Management consultancy: Why talented people are back in demand
Management consultancy: why talented
people are back in demand
If you'd mentioned wanting to become a management consultant five years ago, you'd have seen more than a few raised eyebrows. The industry had seen a decline in personnel to the tune of 8,000. But although the
economic downturn is by no means over yet, the demand for new management
consultants is up again – to the extent that top consulting farms are actively battling over top
talent - especially at low to mid levels.
"There's always churn in this industry, but we saw a sharp
decline in numbers that is picking up rapidly because the marketplace wants to
be well positioned to take advantage of the upturn," says Alan Leaman, Chief Executive of the Management Consultancies Association (MCA). "The
upshot is some aggressive recruiting in the graduate market, along with a lot
of career changers coming in."
While there's still a strong role for the generalist, there is a
big demand for people with a high level of technical skill, says Leaman. Areas of specialism include business strategy,
manufacturing and businesses services, marketing, human resources, quality
management and environmental management.
Why do high achievers want to work
in consultancy?
Regardless of the area you choose, the reasons for wanting to
join the industry tend to be the same, says Leaman. "First, you will want to make a
difference. With consulting, what you're
doing is all about adding value, which can give people a real buzz. Second, you will want to work at a very senior
level. The stakes are very high in this
work – which is why it's paid well – and the level you're operating at is the
very top."
The types of work you do are likely to look rather different
than prior to the downturn, however. "A lot of hard work is now focused on
driving out costs and making businesses more effective and efficient,"
says Leaman. "It's all about
improving and re-engineering businesses to get them through the recession and
upturn. There's also a lot more work in
the expanding markets overseas, and there are a few signs that the work of
management consultants is becoming more people-focused than before."
Almost as soon as the Government was formed, there was talk of
cutting back on the use of management consultants in the public sector, but
Leaman says this may not be as drastic as it sounds. "The Government is not launching any new,
big, expensive initiatives that need to be delivered, but I believe a sensible
Government won't get rid of their skills altogether."
Where do management consultants
work?
The firms you can work for is varied. First, there are the large generalist
consulting firms – including the Big Four of PwC, Deloitte, Ernst & Young
and KPMG – that offer a wide range of services from strategy consulting to IT
and outsourcing on a global basis. Then
there's the strategy, and much smaller. These
primarily offer strategic advice to companies on a project-by-project basis –
such as the reorganisation of a company's structure or the rationalisation of
services and products.
Human resource consultants offer specialist advice ranging from
personnel policy to job enrichment, while the advice given by IT consultancies
ranges from defining information needs to the provision of software. Financial consultancies guide businesses
around issues such as the installation of budgetary control systems to profit
planning, while niche firms often specialise in a particular sector or offer a
specialist service.
Probably the biggest recent change in management consultancy,
believes David Mann, managing director for management consulting in the UK and
Ireland at Accenture, is that it's now about doing as much as telling. "If you go back 20 or even 10 years, when
management consultancy was starting out, it was very much about getting people
to think about what issues they had, and how to move forward – usually in the
form of a report. With us, though, it's
now about making the things you've suggested happen – in other words, the
implementation."
A very rewarding career
Besides the stimulation this brings and the financial rewards
(analysts earn an average of £26,000, consultants GBP 40,000, senior consultants GBP 58,000, managers GBP 69,000, principals GBP 84,000, directors GBP 120,000 and equity
directors and salaried partners GBP 180,000), Mann says the thing people rave
about is the opportunity to work with other highly motivated, intelligent
people who are really driven.
Career progression is another draw. "Whilst the route upwards through the
ranks is pretty standard, it can be accelerated if you're good enough. This is
helped by all our management consultants having the opportunity to take on
responsibility from early on."
Paul Thompson, Deloitte's consulting talent partner, agrees. Indeed, this year has seen the highest level
of mid-year promotions in their consulting practice. "It's 34% up on last year," says
Thompson, who largely attributes this to their range of support programmes and
networks for people as they progress.
This autumn, the firm is set to hire the highest number of
graduates ever, which he says is driven by client demand, particularly in
sectors such as financial services, manufacturing, consumer products, media and
telecoms. Analyst Mark Frost, who was
among the graduates hired last year, says: "I knew I wanted a job that
offered variety, involved problem-solving and required engagement with people
on a daily basis. I spent a lot of time
researching online and came across consulting, which immediately ticked all my
boxes."
