What Actually Got Them the MBB and Big 4 Offers

Transcript

Today you're hearing from five candidates who just landed consulting offers at McKinsey, Bain, BCG, Deloitte, and L.E.K. Consulting. There's no textbook cookie cutter advice, just what really moved the needle and made the difference for them.

If you want that kind of support going into your own prep, book a free 15 minute call with Katie at the link in the show notes. She'll tell you where you stand and whether coaching is the right fit for you. Let's get into it.

So a lot of pitfalls in the consulting recruiting process. And today we've got with us Mark Di Giorgio, who has seen a lot of those pitfalls. Mark, I'm sure you didn't make any when you were recruiting yourself, but I think you've seen other people make some. And you're here to moderate the panel today.

So Mark, I'm going to turn it over to you for an introduction, and then I will set the agenda and then we'll dive into the conversation. But for now, we'd just love to hear a little bit about you.

Mark's Introduction

Yeah, for sure. Thanks, Japheth. So just to clarify, many pitfalls I had. No one is perfect, trust me, but that should be encouraging to everyone here because you're not going to make it unless you have your fair share of pitfalls. So great to meet everyone on the line here.

My name is Mark. As you can see, I'm a coach with Management Consulted. I'm also an ex-McKinsey consultant. So I started my career at McKinsey straight out of undergrad. I went to business school and a couple of months after graduating, I started as a business analyst in the Toronto office at McKinsey. I worked there for about two and a half years and while I was there, I did what they call a random walk. So I worked across different industries and business problems, but specialized mostly in financial services.

After my two and a half year mark, I decided it was time for me to exit. So I now work at a large asset management firm in Toronto in a strategy role. And in addition to that, I like to spend my time coaching. I love it even more than my full-time job. So I'm excited today to chat with a bunch of successful previous coaching candidates who've now made it to the big leagues and can share all of their own stories and excitement for what they're about to experience.

Love it. Cool. Thanks, Mark. Glad to have you with us today.

That was great and true. So yeah, we're going to dive right in to some questions that we've curated just to tease out insights from each of these panelists, their journeys to an offer. We will have some live Q&A. So for those of you who have submitted questions ahead of time, we will answer those. So stick around to the end. We'll leave some time for that where you can ask your question directly to Mark and to today's panel. So Mark, I'm going to turn it over to you. Let's go.

Panelist Introductions

Okay. Awesome. Well, you guys didn't come to hear from me today. You came to hear from our excellent panel of successful applicants here. So I want to just start off by giving everyone on the line a chance to introduce themselves. So we'll go around the room here and for each of you, I'd love for you to just share with the group your name, the firm that you received an offer from, and the specific role as well. We'll go alphabetically here, so we'll start with Aisha, then Arav, Hunter, Maya, and Neely.

Hi, my name is Aisha Adedayo. I accepted an offer from Boston Consulting Group and I accepted for the role of associate as an experienced hire.

Hi everyone, my name is Arav Saksena. I'm currently a sophomore at the University of Chicago, but I just accepted a summer internship offer at McKinsey next summer.

Hi everyone, my name is Hunter Whitney. I'm a rising senior at Indiana University, working at Deloitte this summer, specifically as a data analytics intern for mergers and acquisitions.

Hi everyone, my name is Maya. I'm currently a rising senior at the University of Florida. This summer I'll be interning at Bain out of the Atlanta office.

Hi everyone, my name is Neely. I will be starting with L.E.K. as a senior associate in the Boston office.

Awesome, thanks everyone and great to meet you all.

Backgrounds and Recruiting Journeys

Before we get into the fun questions here, one more kind of logistics question just so everyone gets a good sense of your background. I'd love if you could each share just another quick minute overview of your educational and recruiting background. So if we could just go around the room here, share your educational background, whether it was undergrad, MBA, PhD, or if you were an experienced hire, the number of years under your belt. And then your recruiting journey. So all the firms you applied to, who you interviewed with, if you received offers from multiple firms, share that as well. And then of course, we know which ones you accepted.

But yeah, we'll go opposite to alphabetical order, reverse alphabetical order. So let's start with you, Neely.

