This session was attended by Ashish Iyer (Partner and Director BCG),  Navneet Vasishth (Principal) along with three ISB alums, Akshit Shah (batch of 2007), Ankush Wadhera (batch of 2008) and Kanu Julka (batch of 2009). After a brief introduction of BCG and its values by Navneet, Ashish took charge of the session.

Ashish went on to discuss the causes and effect of the current economic crisis. He delved into the details of sub-prime lending and Credit Default Swaps (CDS). This led to a very interesting discussion with the audience on the underlying reasons for the crisis and how long the recovery will take. Ashish concluded the session with a discussion of the expected effects of this crisis on Indian economy.

This was followed by a separate session between the alums and the ICON (Internal Consulting Project) teams.  The ICON teams utilized this opportunity to clarify their doubts and to get some good ideas on how to approach their respective projects.

- Ravi Krishna (class of 2010)

BCG was represented by

Akshit Shah, Senior Associate (co’2007)

Jitesh Shah, Senior Associate (co’2008)

Some of my major takeaways from the session -

* Understanding the hierarchy and growth path at BCG

* CV

CV is the most critical tool to get short-listed. Alumni help during the duration of the course to help refine it. FOCUS ON THIS WELL, starting Term-3.

* Recruitment Process

BCG would get the resumes of people (~250 in co’2009) for the job-posting. The CV is critical. The BCG shall have panels to eventually shortlist 30-40 people for the interview. There are typically multiple rounds of interview and one may be rejected at any of the rounds. BCG does take into consideration your experience, undergraduate education while short-listing.

Mantra, as I understood is-

“Did you excel?”

“Did you excel consistently?”

* Spikes

It seems that spikes are essential for Consulting J Typically the spikes can fall into the categories of academics (at ISB or pre-ISB education), work experience, Co-curricular activities, and extracurricular activities.

In general I believe the non-academic Spike is a way to measure the passion and excellence one can achieve for the activity.

Some myths-

* Becoming a Club President is not a spike. What matters more is what you do as President or while being at ISB.

* Even without being President of any club there are examples of people who work hard towards activities which were well appreciated.

Some of the examples of the X-factor that could help in shortlisting-

* Enormous patents

* Doctor from AIIMS with exceptional work experience

As a thumb rule, without any spike it is difficult to be shortlisted, 1 spike is a grey area while 2 spikes can make a strong case for short-listing.

* Life @ Consulting

The typical work hours cited was 9 am – 8 pm if you are at the base location, while working at the client side this may be higher. Typically Akshit mentioned he worked for 30% of the weekends in last 2 years.

People do manage to get married and remain married J There have been instances when ISB alumni have taken 2 months off for paternal leave or 9 months off for maternal leave.

Also it was great to know that BCG attrition ratio is in single digits and most people who leave start on their own or to take up senior positions in the industry.

* Type of Projects/ Duration

The duration of the project can vary in general, and for Akshit the average seems to be ~ 4 months, and his longest being of 7 months.

* Difference between consulting firms

Typically the top consulting firms differ in terms of work culture and strengths in verticals.

* BCG operations @ India

BCG has operations in Bombay (since 1996) and Delhi (since 2002, ~30% of work force). The staffing resource pool is common between the two centers.

Related Links:

* Boston Consulting Group (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Consulting_Group)

* BCG website (http://www.bcg.com/)

– Rahul Garg, Class of 2010.

 

Amit Jain (Class of 08, HLL 4 yrs)
Neha Kalra (Class of 08, ITC 3 yrs)
Neha Mittal (Class of 08, Deloitte 2 yrs)
Sambit Sathapathy (Class of 03, ITC 11 yrs)
Vikas Chadha (Class of 07, L&T 6 yrs, Sharp 6 yrs)
Lav Agarwal (Class of 2005, HLL 5 yrs)
Raj Kamal (Class of 03, IAS 8 yrs)
Ruchi Kalra (Class of 07, Evalueserve 2 yrs)

Saket Pradhan (IIMA PGPX, 10 yrs)

 

I feel that the highlight of the visit was getting to know the work culture more closely instead of the usual projects or the life of a consultant at McKinsey.

Life at McKsiney
Our conversation started around trying to understand the work-life balance at Mckinsey. We spoke at length about different support systems available at McKinsey that help employees cope with their work mixed with travel and their personal lives. We got a first person account of this from Bharati, who is the recruiting coordinator at McKinsey. Since joining McKinsey, she had to quit the firm 3 times for personal reasons and was able to join back again. She also told us how flexible McKinsey was, and that the company was willing to work with her and gave her the option of working part time when she had to quit for personal reasons. Our conversation also revolved around the up-or-out policy that most of us are familiar with. It was pleasantly surprising when our alums told us that they know of no one who had been asked to quit. They admitted that on a day to day basis, work does get stressful, but that there are excellent support systems available to help employees to cope with it and the firm makes all possible efforts to retain its people.

Experiences of Alums
The alums shared some of their experiences with us and their motivation for being a part of McKinsey. A theme that resonated across all of them was the opportunity that McKinsey provides for individual development and personal growth. Each of them related a unique memorable experience at McKinsey. Besides this, Ruchi walked us through the different phases involved in a typical client engagement and answered some of the questions we had. The alums also highlighted McKinsey’s role in ensuring implementation of its recommendations after the consulting phase is over in order to ensure the client’s success.

Office tour
We also had a quick office tour where we got to know about the facilities available to employees. The office does not have cubicles for every employee since most people travel often. It instead has team rooms where different consulting teams work together on their projects. The McKinsey office also houses a Gymnasium and a cafeteria. There is also VA (Visual Aids) group dedicated exclusively to the Delhi office. This group provides support to the consulting teams by helping the teams with their PowerPoint and any other form of communication document that they want to present to the client. We also had a quick chat with a partner who shed some light on the clients served out of the Delhi office. The Delhi office serves clients in various sectors including power, healthcare, retail, infrastructure, real estate, technology, government, public sector, non-profit, media, etc.

Life after McKinsey
Towards the end we also talked about some exit options that consultants have. The alums were very open about discussing this topic. Around 20% of people leaving McKinsey go on to become entrepreneurs. Most others go on to join PE firms or some top management position in the industry, depending on the position from which they leave the firm. Quite a few of them also opt to work in the development sector with NGOs.