“The future of consultants is intricately linked to the future of consulting”

That’s what one of the guests had to say about the future of consultants and the promise of consulting careers.

Being a consultant at any of the big three consulting firms—McKinsey & Company, Bain & Company, and Boston Consulting Group(BCG)—meant one thing: The opportunity to work on cutting-edge projects with big, innovative companies. It allowed the people who worked at these companies to have career opportunities, which would allow them to be prepared for even more challenging and rewarding roles in the world of startups.

The accelerated learning, prestige, community and great pay packages that these companies offered ensured the best talent lined up to work for them.

The first two years of a career in consulting are gruelling, demanding and difficult and often involve “low-value work”, like making presentations, data analysis and sending requests for proposals to really annoying clients.

However, people still rush and fight to do it with the expectation that the payoffs compound later. It gives them a broader view of how companies work and operate.

It acts as a training ground for building startups and laterally jumping into senior executive roles at fast-growing companies or even going higher up the consulting ladder.

Today, that trade-off equation looks a bit distorted for students because it’s never been easier to start a company.

It’s also been very easy to find post-MBA roles in companies that are more strategic in nature, and ESOPs look much more real and valuable because companies are going public.

So the question becomes: Will students continue to chase consulting firms as a lucrative and promising career option? And does a career in consulting hold the same promises as it used to?

Joining hosts Praveen Gopal Krishnan and Rohin Dharmakumar for the episode are Rahul Chaudhary, co-founder of Treebo, ex-McKinsey & Company and Pragya Batra, co-founder of Quirksmith, ex-Bain & Company.

Welcome to episode 35 of Two by Two.

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Help us find interesting women guests by filling out this survey – https://theken.typeform.com/to/KH0EOLGo

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Additional listening:

If B-schools were invented today, would students run placements? – https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/if-b-schools-were-invented-today-would-students-run-placements/

AI comes to annihilate India’s SaaS companies – https://the-ken.com/podcasts/two-by-two/ai-comes-to-annihilate-indias-saas-companies/

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This episode of Two by Two was produced by Hari Krishna. Rajiv CN, our resident sound engineer, mixed and mastered this episode.

If you liked this episode of Two by Two, please share it with your friends and family who would be interested in listening to the episode. And if you have more thoughts on the discussion, we’d love to hear your arguments as well. You can write to us at [email protected].