Yeah, happy to. So I went to Penn. I got a degree in economics, a concentration in management, and I also got a certificate in Chinese. I graduated in 2023. And when I was at undergrad, lots of my classmates were recruiting for consulting, but I heard these horror stories of some of the case interviews. You know, you have to estimate the number of golf balls that fell on an airplane, you can't write anything down, all the math has to be done entirely in your head, and kind of this misrepresentation maybe of what a case interview is. And I was very turned off by that. So I went into investment banking and I was in investment banking for about a year and a half. And I was actually able to work alongside consultants. I was able to work with them on some of our buy side projects. And I found their work to be really interesting. And that's kind of what attracted me to consulting and more strategy work. And I decided to leave my job in investment banking so I could make the pivot and I could learn to case and I could really pursue my dream and enter consulting.

And so I interviewed with Bain, BCG, and L.E.K. and then I chose L.E.K. for the role.

Awesome. Thanks, Neely. Maya, onto you.

Yeah, awesome. So I am a rising senior, as I said, at the University of Florida, a non-target school. I actually started off as a pre-law student. So I'm studying economics and math. Had no idea what consulting was until I joined a consulting organization on campus. And that's when I heard about MBB, Big Four, what management consulting really is. And I got interested as a sophomore, but still had no idea about how to network, case, none of that. I just ended up applying to McKinsey for the SSBA program, somehow got the interview and started casing the day I found out about the interview. Absolutely botched it. But I think going through that entire process, obviously learning more about consulting and actually going to the DC office for my final round, I just learned so much more about the role, the industry, and I knew that it was something I wanted to pursue.

And so for my junior summer, I really focused on casing and I got more exposure to other companies. I ended up doing the sophomore women's program at Bain called the Crew program, which I can go into more detail later, but that was a two-day event at the office, gave me so much exposure to the firm, absolutely fell in love with their culture. Bain was on the top of my list and I cased for two and a half months and Bain was the first company I interviewed with. So as soon as I got that offer, I shut down my other interviews.

But on my list were other consulting firms, other Big Four firms, and even other business roles within banking firms, which was something that was interesting to me. So anything on the business and strategy side was what I was looking for. But yeah, that was essentially my journey and I'm happy to share more insights as we continue.

All right, thank you. Hunter.

Yeah, absolutely. So I'm a rising senior at Indiana University studying finance and business analytics specifically. I started getting interested in consulting kind of my sophomore year and was just kind of looking for either financial services or consulting in general. I interviewed with Deloitte, a few other Big Four firms, Bain, as well as a few financial services firms such as Craw, BlackRock, and Capital One. I ended up choosing Deloitte because I kind of wanted some deal exposure, and so I thought that sounded really interesting.

Kind of getting into it, I got involved with some organizations on campus, and that's kind of how I started to case and started to learn how to go through the interview process, as well as we had some great career service coaches available within our school itself, which was super helpful. It just kind of led us along the way. So it was a good process overall and I hope I can be helpful.

Well, thank you. Arav.

Yeah. So like I mentioned, I'm a current sophomore, rising junior at the University of Chicago. I'm studying economics and data science. I used to be math, wanted to do quant financial services and then went through the whole recruiting process. I was lucky enough to get an offer, but consulting obviously moved up their timeline so much that I went through the process and I honestly fell in love with preparing for it, which is kind of sadistic in a weird way. But because of that, I applied to McKinsey first and I got lucky enough to get an offer. I'd applied to also BCG and Bain, but the interviews were like a week after my finals at McKinsey, so I never went through that process.

In terms of on-campus involvement and my exposure to consulting, my entire family, it's a joke, was in consulting at some point in their career, so in a weird way I was kind of pressured into this, but I love it now, so it's great. But I hope to be a help for everyone watching.

Well, that's a good one. And Aisha, off to you.

