important disclaimer – don’t get a masters degree just for recruiting purposes.

Finally, there’s entrepreneurship. I’m clearly a big fan, but startups won’t allow you to break back into consulting unless you consider post-graduate education. There’s no clear network and no channel into management consulting. It is a viable path, however, to venture capital.

5. Network, network, network

Never stop networking. It makes a difference, particularly in tough economic times when there are 10 equally qualified candidates for 2 positions. It comes down to who you know and how well. If you’re in school, network at information sessions, social mixers, business conferences. If you’re out of school, network through school alumni, colleagues past and present, family and friends. Online media (in particular, blogging and forum discussions) can be another great way to meet people with overlapping interests.

6. Prepare for next year

This particularly applies to summer internship applicants. Driving factors for resume rejection include low GPA, lack of leadership experiences and initiative taking, and lack of strong work experience. Work on them however you can. Interview rejection can include factors above, plus lack of preparation.

7. Finally, continue kicking butt in your current role

Don’t slack off. Many complaints that people have about their current jobs are fixable – insufficient responsibility, lack of challenging work, no upward movement. The solution to these topics belongs on another blog, but my advice is to take initiative wherever possible. This applies for current students as well. Your track record of promotions, driving impact, skills learned – will be critical when you try to land consulting jobs!

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UPCOMING POSTS: Why companies employ consultants; The 5 things you can do during school that can guarantee a consulting job offer

I offer resume editing and live interview prep to help people break into management consulting and top business jobs. We’ll prepare you to master the recruiting process, stand out from the 1000’s of other applicants, and land job offers

For now, here’s a roundup of popular reader questions:

For a complete list of reader questions I’ve answered here at MC, visit the FAQ page. Ctrl-F to find what you need

I missed the summer recruiting cycle here at XYZ university. What can I do now?

The short answer is that you’ve missed out on your best shot at consulting internships. Its worthwhile now to initiate contact with your school recruiting office, recruiters at consulting firms that come to campus, etc – and explain your situation in brief with a resume attached.

At the same time, I’d look into alternative summer employment options – while helpful, it’s not mandatory to have a summer consulting internship for fulltime recruiting (there are very few of these to begin with).

What should I do with my Facebook and Myspace accounts? What about my blog?

Be careful when managing these resources. To be safe, remove all sensitive information and embarrassing photos. Even if you great control of privacy settings and your friend list, you never know how recruiters may wind up with potentially damaging information.

As to your blog – it can be a plus to mention that on your resume. At least a small percentage of the time, resume reviewers will visit your site. Make sure the content and site design are high-quality and leave a positive impression on visitors.

I’d be careful with tough-to-substantiate claims on your resume. If you state that you founded a private equity firm in college and a quick Google search for your “Rising Equity” PE fund shows a picture of 4 teenagers on a dumpy-looking website, you’re in trouble.

What�s the difference between first and second round interviews?

First rounds are broad in scope � used as a tool to make sure you reach a general bar in whatever characteristics that firm is looking for � typically some combination of analytics and communication skills. First round cases are straight-forward and cover general concepts (e.g., declining profits, expansion into new markets).

Second rounds are more particular, and focused on two things. One, probing any weaknesses that your first round interview may have shown, and two, ensuring that you�re a good fit in that particular environment/office. That�s part of the reason why first rounds are local (e.g., at your school) and second rounds are on-site (e.g., in the office that wants to hire you). In second rounds, you also meet and interview with more people and typically have contact points across the firm (e.g., with analysts, more seasoned consultants, and partners).

There have been some important changes in my life that I think firms will want to know. How should I update them (if at all)?

This is a popular question. My advice here is to only communicate updates when they are critical to decision-making.

Small GPA increases, school-wide prizes, new leadership positions – not important.

International awards and fellowships, brand-name firm internships – important.

