All questions tagged CV - Consulting Q&A - PrepLounge.com

Hello!

It does not have any importance at this point. They will skim it before the interview to have an overall impression, but that´s it

You can also re-submit to HR a new version, that does not harm.

Hope it helps!

Cheers,

Clara

Hey Luis,

My comments as follows:

1. Profile statement: This should summarise your professional background and bring out key industry, functional skills and personal qualities. Yours is very generic at the moment
2. Education
   • CEMS and Nova School of Business as seprate entries is confusing. Combine these into one and provide details in no more than 3 easy to read bullets
   • No need to mention A best F worst- everyone knows that :)
   • GPA: Just say 3.83/5
   • HEC Montreal- I assume this was exchange semster while you were at Los Andes? If yes, combine it
   • Your education section should have 2 entries with 3 bullets each- thats it!
3. Work Experience
   • Volaris Airline: its very vague and needs to be speficic and impactful. Which georgphic region did you do the analysis for? Which business units were looked at? What insights did you create? Did you work in a team/manage a team/or were individual contributor? What was the tangible outcome of your work?
   • BNamerica: Advised C-suite- REALLY? Make it specific and believable. Same comments as above
   • For consistency use two bullets per work experience entry

Feel free to post version 2 again or send to me via personal message. Also wait for other coaches to reply :).

Good luck!

Hello!

Congrats, I believe you have a great shot an MBB. However, as always, getting a referral will smoothen everthing for you.

Best,

Clara

Hi,

I've been working with startups for a while and MD role is not a clear one, especially at the early stage. Usually, startups have clear employee roles (Sales, Product, Marketing, Ops), and founder titles. MD sounds unclear to me.

Several things to keep in mind:

1. The risks are very high. 75% of startups die at each round of financing. If your startup dies - will look not that strong in the resume.
2. Make sure you demonstrate the results in the startup (i.e. growth) - its all about the story you tell.
3. The industry is important. E.g. doing fintech is interesting and transferable, doing blockchain can be perceived as a scam
4. Again, the functional role is important. Working on product / data science is much more relevant for consulting than doing ops
5. You'll have to explain why you are jumping into a startup environment and then back to corporate. You'll definitely be asked why you decided to move from entrepreneurship to consulting, so make sure you have a great answer

Best

Hi Marc,

It depends on whether such courses compliment your current education background and working experience or not. If you have no business/management background or experience so far, then putting those courses could be a plus point, as it shows you have real interest and is willing to pay the extra effort to develop yourself.

Of course the courses should be from a credible organization.

Hope it helps,

Emily

Hey Elena,

This is an opportunity for you to take charge and highlight key points you want to get across, so use it wisely. There are a few potential topics you can address when asked this question.

• Explain your motivation in your career transitions; make a coherent story of what drives you to interview for a consulting career
• Tell your key strength areas or your working style; make sure they fit the culture of the firm
• One hobby or activity outside work that can showcase your determination and resilience

Hope it helps,

Emily

Hi,

“Tell me about yourself” or “walk me through your resume”- this is how Consultants usually begin the interview. It's an opportunity for them to learn about you and to pick some interesting facts. "Tell me about yourself question" is similar to "Walk me through your resume"

I would recommend the following structure:

1. Start with a 1 sentence summary of your background, why you are relevant for the Firm and what's your unique selling point
2. Talk about 3-4 of your roles (may be professional, education, extracurricular), 3 sentences each. The more experienced you are the more you should speak about professional roles. It can be also the distinct roles within the same organization. Typical structure: 1) What was the company 2) What you were responsible for 3) Greatest achievement in that role, that will stay in the memory of the interviewer (E.g. While working at Adidas supply chain I was personally responsible for the delivery of soccer balls to the Worldcup in Africa)
3. The main reason why consulting (or particular Firm if you were a consultant before) is the next logical career step for you

Best!

Hi Mike, feel free to share it!

Hi,

From my experience, I confirm that it is common to have a 2-page CV in Germany. Nevertheless, you have probably heard contradictory advice when it comes to the length of your CV: ‘It has to fit on 1 single page!’ or ‘Include every detail!’