So I studied education and business at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. I actually started off my college career in the business school on the pre-med track, realized I didn't want to be a doctor, so then I dropped to kind of focusing on business, strategic management specifically, and then kind of halfway through my college career, I realized that I had this unique opportunity to be able to study and take whatever classes I want that I'm interested in, really dive into the humanities and social sciences that I most likely won't get again. And so I decided to switch my major once more to educational studies to really understand social systems, education policy, and things like that.

And so during my two years in the business school, I recruited for consulting. I went through the whole process, recruited for Bain, BCG, and McKinsey, as well as Deloitte, and then some education consulting firms as well, like Education Resource Strategies. And I got a final round, I made it all the way to the final round with BCG, but I did not get an offer that summer. That was for the internship.

So at that point I was like, okay, maybe consulting is not for me. Maybe I should just really focus on this education thing. So I ended up applying for Teach for America, looking into teaching, and things like that.

But I graduated, and I also served six years in the U.S. Army. And so that's where kind of my experienced hire route comes from. So this past year, I just completed my six years of service, completed my service obligation. And so as I'm transitioning into my civilian career, I decided to try again with BCG. I really fell in love with the firm and the people that I met there. I was able to network. I spoke with so many people that summer, I think I spoke to almost 30 people at different BCG offices. And so I decided, why not? Let me try it again. I really loved it. This second time around, I did put all my eggs in one basket, which I wouldn't recommend, but I thought that I had a really good chance with BCG, especially because I made it so far. And so I only applied to BCG while also applying for other opportunities in the education space. And I got the offer. So I will be starting in the Houston office specifically. And I'm more than happy to answer some more questions about my non-traditional journey.

Wow, that's incredible. Very inspirational. I think the thing that everyone should have realized through all these panelists' backgrounds is consulting is full of such diverse individuals. And there's not one track that everyone starts on to end up in the consulting world. And there's not one track that everyone ends up in after leaving the consulting world. So it's full of super smart, super interesting individuals. And I think the five of you are attesting to that.

Building Your Firm List

So let's jump into some of the more detailed questions here. So in your backgrounds, a lot of you mentioned or alluded to target firms and firms you kind of had your eyes on in the recruitment process. So can you just share with the group here how you might have built those lists? If there were any personal or specific reasons why you made the lists that you did. And for this question, we'll start with Aisha, then I want to hear from Arav and Hunter.

So as I kind of alluded to, I've always been very interested in social impact and BCG is one of the firms that's known for their social impact work. They also do some work within the education space. And so that's how I originally became interested in BCG. And I was in Phi Gamma Nu, which is a business professional fraternity at my university. And a lot of people in my fraternity ended up going to BCG or Bain. And so that's how I kind of got that initial exposure.

But I did apply to other firms. I wouldn't say I had a target list per se. I kind of had my eyes set on BCG, but I also applied to other firms. So I wouldn't again put my eggs all in one basket that first time around, but the second time around I ended up doing that because I knew I'm really interested in consulting, but I'm also interested in other things. And so I felt that it would be good to kind of cast a wide net, not only in terms of consulting firms, but also other types of opportunities.

Yeah, mine is sort of different than that. I too was also really looking at the social impact side of things. And so BCG and McKinsey kind of popped up immediately for the same reasons that Aisha mentioned. But additionally to that, sort of like my college application experience, I just applied to as many as possible. And so my list comprised of sort of MBB, Big Four, but also Accenture, Parthenon, and those. And then I kind of whittled it down through conversations that I had. So consulting and networking isn't as important as it was for banking for me. And so I sort of typically did that. But through the conversations that I had, I whittled down my list really primarily to McKinsey and BCG. I kind of went really hard on those two. And luckily, looking at it, it worked out.

My strategy was also a little bit different. I tried to create a diverse list between the type of services available, like somewhere more financial services like wealth management, for example, some more traditional strategy consulting, and so forth. But for me, a lot of it was on campus, talking to the recruiters that come to campus and trying to get a sense of the firm's culture, what they do, and grab maybe two or three firms in each of the areas I was interested in, and then try and meet people from those areas. And that's kind of how I made my list.

I think, yeah, that's a great point. And I think, again, another thing that you all kind of alluded to there is this point around networking, right? Meeting people from the firm, establishing those connections. I remember when I was recruiting myself too, I aimed to have like two to three good connections for the firms that I really had an eye on. And it's great to hear that that was part of your success stories as well.