In your update, you must not come across as arrogant. The best way is to send an updated resume to your firm recruiter contact with the following:

“Dear Sir/Madam, I wanted to send you an updated resume for my file. I recently received the Harry Truman Scholarship for public service and wanted that to reflect in my record. Please let me know if you have any questions. Thanks!”

I’m still too young to apply for management consulting jobs but want to get a head start. What types of jobs teach you the skills that will be helpful in consulting?

Anything business-oriented where you can show the following things: ability to manage people and teams; capacity to learn sophisticated concepts; ability to drive measurable impact in your team/group/division. The firm’s brand-equity is important (eg, Goldman Sachs is more valued than Wachovia).

After several years in finance, I’ve decided to transition into consulting. How do I start?

No direct experience here, but the parallel/experienced hire process is similar across professions. It’s best to have “internal champions” – those within your target firm that forward your resume to recruiters internally, write positive recommendations, help get the ball rolling. Headhunters play a role – but less so in management consulting than in private equity/hedge funds. Reach out to your extended network and generate contacts. Talk to peers/colleagues that have made similar transitions. And keep me posted as this is one area I need to understand better and share with readers.

How do you find boutique consulting firms to see if they’re a good fit for you?

Tough question. Unlike investment banking, there is no centralized database of boutique consulting firms. They’re tough to define (since there are countless one-man consulting shops). The
Vault Guide to the Top 50 Management and Strategy Consulting Firms, 2009 Edition is a good start. Google Search is another resource. Finally, there are many forums where you can receive advice (WallStreetOasis Consulting Cabaret and Vault Consulting Message Boards among them). I’ll be writing a short article on good consulting forums soon.

A reader recently posted data on their post-MBA salary/signing bonus offer at a major consulting firm. It’s lower than the data in my salary post so I wanted to share below:

“I accepted an offer this year with a top Consulting Company (post MBA in June) for $115 base, 20% bonus, and $10K signing. Consulting companies are not offering starting packages this year as high as they did the in the past 3 years. I expect to �catch up� in the next few years as times get better.”

Are thank you letters necessary?

While in finance, they can be optional – I’d strongly recommend writing one in consulting. Why? Because decision-making timeframes are typically longer in consulting; consultants have blackberries and continuous access to email; most interviewers appreciate the gesture and at the very least, it’ll keep your name in their minds for longer.

Thanks for reading! If you’re new, here are some recommended posts: The Consulting Industry 101; Investment Banking vs Management Consulting; Day in the life of a Management Consultant; Overview of the recruiting process; The Management Consulting Dictionary

UPCOMING POSTS: Life as a Consultant: Interview with Steve Shu; Great forums and other online resources for current and aspiring consultants; You were turned down. Now what?

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I offer resume editing and live interview prep to help people break into management consulting and top business jobs. We’ll prepare you to master the recruiting process, stand out from the 1000’s of other applicants, and land job offers

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• Participate. Comment on posts, email me with questions, insights, feedback, etc

I’d like to thank Mergers and Inquisitions for their kind word. Brian, the author of the site, is a good friend of mine and was the role model for the launch of MC. If you’re serious about finance (and broader recruiting issues), check out his site. I’ll be writing an in-depth post about the projects he’s working on in coming weeks, and hopefully we’ll have a few joint ventures in the works as well

This post will be short. I’m following it up with a post on “Getting a consulting job from a law background” so stay tuned.

There are many valuable consulting-related resources on the web. I want to point out a few:

• From the Killer Consultant – “You got the offer, now what?” – some great tips on how to assess the offer and manage the process
• From the Corporate Whore – “Summer Intern Rules – Don’ts” – a few funny but informative tips for prospective (and current) summers
• Razume – a new resume review service. Interesting concept but not sure how they incentivize reviewers. Thought I’d pass it along – if anyone tries the service (it’s free), let me know your experience!
• From Steve Shu’s blog – “Client Facilitation Skills” – I’ve followed Steve’s blog for sometime now. He writes infrequently, but his posts are always insightful and provide more detail than any other blog I’ve seen on the consulting life

I’m starting a series of interviews with current and prior consultants. This will be great for readers because they’ll get an inside view of topics ranging from what it’s like to work in international offices to cultures of specific firms (eg, Bain, Oliver Wyman) to what ex-consultants are doing now

If any of my readers are interested in being interviewed for Management Consulted, please let me know!