So which is the right answer? I personally follow a simple rule: 1 page for every 10 years of work experience. Even though squeezing your experience might seem difficult it will eventually pay off: a crisp and focused CV demonstrates your ability to synthesize, prioritize, and communicate the most important points about your profile. MBB appreciate that ability very much.

Entry-level candidates, especially those straight out of college, should keep their CV to 1 page. Experienced professional, will find it difficult to squeeze everything onto 1 page, but it is still very important to keep it concise.

Good luck,

Jacopo

Hi Jamie,
I believe you can include it. On one hand having examples of leadership within same-sector or same-role might be preferable when applying in order to tailor your CV to the employer. On the other hand, that obviously is only possible when you worked in a similar role before, which for applicants to consulting is mostly not the case.
In addition, it is great to demonstrate leadership within a broader set of contexts and challenges.
Just make sure that including that description in CV does not come at the price of removing more recent of closer experience to the role, also in the outlook of an optimal structure and lenght.

Hey A,

feel free to share it with me.

I will review it and get back to you with feedback and recommendations to improve.

Best,

André

Hi Iulia,

Given you did not apply during the recruiting period, there may not be a set deadline for the BCG office to get back to you on your application, thereby I would not draw a conclusion that you did not pass the CV screening. BCG typically emails the candidates that are considered.

My advice would be to on this page "https://www.bcg.com/en-tr/about/offices/default.aspx", find the office you are applying to, and get the contact details of the HR / recruiting assistant and email him/her. If you do not hear back in 2-3 days, you can call them directly and they will provide you an answer on the process.

Best of luck!

I have not worked at Bain or interviewed there so this more of a general answer. I have worked at McKinsey and Deloitte. Did a ton of recruiting at Deloitte. This is how it used to be done

Who does resume screening depends on level.

• For Analyst level, an Analyst volunteer team used to do it and help HR
• For Associate level, then Assoicates volunteer used to do it
• For Experienced hires, HR does screening with guidance from consultants who volunteer their time to help. usually at the level or above what the applicant applies

Hi,

I would strongly suggest that you do not leave out your grade from your CV. As a screener and a recruiter, I can tell you that a lower GPA CV is much better than a no-GPA one - it builds trust that you are not hiding anything. Trust is crucial for the start of any relationship - especially professional ones. If you do not provide your GPA, you are forcing the interviewer to focus on this specific point, whereas it could be just one of the talking points among many others during your interview.

Secondly, I don't think you need to convert your GPA to a 4-point scale. Leave it at a 10-point scale and back it up with strong points on your CV. Don't be defensive in your interview for a low GPA - instead, you should focus on what all you achieved while managing a decent GPA in your academic career.

I can review your CV as well as prepare you for an interview if you need the same. Feel free to get in touch. All the best!!

Hi there,

More than happy to! Send me a DM and we can talk through it. I am also able to provide a killer CV template as well as sample cover letters

Hi Anonymous,

Whereas recruiters typically look at grades as a measure of perseverance and intellectual capability, it's only one aspect in the big picture.

Especially, the longer in the past and the more real-life experience you have, the less relevant it is.

Therefore, should not be an issue in your case, based on your information given.

Hope that helps - if so, please be so kind to give it a thumbs-up with the green upvote button below!

Robert

It is worth bringing up with HR. Yes it looks bad and yes it was a mistake but it is better to communicate it rather than hoping no one notices. No one can predict the impact of the error but they will appreciate that you were honest about it.

Hi Anonymous,

you should avoid to have gaps in your CV, thus unless you can cover the time abroad with something else (eg if you played football full time), you should include your university abroad.

In terms of the answers to the recruiter, you should identify stories showing achievements in those three years – the experience with football could be useful so far that it led to results that show teamwork, drive or leadership.

Best,
Francesco

Hi,

It would be useful if we had more context, but what I can advise is that you should keep this in your CV as international work experience is valuable. You can position this as an internship or contactor/freelancer work (instead of a full-time job).

Best,

Deniz

Hi,

The general rule is to have more than one page once you have more than 10 years of experience.

Answering you concern in the comments - it is important although not a game changer. Noone will reject you purely based on the number of pages in a resume. Moreover in consulting resume screening is still manual, so it's not an automatic rejection criteria.

I would recommend in most cases use one page in the future!

Best!