Networking Deep Dive

Just, you know, maybe if we deep dive a little bit on that networking piece. So everyone always throws this networking word around, right? Network, network, network. And it is true that it is so important to your success. And I want to understand from the group here, and maybe Neely and Maya, I'd love to get your thoughts on this. How big of a role did networking play in your success? So kind of walk the group through where you started, if it was from nothing and you had no relationships, even better. Where you started and how many people you reached out to, what the outcomes were, how strong and personal those relationships felt. I'd love for both of you to share your thoughts on that. And maybe Neely, we can start with you.

Yeah, that sounds great. So I did network and I kind of started using my personal mentors. I had professional mentors and they had connected me to several individuals who worked at firms on my target list. So I did that initially. I also did a combination of cold outreach. I prioritized looking at graduates from Penn as well, or those who had a similar academic background to me. And I would say just a piece of advice is try to make it not as transactional as possible and just show a real interest in the person and their experience at the firm. And just know even if you don't work with that firm, you can still learn things from this person about their career and the experience that they've gained, and just try to enjoy that process.

And I will say, I think I reached out to maybe 15 to 20 people, I probably had live calls with maybe eight or so. And going into it, just knowing whenever you have calls, sometimes they're great, sometimes they're kind of average. But maybe every third call I would have a conversation where that person would become an advocate for me. So they would want to introduce me to a recruiter or to someone else that was hiring, or they may offer to case with you. So just having those kind of expectations, don't think that every phone call you have is going to be absolutely amazing and things are really going to change for you, but enjoy building the relationships, learning from their career, with the hope that every few calls you will find someone that really connects.

Yeah, that's great. Totally agree. Super helpful advice. Maya, you're up.

Yeah, everything Neely said I echo. And I think to add on to that, one thing I learned through my entire recruiting journey, which spanned two years counting sophomore year as well. And I think for me, networking was always very intimidating. I was always scared of the word. I thought I was the worst at it. Didn't know how my other friends were getting multiple calls and long conversations. I wasn't able to do that initially. But I think for me, what I learned is that the most meaningful conversations I've had were about their life outside of work or more meaningful experiences that they've had.

Like, I had a conversation with someone about how Bain has been a part of their journey through a lot of their different phases of life, whether that's getting married or having children and how the company's been by their side. And that really stuck with me and spoke a lot about the company's culture, which I then brought into my interviews as well.

And so I think everybody loves to talk about their families, their hobbies, and also the kind of work that they're really passionate about. And so giving them that avenue to do so, I think really takes the conversation to the next level. And I learned a lot about that. And I think it's also really important to keep track of everybody you're talking to. And if that's an Excel sheet or some kind of list or you're just taking notes, it's very crucial. Because one of the partners that I ended up connecting with during my sophomore summit, she was one of the people who interviewed me for my Bain final round, and I brought in specific things that she had mentioned. And she was very happy that we could continue that conversation and she remembered me as well.

And I think that's something that I really want to echo. It's really important to come with meaningful questions and also just really remember the conversations that you have.

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Interview Prep: How Early Did You Start?

Of course. That's great. I think the one thing you both mentioned there is being genuine, right? Being yourself and establishing those personal connections. It's so important, even in the interviews themselves. That's what makes you memorable to people, especially when they're meeting so many people every day. There are so many copy-paste candidates that these consultants are seeing. And being that personal connection that they make is what makes you stand out.

Well, let's shift a little bit now from things you can do to get the interview to how you actually prepare for the interview. And this can be quite daunting. Maya, you mentioned it was a two-year process for you alone. So I want to hear from Arav and Hunter on this one. And my question here related to interview prep is how early did you actually start? So try to give a specific answer here in number of months, number of weeks, if you were that brave. And what that preparation actually looked like. Maybe Arav, we can start with you.