Thanks for reading! For more background info and if you’re new to Management Consulted, here are some recommended posts: Management Consulting and the Consulting Industry 101; Investment Banking vs Management Consulting; Day in the life of a Management Consultant; Overview of the management consulting recruiting process

Subscribe to my RSS feed here to learn more about management consulting jobs.

I offer resume editing and interview prep. I’ll help you stand out from 1000’s of other applicants and land consulting jobs

The recruiting process

Similar to the fulltime process. Summer recruiting typically begins in January/February at college campuses for undergraduate and MBA. Expect a standard succession of information sessions/mixers/company presentations, then resume and cover letter screens, then multiple rounds of interviews focused on fit/personality and case studies.

The process may be less rigorous than fulltime (eg, one fewer interview round, less challenging case studies) but the competition is equally tough

What if consulting firms don’t recruit for summer interns at your school

I plan to write a full post on this later as its a common concern. You have 3 options:

• Find contacts at target firms through your school’s alumni database. Get in touch with them to learn more about their firm and express interest in working there
• Find contacts at target firms through your school’s career center/career development office. This is typically alumni-based as well, but the career officers may have additional resources (eg, headhunter/recruiter databases)
• Submit resumes and cover letters through each company’s online application process – not all firms have these. Big ones like McKinsey and Accenture definitely well, but you may need to get creative with smaller ones like Katzenbach and LEK

In this situation, your best bet is to network, network, network. Friends, family, university alumni, try to build connections to your target firms and dialogue with those people. That’s the best chance you’ll have of recruiters and HR taking a serious look at your resume

Further reading: What if consulting firms don’t recruit at your school

The goal of summer internships

To receive a fulltime offer! Everything you do over the summer should be geared towards helping you reach this goal. In the process, you’ll learn plenty about the job itself and even if you decide management consulting is not for you, options never hurt.

The standard summer internship structure

You’re assigned to one project that should occupy your entire summer (ranging from 10-14 weeks). There is a very short training period (1-2 days) after which you’re expected to function like a regular consultant – complete with your own workstream and deliverables.

You’ll have several “managers” – someone junior (such as an early analyst or early associate) as well as the standard team leader/engagement manager. There will be an endless stream of social events – designed to help you network with the rest of the office and the fellow “summers“.

How to ensure a return/full-time offer

• Do your work well. This is an absolute must. Doing your work well comes down to three things: #1, understanding directions and clarifying when you don’t; #2, checking and double-checking and triple-checking your work; #3, expressing your opinions often. Participation is critical to a consultant’s job, and if you don’t speak up, you won’t move up
• Network, network, network. The more senior consultants that you meet at the firm, the better your chances of receiving a fulltime offer. Strike up conversations based on shared backgrounds, career goals, personal hobbies, whatever!
• Build a strong relationship with your team leader/engagement manager. They have the biggest influence on your return offer prospects. Create one-on-one time with your manager – setup weekly coffee times to discuss your work, get advice about the job, and so forth
• Ask for continual feedback. This is a great way to not only improve your business skills, but to build rapport with your colleagues and managers
• Impress the lead partners. There are usually several partners who are closely involved with your project and client. Through the summer, you’ll have opportunities to get in front of them – whether that’s presenting a small piece of your work, or chiming in during brainstorming and team sessions. Capture these opportunities – the sooner they know your name and the more times that you impress them, the better your chances of landing that valuable offer

Further reading: 6 secrets for summer interns to secure a return offer

Stay connected:

I offer resume editing and interview prep. I’ll help you stand out from 1000’s of other applicants and land consulting jobs

This is post #1 of my series on recruiting. Below, I’ll touch upon the main components of the consulting job search and what I believe are the key do’s and key don’ts. Feel free to post comments below or email me with any questions and followups. I want to thank my readers for making these first 2 weeks of blogging a very interesting time – blogging is a 2-way street where the writer learns as much as the readers.

