Reframing weaknesses

Hello there,

It's great that you recognize the importance of community engagement and leadership in your profile, especially when considering competitive fields like consulting.

While you may feel discouraged, remember that your strong technical background and achievements are valuable assets. 

Here are some steps you can take to address your lack of traditional leadership experience and position yourself competitively for top consulting firms like MBB:

• Highlight technical leadership. Emphasize the leadership roles you've taken on within technical projects. Consulting firms highly value individuals who can lead and manage complex tasks, and your technical leadership experiences can demonstrate your ability to handle challenging projects. 
• Showcase transferable skills. Although your leadership experiences have been in technical projects, highlight the skills you've gained that can be applied to community and organizational leadership. These skills might include project management, teamwork, communication, problem-solving, and decision-making. 
• Demonstrate initiative. Even though you lack traditional community involvement, you can still demonstrate your initiative. Talk about how you've taken the lead in organizing events, workshops, or knowledge-sharing sessions within your technical projects. These initiatives show your ability to take charge and create impact. 
• Highlight impact. Emphasize the impact of your technical work on a larger scale. If your projects have contributed to solving real-world problems or have had positive outcomes, it showcases your ability to create value and make a difference. 
• Connect technical expertise to consulting. Illustrate how your technical expertise can be directly relevant to consulting work. Consulting often involves solving complex problems and providing strategic recommendations, and your engineering skills can be positioned as assets for tackling these challenges. 
• Network. Connect with professionals in the consulting field. Attend networking events, workshops, and conferences to learn from experts and gain insights into the industry. Building a strong network can help you navigate the application process and showcase your enthusiasm for the field. 
• Address the gap honestly. In your application, address your lack of traditional community leadership honestly, but also emphasize your commitment to growth and your eagerness to apply your skills in new contexts. For example, you could talk about how you're planning to get involved in your community after you graduate, or how you're eager to learn more about leadership and community engagement.

Remember, while traditional leadership roles are valuable, MBB firms are also looking for a diverse range of skills and experiences. Leverage your strengths, be authentic in your application, and showcase your potential to thrive in a consulting environment.

On a side note if you really care about community engagement, you will find a way to make time for it. There are many ways to get involved in your community, even if you have a busy schedule. 

I hope this helps!

“I am starting to feel discouraged and that I have no chance because I'm not a student body president or a leader in any clubs. ”

Wow! I am baffled by how this is just taken as a fact by people.

Let me assure you - it is ABSOLUTLY NOT a precondition to preside a student body etc. This is just ONE of dozens of possibilities to show engagement and impact orientation. Don't be so narrow minded. You can be a STELLAR candidate without any of this. So please relax and instead spend your energy in highlighting the impact and excellence of your profile! This is what makes a profile monster strong, but it is desperately lacking lacking from all the copy-paste resumes that are sent to MBB recruiters nowadays.

Wishing you best of success!

Cheers, Sidi

___________________

Dr. Sidi S. Koné

Former Senior Engagement Manager & Interviewer at McKinsey | Former Senior Consultant at BCG | Co-Founder of The MBB Offer Machine™

Hi,

This is a great question and a common one especially for people who haven't ‘planned’ or prepared early enough to break into consulting. 

I too had a similar struggle. I studied History and had no idea of the consulting world until I was about to graduate. I had lived my college life the way I wanted to (spending my summers scuba diving  and playing video games mainly), and not in expectation of a job in Corporate/Consulting/Banking. As a result, I had zero internship experience (because I thought I was going to do a PhD after college).

Yet I was still able to land interview invitations with several T2 firms and one of the MBBs. There are several lessons I learnt from this

• Highlight and play to your strengths, if it is academic excellence, this should come out strongly in your CV
• Dig deep and reframe your experiences. Think hard about what experiences you have had so far (doesn't need to be ‘internships’ or ‘community’) that can highlight the necessary skills firms are looking for and craft strong stories/bullets around them
• Network to increase your chances to land an interview → this is often the strongest lever
• Last but not least, I did realize that this is a competitive process. My CV did not make the cut for 2 out of 3 MBB firms, but I was not surprised. 
  • But I was able to work with what I had and still land several interviews at the end

All the best!

Hello,

First of all, as other coaches here have pointed out, you don't have to be perfect in all possible traits across the board to get a consulting job. Most candidates have some “peaks” = traits that they particularly excel at, and some have more specialized profiles. This is perfectly ok. Don't think of yourself as lacking!

In terms of framing, I would offer the following advice. The general traits consulting companies look for are leadership, teamwork, and initiative, but these don't necessarily have to involve community engagement. Sure, community initiatives and campus clubs are often used to showcase those traits because that's what a lot of students tend to be involved in, but this is not necessary if you can demonstrate leadership in other parts of your profile. Similarly, a presidential or leadership position in a club is absolutely not required! You mention that you “have taken on leadership roles within numerous technical projects” - I would hone in on this to showcase your teamwork and leadership skills.

Hi there, 

My number one recommendation is to find a good coach to prep up your CV.

It sounds like you have a great background but not yet a clear idea of how you can make it shine in your application. 

So you need somebody who can tell your story better than you, put it on paper and teach you how to deliver it convincingly. 

The fact that you lack volunteering experiences doesn't have to be a liability as long as you're keeping the recruiter busy reading about all your others assets. 

It's all a matter of perspective.

Feel free to reach out and I'm happy to help.

Best,
Cristian

Hi there,

Q: Any guidance on tackling this weakness while positioning myself competitively for MBB?

First of all, your profile could be fine already and possibly you might just need to emphasize in a different way experiences you already have.

If you feel there is something to compensate in your CV, the best thing to do is to find a referral for your application – you can find more on that here.

If you still do want to add volunteer or community experiences, I would recommend starting with what you actually enjoy as a hobby or interest. Then, I would look for a community (eg a Facebook group). Then I would contact them and ask if you can provide any help for free. In this way you could contribute by doing something you actually enjoy and possibly without too much time/effort.

Best,

Francesco

Hi there,

First of all, it's important to remember that you can't be/have everything. If you have focused on strong GPA and test scores, and internships, that's fantastic! I would rather hire you than someone with low grades/scores, weak internships but TONS of extracirricular activities.

Play to your strengths and don't worry about having every thing thing :)

The best way to address this is:

1) Have as strong a resume as possible

2) Network extensively

3) Apply early

Here's some more reading to help:

https://www.preplounge.com/en/articles/how-to-get-a-consulting-internship-tips-and-tricks

Hi there, 

happy to have a chat and help you find the right positioning - this should usually not become a dealbreaker. Feel free to reach out via DM to share your CV and discuss further.

Regards, Andi