Yeah, so this is going to be probably terrible advice, but I applied to McKinsey right as it came out, probably in March sometime. I got the first round probably about a month later and then I started prepping that day and my interview was a week later. I luckily sort of had this behavioral prep going for me because of my banking and other experiences. So the PEIs, which is sort of their behavioral component, came relatively naturally to me because I had so many of the stories written out and ready to go. So it was sort of just a retrofitting of it.

The cases though, I'm really glad that I had no midterms during that time because that was all that I did for that week. One of my roommates, one of my best friends from high school who I live with now, he got the offer at the same time as me, so it was great to have that sort of buddy to work with. Initially though, I started by going through every website, every YouTube video I could find, from Management Consulted to Case in Point, whatever I could get my hands on. I was trying to read, read, read, and then I completely pivoted to live conversations. And sort of going back, I forget who made the point, but the networking piece really allowed me to connect with current BAs at McKinsey, who then prepped me a lot, and those sort of live case preps were extremely helpful, really breaking down exactly what I should be expecting. And then when I went to the final round, I sort of focused more on polishing the PEIs first.

Wow. Like I said, brave. That's pretty impressive. Okay. Hunter.

Yes, mine was not quite that last minute. But I would say about a month and a half ahead of time was more so when I started casing fairly heavily. I had done some off and on over the summer coming into my junior year, but then starting again, probably September, I think, was about the time, if I remember correctly. I tried to do close to a case a day. And I started by also reading Case in Point and using Management Consulted sources, but then I just kind of switched it up as well. Having my roommate just give me one, because the in-person conversations were much more helpful. And then after getting through first round to going to final round, much like what was shared, it's about polishing and also kind of trying to make it personalized and show some personality.

Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it's all about reps. And wherever your starting point is, if it's from scratch and you have no idea what cases are, spending that time to learn a little bit about what the structure looks like and what the flow feels like is helpful. But even after that, just going through one case after another is what really makes the difference there.

How Many Cases Did You Do?

If we just stick on this preparation piece a little bit more, a more specific question here. I'd love to know, maybe Aisha and Neely, I'll turn to you on this one. How many cases did you guys complete? So I want to know this from a solo standpoint, how many you did on your own before kind of engaging a partner. And then after that, how many you did with a partner leading up to your interviews. Maybe Aisha, we could start with you.

Yeah, definitely. I think I'll break this up by both recruiting rounds because I recruited, like I mentioned, my sophomore year and then I recruited again recently, post-grad.

But I think the first time around, my focus was very much on quantity. And so I did nearly 50 cases that summer. I had the whole summer to prepare for the internship round and I did about 10 cases on my own, just kind of getting a feel for it. I would watch live cases on YouTube and just kind of follow along. And then the remaining about 40 cases were either with a case buddy who was another student at my university that we were both casing together and preparing together, or I would be lucky enough to snag a mock case with somebody currently at the firm. And I think those were the best and most fruitful cases because they were able to give high quality feedback.

But this second time around, I approached it a lot differently, where I was focused more on quality. So I only did about 25 cases the second time around, but all of the cases I did were with somebody currently at the firm. And I noticed a huge difference in my case performance, because the feedback was high quality and it was very tailored. I cased either with somebody at the firm or with a coach. My coach was Raghav. And I think having Raghav see the trajectory of my improvement throughout, he was able to give very tailored feedback. And so that's what I would recommend.

I hear a lot about people saying you have to do 50 cases, 40 cases to get an offer. I don't believe that's the case. I think focusing on quality and being very specific about what areas you need to improve on is what matters. For me, it was math. I'm not very strong when it came to math. So between cases, I would do math drills, and I'd drill on frameworks as well. So then when it came time for my next mock case, I was coming in with very specific areas that I wanted to focus on and improve on. And I think that made a huge difference in getting the offer that second time around.

Yeah, for sure. Totally agree. Great point. Neely.

Yeah, so I did not do many solo cases. I read through a few cases before I did the live practice. In total, I did probably 45 to 50 live cases. And I will say there is this pressure of like, oh, I don't want to schedule a session with a friend or a peer when I don't feel prepared. And I would just say ignore that and start doing it as early as you can and just realize they're figuring this out as well. And it's better to do it early if you have that kind of optionality.

