Hey guys, I’m a senior now, considering different schools for management consulting, my prospective career path, and I’m hoping to place into one of the Big 3 Firms (McKinsey, Bain, BCG).
I was wondering, which schools are the best to do so (when including your list of schools, please include schools outside of Ivy Leagues, because I know Ivy Leagues are recruiting gold mines, but I’d like to know about others)
Please tell me the employers who recruit most at these schools as well!
Thank You!
a lot of your chance of getting hired comes down to you, if you feel the need to work at one of those companies it is true they recruit heavily at the ivy league. but look at carnegie mellon and duke university too. are you sure that you want to narrow your college search and future employment to a small handful of companies like mckinsey or bain? maybe focus on finding a school where you will happy and learn, and 4 or 5 years from now you may have a different post college plan. (it happens)
also check out lehigh university
http://cbe.lehigh.edu/undergraduate
Personally I’d aim your college goals towards getting the best possible education and having the best 4 year experience that you can. Gearing your college experience towards getting a Big 3 consulting job is kind of like gearing your entire HS experience towards getting into HYP – it can happen, but can never be assured. Many other consulting opportunities exist (ex. Big 4 accounting firms etc.) and many amazing non-consulting opportunities exist in the business world. I would not map out any career path before you take steps such as: 1) taking some business classes as an undergraduate, 2) doing internships, 3) talking to career placement at your college, 4) picking the minds of professors you love etc.
That said, perhaps NYU - Stern?
Have a look at Indiana Kelley as well - great program and auto admit with the right stats. Agree with above advice - get a solid undergrad education, do internships, and fully explore all career options beyond consulting.
And IMO as a sophomore in HS it is too early for you to target specific schools and a specific career after college.
Bain Capital would be a good career choice. I am a believer that if one cannot get into an ivy school then you should try to study near the company you wish to work for. So in this case, you would look to study in Boston and try to hook up a co-op or Internship with Bain during your Junior year and then slide into a position. Nothing beats having boots on the ground to help getting a job.
Two business schools in the area would be Bentley University and Babson College. More general universities would be Boston College, Boston University and Northeastern to name a few. Northeastern has a fantastic co-op program that might interact with Bain. You can check with the school for that.
You can also contact Bain directly and ask which schools in Boston area they tend to recruit at.
Next would be to gather some business intelligence by using social media sites and Linkedin type sites, professional license and society sites, etc to gather intelligence on the current employees at bain and see where they went to school. The internet makes it so easy to gather this type of intelligence.
Good luck.
It seems that Northwestern has an excellent placement in consulting – especially if you do Kellogg Certificate.
University of Michigan Ross is probably the most heavily recruited undergraduate business program by the Big 3 outside of the Ivy League. Last year, 22 Ross undergrads were placed into the Big 3 firms. Considering that Ross is a mid-sized program (roughly 500/class), 22 is a hefty number. Ross is usually ranked #1 in Management at the undergraduate level, and its Strategy professors are among the most well regarded, so it goes beyond recruiting.
http://michiganross.umich.edu/sites/default/files/uploads/Community/pdfs/15_recruiters_guide.pdf
Consulting is often considered to be a “soft” business field in the sense that the quality of consulting service is harder to be objectively measured. In general, the prestige of your degree plays a relatively more important role in “soft” recruiting. So if you want to get into a consulting profession, you may want to choose a more prestigious school.
At the opposite end, in those “hard” business fields, say asset management, the quality of asset management service can be more objectively measured by the rate of return on the capital. In general, the prestige of your degree plays a relatively less important role (still important though) in “hard” recruiting.
I teach at a top 50-100 university. I have more students get into a big-name hard-field company than a big-name soft-field company.
Hope this helps.
Thanks for all of your replies! I should have been more clear: Big 3 is my goal, but just any big consulting firm like Accenture, EY, and others appeals to me as well! I have looked into all of the schools you guys have mentioned, and being born in Pittsburgh, I was wondering: How good is Carnegie Mellon for placing into a Consulting/IB job? Also, I will definitely consider my options, but I just want to set a target school.
Try to research the programs rather than rely on us. Most business programs have accurate reports. Tepper certainly does.
http://www.cmu.edu/career/documents/one-pagers_2016/tepper.pdf
The Big 3 hired just 1 Tepper graduate combined. But other major consulting firms, like Accenture, Deloitte, E&Y, Oliver Wyman, PWC etc…recruit their fair share as well. If The Big 3 is your priority (and considering how difficult it is to land a job with those firms, I would not make it a priority), I do not think Tepper is a good option, but if you are looking for a consulting career in general (much more sensible approach), it will do very nicely.
McDonough also publishes a report, although it is slightly dated. Again, the Big 3 do not recruit there, but other major consulting firms, like Booz, Deloitte, Accenture, L.E.K etc…actively recruit.
https://georgetown.app.box.com/s/0ww4l1niu13udxy28wv0
UVa’s McIntire also releases a fairly comprehensive departures report, but their specific numbers include graduate students, and are over a three year period.
https://www.commerce.virginia.edu/sites/default/files/CCS-Documents/DestinationsReport2016.pdf
Strangely, Stern does not publish a report. I have always found that suspicious.
It should be noted that getting into CMU, Georgetown, Michigan (OOS), Stern, UVa (OOS) etc… has become as difficult as getting into Ivy League institutions. I would not consider them targets.