I did an internship in a consulting firm. What I've learned is that it's the most bullshit job ever. Basically making PowerPoints and telling other people to work better. Well at least you can make a lot of money while providing little to no value, absolute parasites.

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Hi Mika :) Thank you so much for making this vdo. I am a new grad and will be joining a networking event tomorrow for the first time aloneee, which ofc super nervous. Your tips calm me down a lot and I hope everything will be great <3 and wish me luck.

Hi do you need a website

I am a web developer. Do you need a website? If so, I would be happy to create one for you.

Wait so what’s the difference with consulting (Deloitte ) and contractor ( Lockheed)???

This is lovely

Can anyone offer me some perspective or advice? I am not sure if my experience is the same as others. I work at one of the Big 4, have an MBA in International Finance with 5 years of accounting experience. My whole Big 4 experience has been an absolute nightmare. Let me explain. I was working as a level 2 accountant at a major corporation. Then a Big 4 company reached out to me and actively recruited me for a Financial Analyst position. I ended up accepting the offer because the Big 4 company recruiter actively pursued me for the financial analysis position, and I figured the Big 4 was a reputable company where I can learn new applicable financial analytic skills for my career growth. However, from day 1 of starting at the Big 4 company I realized that the opportunity was 100% misrepresented. Essentially, the engagement I was put on was processing invoices repetitively. This engagement was a very low skill engagement with call center vibes, and 100% not what was being presented to me or what I was agreed to. After six months of processing invoices, I reached out to an experienced manager and explained my experience and what had transpired. She agreed with me that my concern was valid, and this should not have happened to me. Therefore, they looked for a financial analysis engagement where I would be able to learn and apply financial analytics which is what I was recruited for initially. The new project that they presented was "Real Property Valuation" and was presented as an engagement that would require traveling to different location where I could apply financial valuation skills such NPV and IRR, so I agreed to this new engagement. However, when I start this new engagement, I soon realized that this engagement had the very same nature of the Invoice Processing engagement with no traveling or financial analysis being applied or learned for the activities. Personally, I have never felt so mislead and violated as an employee in my life, and I am not inspired to do the work. Every job I have ever had, the job description has been pretty spot-on except for this Big 4 company. Now I am in a very tough situation where I have sacrificed my prior career for a situation full of deception hoping and I feel they hope I don't notice or say anything. I was really hoping to get more out of my experience at the Big 4, but I simply don't think they have what they were recruiting me for. Is this a normal Big 4 experience? Has anyone else had the same experience? What should I do? Serve 1 year there hoping that I can transfer to a different part of the company or start making my exit strategy? Any suggestion or advice would be appreciated.

Consulting = Concubine of client and pimped by your manager....

Don't join consulting. Period.

Actual best pseudo-algorithm: { Don't join consulting if TRUE; }

Am I tripping or are those firms all accounting?

Schmoozing in a consulting firm will teach you everything you need to know about schmoozing in a consulting firm but not much else.

13:02 this reminds me Korean work culture haha 🤣

What do you do know?

just saying…smoking hot.

Watching from Kerala, India Bincy Elizabeth Mathew

it helps alot thanks

Thank you for the tips, they are quite useful and insightful, especially for persons who are introverts but would like to make connections with other professionals.

My friend said it's actually pronounced 'con-insulting'.

I joined deloitte in 2021, it fucked my entire life. Not only was they not working seriously, I found myself embarked in a catastrophic development with one member of my family fired, myself fired under false pretext, my aunt working in the algerian public sector degraded. And was left jobless, without a nickle nor a psychological nor at least a kind sentence for 4 years, experiencing all sort of abuses, loneliness and depression. To me, yes, Deloitte ruined my life, they can say whatever they want, the truth is that they don't know anything, and worst, they are not honest, they bring smiling people with suits, but they are acting like a mafia

It depends on the consultancy. Some great smaller consultancies out there where work life balance is good etc etc.

I watched few videos about this topic yours is 100% helpful so thank you.

From what I heard, the firms like pwc or Accenture actually don’t pay so well compared to the hustle and honestly, often rather boring work (at least in Europe). You can easily get similar or even larger salary working in the industry.

I stumbled upon you channel and i must say...i am truly grateful i found you😭❤ you give such great advice and i love your personality too😊..Have an amazing day

Did enterprise software consulting for 2 years at one of the 2 big Enterprise software(The German vs the American) upon getting my graduate. Can tell you the hours are really tough... 72 working hours on a busy week is expected. Gone are the public holidays and have to use leave to work. Left because well... the customer value you more than the employer. Anyway employer also wants to outsource all jobs to partners. Can you imagine that my colleague and I nearly got suspended because we were helping the customer and our boss actually audit through the customer account and found our login. WORST sheat ever. Went to a partner for 2 years. Great boss, great environment but the software principal played us partners out again. Could really see sometimes my employer was really darn pissed... Thats it, thats the last straw. The money doesn't dance for the effort you put in. Not worth it anymore. I decided to work in cyber security. Much happier now.