And then I will say too, one thing that's not really talked about, but there is such a thing as case fatigue. So whenever I was past my 40th case, I just started to get a little flat in some of my practices. I wasn't as excited or enthusiastic because this was like the third M&A case that I've done today. And so I would just say be really mindful of that and don't burn yourself out before the interviews because the interviewer can tell if this person is excited or not. And I think that's one of the undersold qualities that they really look for. Is this person really enjoying the case? Do they seem stressed or disinterested?

And I think too, someone had mentioned it earlier, just notice as you're doing all the cases, do you really enjoy this? I love the process and I found each case really interesting. But if you don't and you're dreading the casing, consider that strongly, maybe as indicative that you wouldn't be happy in the job. But yeah, that was my strategy. And I also worked with a coach. I worked with Abi Chen, and she was absolutely fantastic. And I really enjoyed that.

Best Prep Resources

Awesome. Well, I'm glad you guys both shared some of the resources that you used to prep there. Perfect segue to my next question. So Maya and Arav, I'll turn to you guys again here. What would you say were the two most valuable resources that you relied on through your prep, whether it was coaches or online videos, watching people case, whatever it was, what those were for you and how they specifically helped you succeed. And if it was a coach, if there were any key insights that really stood out for you, that'd be great. So Maya, maybe we could start with you.

Yeah, of course. So I think my first big resource was ChatGPT. I used it a lot for my framework practice or anything qualitative. When I was recruiting for Bain, they focus a lot on organization structure of your framework, but also depth when it comes to brainstorming. And I was really struggling in those areas. So what I would do is I would do more of this isolated prep where I would copy a case from a book and ask ChatGPT to give me similar difficulty prompts from various industries and various types of cases. So every day in an hour, I was doing five frameworks in the morning. And so by the end of the week, I was getting a lot of framework practice. And just from week one to week two, I saw significant improvement. And so I used this same method for the brainstorming practice as well and saw huge improvement.

And I would actually use the mic feature to say my framework out loud and I would ask ChatGPT to grade me as if it were an MBB style interviewer on content, articulation, and delivery. And I was able to work on my timing significantly as well. So huge, huge help.

When it came to my math and my quant, Management Consulted has the drills with percentages and multiplication and division when there's a lot of zeros, things like that. So when I really practiced for one week on just making sure I wasn't making those silly mistakes with the zeros and doing quick arithmetic, that was a big game changer for me.

Awesome. Love it. Arav.

Yeah, first and foremost, like a lot of people mentioned, my coach. I used Rick Wilmot, who was extremely helpful. And I think the biggest piece of advice he gave me, which I think Neely also brought up, was this idea of if you enjoy the case, do it a couple of times, but don't do it too much. You'll get to this point where you hit diminishing returns and after that you stop being creative, you become super robotic, and you sort of lose the curiosity for the cases that you should have when you go into it. Which kind of fed my habits of not doing a lot of cases and not a lot of prep, but I definitely think that rings true for a lot of people.

And my second resource, which is kind of atypical, was honestly giving cases to people. It helped me more than doing them after a certain point. It was helpful to see it from the interviewer side, reading through the McKinsey rubric and then giving structured feedback. It allowed me to both reflect on their work product but also my own. And they would obviously have these amazing solutions that I would never have thought of and then I could apply that later on. And so doing the other side of the work was also very helpful to me.

Yeah, nice. A coach always knows how to play a sport. Nice.

Biggest Misconceptions and Final Advice

Okay, cool. Well, thanks so much. That was very helpful. I want to bring this all together now with all five of you for one final question before we start to wrap up here. And this is my favorite question to ask people all the time because it's definitely going to be unique to each person. And it's kind of a two part question. What is the main misconception you had about the entire consulting recruitment process going in? And the second part, the single largest piece of advice you want to give to all the candidates in this room right now. And for this question, we'll go Hunter, Maya, Aisha, Neely, and Arav. So Hunter, let's start with you.