I’ve also lined up my first “personalized consultations” (for one college student preparing for summer internships and one recent grad interested in switching industries) and will be posting updates on how these sessions go in the coming weeks

Now, on to RECRUITING. The key components are:

Note that each of these sections is worth a long post alone (similar to my first post, Management Consulting and the Consulting Industry 101). This is a Cliff Notes version for now

#1 Company presentations/mixers/information sessions

Far more common if you’re currently in school (undergraduate, MBA) where consulting firms ranging from Boston Consulting Group to Mercer HR to Kurt Salmon will swarm campuses, giving presentations, holding social mixers, etc in an effort to publicize their firm and identify “high-potential” candidates. Handling a company presentation is like, as a quick sports analogy, being the heavy favorite as a nationally ranked, Division 1 team in a game against an unranked, Division 2 team. In other words – there are 10,000 ways you can mess up, but very few ways to truly beat expectations.

Key Dos:
-dress sharp (refer to my Interview Tips page, tip #2)
-meet at least 3-4 consultants/recruiters present, ask for their business card, and FOLLOW-UP to ask for advice/interview tips

Key Don’ts:
-spend the entire time talking to your friends
-spend the entire time by the snack bar
-hand your resume to recruiters or consultants unless SPECIFICALLY ASKED
-ask 50 questions – people remember the ANNOYING APPLICANTS

#2 Application – resume + cover letter

This is where the wheat begins to be separated from the chaff. At this point, you’ve decided management consulting is a potential career path for you. You may not be 100% sold over other options (eg banking, accounting, corporate, etc) but are interested enough to invest significant time. There are many variations of how this process works: if you’re currently enrolled in school, there are typically resume submission periods followed by a selection process to determine who receives interviews. If you’re not in school (or your target firms do not recruit at your school), it typically means submitting your resume through internal friends, HR and recruiting contacts, or even in-person at job/career fairs and waiting indefinitely to hear back. Either way, a top notch resume will ALWAYS STAND OUT. Cover letters, on the other hand, present significantly more room for error and have limited upside.

Key Dos:
-build a consulting-ready resume (refer to my Resume Tips page)
-make sure you have the RIGHT FIRM, ADDRESS, ETC on your cover letter
-follow-up with recruiters if you haven’t received confirmation upon submission
-let contacts within firms know that you have applied – they can send a positive recommendation to recruiters if they are inclined to do so

Key Don’ts:
-send more than 1 email asking about the status of your application
-have more than 1 page for either your cover letter or your resume
-send additional materials (eg, portfolio work, letters of reference) unless SPECIFICALLY ASKED

At some point you may need to narrow your scope – I recommend submitting resumes/cover letters to as many firms as possible, but if you’re lucky enough to receive tens of interviews you should really consider which firms are best for you so you can focus on the ones that matter. This post on global management consulting firms versus boutique firms may help

#3 Interview (phone)

Self-explanatory. Phone interviews are usually fit-oriented, and if done are either because #1, the firm doesn’t have enough resources to immediately hold in-person interviews or #2, you’re a “borderline case” and they need additional information about you and your background to decide. The approach with phone interviews should be to focus on answer quality, and less on building interviewer rapport given the difficulties of doing that over the phone. Cover the bases below and you’ll do fine.