Wow thank you so much! I am a senior and I am considering different types of jobs that I might like, and your videos are super helpful at painting the whole picture of what working as a consultant could be like. Or at a big 4 company for that matter. However, despite me not knowing yet what I want to do, I know for sure that I would love to have the freedom to try these different roles. Maybe not forever but for a while it seems like a good idea to work there.

EY the worst company ever!

so what is the opposite? a product company?

correct, its not for me! Toxic.

Thank you Mika for such helpful insight. My first networking event was really intimidating due to which I missed many upcoming networking events. After watching this video, I realized the best way to cope with these kind of situations is to face them. Thanks a lot for such informative videos.

I’ve been a consultant for over 30 years of my career. Mika’s comments are a good introduction to consulting. What she does not mention is that there are large cultural differences between consulting firms. Publicly held firms (like Accenture) behave very differently than partnerships (PwC, Deloitte). Also, government consulting is very different than consulting for private firms. Anyone who is interested in a consulting career should understand the differences between the firms and the kind of consulting they do. Additionally, there are specialized boutique consulting firms that are very small and very profitable. And she is right, the winning of a contract is different than executing the contract. A good consultant always knows the contract and how it makes money. Scope creep is a killer for consulting careers and for projects that don’t hold the client accountable. It can be a very rewarding career, but a consultant has three masters: the client, the contract, and the firm they work for. All three legs of this stool must be there or the project and your career will fail. And finally, you will do better if the client likes you. Gaining the client’s trust is of utmost importance. Finally, being likable is important because if you can deliver the hard news to clients and if they still like/trust you become gold.

That sounds even more toxic then I thought... I am ok with doing more work as long as it is not intentional planed... I was thinking about consulting....but now I know that I will rather clean. Less stress... probably equal pay considering the hours you work and I still have more of the most valuable resources of all... time.

Low-performer

dangggg i'm going to take the preliminary test for business consulting at big 4 tomorrow and now this video scares me...

good

As someone with 4 years of experience in management consulting, I would say that starting your career in consulting is incredibly helpful. Consulting instills in you structured thinking, frameworks, analytical problem-solving skills, time management and most importantly the art of storytelling. These skills are highly transferable and sought after in almost all corporate roles. Will be rejoining it after my MBA as I absolutely love it!

The culture is different at some big 4

What if you want to be a consultant but are nervous about AI's impact on consulting. Try being at the forefront of technology adaptation in management consulting. Here is an AI platform designed specifically to improve strategy consulting. It does about 75% of what a McKinsey, Bain, or BCG does in an extensive/expensive consulting engagement and does it in 90% less time. This will likely arm small to midsized consultants (and companies) with the data collection and analysis tools that the big houses (McKinsey, BCG, and Bain) have used and do it fast: kzbin.info/www/bejne/iGq4pp2Yeb-Smrcsi=Qj7BasEBucdOMi2D

Consulting firms = crazy life 😢

Don’t consultants also cheat a lot due to all the stress and travel.

Really helpful and authentic tips!!

“Billabillity above all else.” Don’t know what that means? You will.

I worked in one of the Big 4 as an Audit Associate, and yes the POLITICS was Insane. Still in Therapy because of what it did to my mental Health. 💔

Consulting is the worst industry to join. You will do 2-3 times the amount of work, for almost no pay and Im saying this as somebody who gets paid more than anybody else. You are basically unemployed and constantly pushed onto client projects where you have to have 75% of your time billed to clients at worst. Clients obviously work in different industries with different requirements and environments that you constantly have to adapt. Too much work, too much slavery, less pay for nothing. Most people exit within 1-2 years. You are providing a highly creative, high IQ service, for multiple clients at the same time for almost no pay whatsoever. I think about quitting every single day. Being unemployed was way better.

Most of this I can approve. Nevertheless it is important to set up boundaries, learn to say no, learn so find the things to say yes to, don't work all day - if you do those things it will most likely just a short adventure before you burned down your candle from both sides. And remember - a few people within all those suit wearing consultants still have to do the work. We are always happy and need the quiet hard working people. The client facing people support the techies and the other way around - only presentations will help no one after all.

Since you are a know it all telling us not to join consulting firms what do you suggest that we do for work instead?

Thanks Mika......really appreciate it 👍

I know i would hate the environment lol but as a fresh graduate, I really want to give it a try, at least the internship program.

Whenever I see a manager in consulting with a PMP certification, I call them pimps 😀 If you want a life, don't join consulting. I know, I've been there. Money can't buy your health, relationships, and sanity.