Yeah, absolutely. I would say the biggest misconception I had was I had a bunch of friends who were all recruiting for consulting and we were all practicing together. We all had this idea that there's this certain thing inside the box that they're looking for, like they're looking for a specific candidate with certain criteria. When in reality, when we all went through the process, it kind of seems more so that they actually want the outside the box thinker. They want the creative person, they want the person who can brainstorm deeply. And so that was kind of an interesting thing to see and learn. So be creative was kind of the takeaway, and also be unique.

Yeah, for my biggest misconception, I would say obviously the case is a pretty big part of the interview, but it is not the only component. The lasting impression I think is super important. And I learned a lot about asking the right questions when you have those two minutes at the end and your interviewer is asking you, do you have anything to ask me? Those two minutes are your two minutes. And coming up with the right questions, being prepared, really gives a good lasting impression if you've done your work. And so that goes with not just the questions you ask, but also just networking in general. Being authentic and coming prepared with the right questions is a very big part of the interview process as well, especially with the behaviorals.

And for my one tip, I would say there is no cookie cutter applicant. I think I come from a very different background. I grew up in an international boarding school in India and my entire resume was geared towards a career in law or going into law school. And so I had very unique experiences. I was very passionate about the education reform space. And I talked a lot about that during my interviews. And the only thing I really had was being part of a consulting club. I had nothing else within the business school. And I thought that was going to work against my favor, but I ended up getting the interview and gratefully getting the offer. And so I would say just be authentic, be yourself, and whatever experiences you have in college, make the most out of them, but also pursue whatever you're passionate about because that will shine through during your recruiting journey.

Awesome.

I definitely echo everything that Maya said. I also want to emphasize the importance of being yourself in the interview. I think my biggest misconception going in was thinking that I had to present myself as this super polished, future business woman type of vibe that I would get from a lot of the consulting clubs and the business school and people who were recruiting for consulting that I saw around me. But going through the interview process, especially when I was running mock behavioral interviews with people that I connected with at the firm, everybody would tell me, girl, you don't sound like a real human being. You sound like a robot.

And I think that feedback was so, so helpful for me because even at the beginning of my final round interview, I spent 10 minutes just chatting with the interviewer. I came on the call, I complimented her mug. I really liked it. It reminded me of a vacation I went on in Indonesia and we had a whole conversation about that for literally 10 minutes straight. And then going through the case, even whenever I'd make a very silly mistake, I rounded by one extra zero or something like that, I would laugh it off, the interviewer would laugh, and then I quickly corrected myself. And I felt a lot less pressure during the interview, and I felt like I could fully be myself. And I think that makes a really big difference.

And then one piece of advice I would quickly give is I strongly believe in second chances. The first time around that I applied for BCG, I didn't get the offer and I thought that was kind of like the end of it for me. I thought consulting wasn't for me at that point. But I just wanted to remind everybody that these firms are really, really difficult to get into. And a lot of it is truly luck. Like you could prepare perfectly and do everything right and be the perfect candidate, but for some reason maybe they don't have enough spots open that year, or maybe there's something with the interviewer, whatever the case may be. So cast an open net, apply to as many firms as possible. And then also, if you don't get it the first time around, there are many other pathways to get there. I got in through the experienced hire route, even though I didn't get the internship. And so I think just always giving yourself a second chance, you never know what could happen.

For sure. Great advice. Neely.

For misconception, I had the idea that in the interview, somehow you and the interviewer are opposed and they're going to try to grill you and they almost don't want you to do well, which is not true at all. In most of my interviews, they were very collaborative and it's best to go into it thinking, I'm going to be working with this person. This is how I would look at it. Do you have anything to add here? And just being very collaborative and solving the problem with them, you're taking the lead depending on which firm it is and if it's interviewer versus interviewee led. For mine it was interviewee led, but just view it as more of a collaboration and they really do want you to do well. So you'll notice that, and if you can get them to like you they'll be more helpful with the questions they answer and just the whole dynamic of the case.