Having graduated with a BSc in physics and an MSc and PhD in
astronomy, he admits he was conscious of the downturn. "It added some pressure when applying for
jobs, but in some respects it helped by making me ensure each application was
as good as I could possibly make it." He welcomes the "endless opportunities to
get involved in sport and social activities. You can end up spending a lot of time together
and it begins to feel more like an extended family".
KPMG, which has also seen a big recruitment increase since last
September, adds the economic and regulatory environment to Deloitte's list of
current client demands. KPMG helps such
organisations to improve their performance through transforming operations,
business intelligence and finance transformation, working capital and cash
management, revenue enhancement and cost optimisation, IT enabled
transformation, embedding risk and regulatory management and deal services.
Ashley Unwin, partner and head of consulting at PwC, points out
that a good academic record is just the start when it comes to taking on
people. "We require people to be
outgoing, with ambition, energy and drive. Emotional intelligence is especially important
to us, given that so much of the work consultants do is in interacting with
other people."
At Ernst & Young, a spokesperson says: "An
entrepreneurial and ambitious spirit is a good start, alongside confidence,
commercial acumen, an analytical mind and a well-rounded nature."
You never stop learning, says Joanna Henderson, senior
consultant at Ernst & Young. "We work on complicated problems, and so
some days I may be using analytical techniques to derive insight, whereas on
other days I may be facilitating a workshop to help the clients act on insight.
It's hard work, but the sense of
achievement of seeing your hard work make the life of your client easier is
definitely worth it."
“I'm really interested in strategies
that businesses adopt”
Pat Newberry is managing partner,
commercial in PwC's consulting practice and the president of the Management
Consultancies Association (MCA). "I joined the profession twenty years ago. I'd been a partner working in a big accounting
firm, but my work had strayed more towards general advisory work, and a
consulting opportunity came up in the financial services industry. I took it because I'm really interested in
strategies that businesses adopt – and transactions and deals are only part of
that. I wanted to get deep inside
companies and see how they ticked.
It wasn't an easy transition. Consultancy isn't just about advising – the
trick is listening and understanding before you go anywhere near advising and
implementing. My career has mapped out
well. I'm one of the senior partners who
run this consultancy, and am amazed at how many new challenges come along.
Among my most memorable moments was merging a major life insurer
with a major UK bank. They were very
different cultures with complex organisational technology problems to solve. That was a real buzz.
There have been hiccups. When
the dotcom bubble burst, most consultancies, especially in the financial
sector, suffered and I had a couple of very hard years in 2002/03. But it did teach me an awful lot.
Management consultancy is much more demanding these days. When I
started out, a lot of the emphasis was getting organisations to work in a
project manner. They had relatively
little experience of putting together big projects and programmes, whereas today
the private sector works mainly in this way. That's how they run their day-to-day business,
so the help they look for from consultants is much more specialist – more
detailed technological intervention.
That means you need deep skills in particular areas, such as
change management, financial management and IT."
‘The rewards – financially and terms
of stimulation – are huge'
Juliet Osborne is market director for home affairs in Tribal's
Government business. "I spent two
years visiting prisons across the UK. I
worked with the president of Pakistan on anti-corruption reform. I have worked in a number of police forces to
improve their performance. What other
career could you pick that gives you an entrée into so many areas of public
life? When I get home and turn on the TV
news, a large proportion is relevant to my day job. There aren't many people who can say that.
That's not the only reason I love my job. I also enjoy the
opportunity to add value to public services at the highest levels. Then there's the career progression which, for
me, has felt like a sharp uphill climb.
I started working in the voluntary sector in 1992, because I
wanted to do some good in the world, but quickly realised I needed a
profession. I qualified as an accountant
and focused on home affairs. During a
two-year secondment to the UN, the nature of my work shifted from finance to
performance improvement, and in 1998 I made the official move to consulting and
joined KPMG.
Six years later, I followed two partners to set up a strategic
consultancy within Tribal. Since then,
I've pretty much exclusively focused on the home affairs market – covering
everything from the Ministry of Justice to policing. I now lead all of Tribal's work in home
affairs.
Good consultancy is no longer about writing a report that will
sit on a shelf. It's about delivering
outcomes. In any case, the kinds of areas we focus on are how to manage large
procurements, how to get the best value out of large IT suppliers, how to set
up social enterprises and get them delivering to the public sector. It's not -cost-effective to do that in-house.
This job is not for nine-to-fivers and there's a lot of travel
involved. But the rewards – financially
and in terms of stimulation – are huge."