A bit of background information: I worked in the industry for 4 years and did my MBA. Post MBA, I first worked in Big Four consulting, then switched to a boutique consulting firm. Currently, I'm at the consultant level (one rank below manager), and overall I have 3 years of consulting experience.
I would like to understand better whether it is common to take a pay cut to join corporate strategy at the manager level? As a consultant, my pay is similar to MBB at the same level. I am not planning to go back to the industry where I worked pre-MBA, and that's also one reason why it's hard to target more senior corporate strategy roles given that I have only 3 years of consulting experience.
After speaking to headhunters and a few friends, it seems that it is quite often that corporate strategy managers get paid 10%-40% lower compared to my current consultant-level salary.
Understand that this is a broad question which would depend on region / industry / company, but would be good to learn more from your experience and set the expectation right. Thanks!
Love this breakdown