So that was one misconception. And then my piece of advice is just know that casing is a learned skill. Everything from the structuring, the quick math, brainstorming, idea generation, and being able to speak concisely, all of that is something that you can learn. Not everyone is naturally gifted in those areas, but that doesn't mean consulting is not possible for you. So I would just say be encouraged and be resolved just to be better than you were yesterday. I know that's cheesy, but it's definitely something I learned through the process. And just try to enjoy the learning and the growth and don't necessarily anchor around a cookie cutter result. And you'll actually be far more successful if you can have that kind of growth mindset.

For sure. Awesome. Arav.

Yeah. Misconception, I think the biggest one for me was coming from IB and that recruiting. The technicals for consulting, I truly believe, are significantly less important than the behaviorals. For me, I would say the McKinsey structure is you have your PEIs first and you have your case. And because it's the first thing that they evaluate you on, it sort of sets the tone for the rest of the interview. And if your PEIs aren't polished, they don't like you, and you won't get any help on the case. And the opposite is also true. And so that sort of paradigm shift for me was extremely helpful when I eventually was told that, and then it helped me through mine.

And then sort of one piece of advice, kind of meta, is that everyone is playing the same game to try and get this offer. And I think the candidates that really stick out are the people who don't play the game, who are creative or super genuine. You can meet a million people and do all the right things and not get the offer. It's the people who spend the time to really enjoy what they're doing, think creatively, that succeed and really actually enjoy the process and get the offers.

Awesome. Okay. Well, thanks so much, everyone. Great piece of advice across the board here, and really appreciate the transparency and the honesty. And I hope for everyone in the room this has resulted in a lot of motivation and hope that you'll be sitting up here one day too, just like our five panelists here.

Closing and Black Belt

So Japheth, maybe I'll pass it back to you and we can continue on to the next portion.

Thanks, Mark. Yeah, for all of the folks listening, maybe next year you'll be up here sharing your insights from your offer. So I hope that this has been helpful. It's certainly been encouraging and insightful for me. So thank you so much to the five of you for sharing.

One thing that you've noticed is that they were strategic about their approach. They were intentional and they were really dedicated and serious. And almost every one of them leveraged some form of coaching. And so if you want that sort of coaching program, I've got Katie here to just share the two minute version of our Black Belt program. So Katie, while I'm pulling that up, do you want to just pop on and say hey?

Hey, what's going on everybody? That was a really great motivating panel. So thank you all for sharing some vulnerable insights, but insights that will help others get to where you are now.

So how do we all get there? I will tell you, I was also a Black Belt. I got coaching so I could get into BCG. Everyone has a way to get there, maybe kind of riffing off of what Aisha said. There's different paths, there's different journeys, and sometimes we all need support. You don't do this alone. And none of these panelists here did this alone. They had support.

This is what our Black Belt program is all about. This is about helping you figure out how to outperform who you're competing against because these are competitive roles, and it's about creating structure, knowing what to focus on, and letting the noise disappear. So how do we do this? We basically help you fix all of those big challenges. We give you a system, we get expert coaches, they give you homework in addition to all the self-study that you need to do, and you're given accountability measures basically by meeting with your coach again and you know what you need to do each week.

And something that I think really stands out is quality casing over just what Neely said, this fatigue. But we don't need to just case, case, case indefinitely and think we're going to get better. I love alluding to marathons, but you don't go out and run a marathon every day. You need to train smartly, efficiently, and then you go compete.

So if you're interested in getting that structured support, we have Black Belt. It is an investment. And all of these panelists here are now starting with a really nice salary. And this was just a small part of that. And if you think about the opportunity cost, this is totally worth it. Re-recruiting is kind of painful. There are new cycles. So if it doesn't work out the first time, it can work out again. But maximizing your chances means getting that expert help.

Outro

And that's a wrap. Big thanks to Aisha, Arav, Hunter, Maya, and Neely for being so candid about what actually got them the offers.

A few things stood out across all five. They networked early, they focused on quality over case volume, and almost every one of them worked with a coach. That's not a coincidence.

If you're serious about your shot at MBB or a top firm, book a 15 minute call with Katie, link in the show notes. Show up with your timeline, your goals, and your gaps and she'll tell you exactly what you need.

We'll see you next week.