Internship decisions

Question

Hi there,

I am 20 y/o and a beginning MSc. Student in Electrical Engineering, with some experience in strategy. I won a business challenge for a large oil and gas company, did a strategy summer school in collab with McKinsey and work for a non-profit consultancy association at my university.

This summer I have been interning at a tech company, and decided I want to follow-up with an off-cycle internship as a strategist. I made a list of target companies and started applying. I almost immediately (after a week) got 3 interview invites: from Strategy&, OW and AT Kearney.

When I wanted to apply for MBB this week I suddenly started getting doubts. I feel that if I mess up now, I might mess up a chance for ever getting a full-time offer after Master's (Fall '21 by the earliest). I have been working hard on my case interview skills as I am coming from an engineering background, but doubts if it is good enough have started to creep in.

I have the feeling that this fear might be ungrounded, and that if I land one of these tier 2 firms internships, I will have regret that I did not try with any of the MBB. On the other hand, I see an internship at tier 2 also as a nice opportunity to see if I made the right choice of switching my focus from tech to strategy.

Please let me know your thoughts on this situation. I am super grateful to share my thoughts with this community.

Best regards,

a confused Dutch guy

Answer 1

Hi,

You should apply now for a number of reasons:

It's easier to get an internship rather than full-time offer
Failing an internship selection process will not impact your full-time interviews

However, I recommend doing your best to prepare since preparation is the key

Best!

Answer 2

Hey,

first of all, you are in a great situation from what you have described. No need to worry at all!!!

Applying now an getting rejected will very likely not have an impact on your Fall '21 applications. Since there are 2 years in between. I for example failed my MBB interviews after my BSc degree and got invited and accepted at MBB after my MSc degree two years later.

Nevertheless, MBB (in Germany at least), likes to see one intership with a Tier 2 consultancy before starting there as an intern/ full-time. If you have time for two internships I would recommend the safe route of trying Tier 2 first and then on of the MBBs. If not, go for MBB directly and try.

The above is an "answer-first" from your description. The decision is surely more multi-facetted but it might help you...

Best,

John