Best online courses

Question

Based on experience or insight from others, could you please list online courses that are actually helpful and useful for the below areas. A lot of these cost money and I want to make sure I am spending it on something that will actually help me when I start my consulting gig:

- Excel

- Financial modeling

- Powerpoint

Answer 1

Hi there,

I think this is an interesting question that may be relevant for many people. I would be happy to share my thoughts on it:

First of all, while it is great to see how eager you are to prepare for your career start in strategy consulting, I would highly advise you not to worry about it.
All major strategy consulting companies will provide you with excellent onboarding and training that will prepare you for everything you need to know.
Lastly, if you want to prepare on your own, I would advise you to practice your Excel and PowerPoint skills. While there may be company-specific Excel and PowerPoint functions, you will still be faster in the first few months with some practice.

If you would like a more detailed discussion on how to best practice your Excel and PowerPoint skills beforehand, please don't hesitate to contact me directly.

Best,

Hagen

Answer 2

Hi there,

This sounds like an amazing question to ask ChatGPT. Let us know as well what answers you get ;)

By the way, if you're looking to improve these to be prepared for when you go into consulting, I wouldn't stress about them. You'll get plenty of training on the job.

Best,
Cristian

Answer 3

Hello Anonymous A.,

I would check out Wall Street Prep for the Excel and Financial Modelling. From what I've seen, they have a great library of courses, but if you're accessing them through an individual account, the cost could be rather high.

That said, I have seen a number of excellent YouTube channels in the last 2 - 3 years that seem to put out great content on Excel with opportunities to join Live instruction classes as well. Of course, the channel videos are free; the Live instruction sessions are not but would be significantly cheaper than the traditional vendors.

Try a few YouTube searches for Excel content. You'll know you've found a good one if there is a deep library of videos that consistently have more than ~20k views per video and a solid degree of engagement in the comment section. If you find any great Content creators in that space, it would be kind if you would return to this forum and share. Not only does that help others in the same shoes as you, but you in turn support the Content creator by introducing them to new (and, in this case, relevant) audiences.

I regret that I cannot guide you on PowerPoint.

Good luck!

Answer 4

[This comment has been deleted by PrepLounge for violating the Q&A Guidelines]

Answer 5

In terms of Powerpoint, I am not sure about online courses but every firm has its own tools or plugins and its own way of working which you will learn on the job.

A couple of things you can do before starting your consulting gig to get up to speed on PPT:

- Speak with consultants or alumni from your office to understand which specific tools they use

- Familiarize yourself with industry-standard tools such as thinkcell

- Check existing b4 or mbb presentations (do a quick search) to understand the different formats and have a collection of slides you like as a resource to get inspiration

- You can also use new tools such as Marvin AI to generate different types of presentations on any industry to get inspiration for your slide deck