Note that not all consulting firms will have phone interviews. Some may skip directly to in-person interviews. Some may have several phone interviews before any in-person meetings

Key Dos:
-place the call in a QUIET AREA WITH GOOD RECEPTION, preferably a land-line
-ask for time if you need to collect your thoughts – but don’t take longer than 30 seconds
-have a notepad handy for technical questions
-ask for their email address to send a THANK YOU NOTE/FOLLOW-UP EMAIL

Key Don’ts:
-conduct the phone interview while on a train from Lumsford, New Mexico to El Paso, Texas
-be too casual – its easier to make this mistake on the phone – remember that it is a JOB INTERVIEW. No excessive laughing. Keep discussion of personal matters to a bare minimum unless directly asked

#4 Interview (in-person)

Also self-explanatory. If you’ve made it here, congratulations! They clearly think highly of what you’ve accomplished and now want to know you as a person – your communication skills, your on-the-spot thinking and analytical abilities, your presence and personality. This is truly the most difficult part, as I can guarantee that at this point you’re up against some very qualified candidates. To stand out, the keys in management consulting interviews are to really ACE THE CASE, have well-rehearsed but NATURAL RESPONSES to non-case questions, and be well-informed about current business news. Sounds simple, but takes many many many hours of solid preparation to make this happen.

There are two components to interviews (both phone and in-person) – the case study, and the fit/behavioral questions. I will dedicate separate posts to each, but the important thing to know is that the case study accounts for at least 50% (and usually more) of your final “score” in determining whether you get an offer

Key Dos:
-everything I wrote on my Interview Tips page

Key Don’ts:
-forgetting everything I wrote on my Interview Tips page

#5 The Waiting Period

Like #1 Company Presentations, there’s not much upside but you can do a lot to ruin your prospects. Be patient and focus on other priorities – and NEVER STOP LOOKING FOR OTHER JOBS.

Key Dos:
-wait patiently and if you have upcoming interviews, prepare for those
-if you have no response after 1 week of the “final interview”, send an email to the recruiter asking if they need anything more from you regarding your application; CC one or two consultants you interviewed with or talked to extensively in the process

Key Don’ts:
-assume you have an offer and stop the job search process
-send an email a day to recruiters/consultants at the firm inquiring about your status

#6 The Offer!

CONGRATULATIONS! You’ve done it. It’s extremely difficult to receive offers from management consulting firms – their scale is simply an order of magnitude smaller than financial service firms (as an example, McKinsey’s New York office, one of their largest, occupies about 10-15 floors of one skyscraper. Goldman Sachs in New York has 3 skyscrapers all to itself). Now is time for thorough due diligence and diplomatic negotiation if necessary regarding final terms, start date, etc. Again, congratulations on a job well-done and welcome to the challenging and wonderful world of strategy and management consulting.

Key Dos:
-thank them nicely for the offer
-send an email to firm contacts that you’ve met through the application process and thank them/notify them as well. Setup time to discuss the offer and ask questions of them
-gather as much information as you can from current and former employees, friends, books, etc
-ask your primary HR contact with any “administrative questions” eg salary, benefits, etc

Key Don’ts:
-accept the offer immediately unless you are 100% sure that’s the job for you
-ask non-HR contacts any “administrative questions” unless you know them well
-immediately negotiate details of your offer without fully informing yourself first. And as a general rule of thumb, don’t negotiate anything that won’t SIGNIFICANTLY change your decision or satisfaction in the job

Thanks for reading! For more background info and if you’re just starting to read my blog, here are some recommended posts: Management Consulting and the Consulting Industry 101; Investment Banking vs Management Consulting; Day in the life of a Management Consultant

UPCOMING POSTS: Perspectives on the Big 3 (McKinsey, Bain, Boston Consulting Group); Additional resources about management consulting

Like what you’re reading? Subscribe to my RSS feed here to learn more about management consulting jobs.

I offer resume editing and live interview prep to help people break into management consulting and top business jobs. We’ll prepare you to master the recruiting process, stand out from the 1000’s of other applicants, and land job offers