| Topic Name: |
Hate Banking.. Want Consulting |
| Message Name: |
More detail/ hours in consulting |
| Date Posted: |
09/22/2003 |
| In Reply To: |
2) At the analyst levels, both bankers and consulants will spend most of their time either sitting behind a desk staring at spreadsheets or powerpoints, or running errands for VPs/partners. From that perspective, the work is the same, even though the industries are different.
3) Travel time is work time. A consultant's billable hours may be less than a banker's hours in the office, but once you factor in airport delays, etc, it's about even. Basically, both industries work junior staff as hard as they can without actually killing them.
4) True. |
| Message: |
Sorry to belabout the point, but I'm another case of corp fin analyst thinking about going to MC.
The 'hours' issue is quite an important one, not only because it really affects one's life (the difference between 70h/wk and 100 h/wk can determine whether you keep friends or have a sexlife) but also because I believe it indicates the work 'culture'. To this I would like to suggest that from my experience, there is something wrong with i-bankers working 100h weeks consistently in the post-bubble era (if not working in one of the few superstar teams that close >10 deals a year). There is something wrong with the perfectionist culture that endorses this inefficiency.
My impression from my consulting circle of friends is that working 'a lot' means doing 60-70 hour weeks, where they may come back home midnight on a few occasions but will have the w/e free or vice versa. And 95% of the time will be 'real' work, implying work that won;t go down the bin come next morning.
Would any consultants out there like to confirm their honest working hours week (including travel, even though I don;t fully take the point that travel time equals work time - there's something about a business lounge that makes it a bit more bearable than spreadsheets at 3am).
This would help me understand if the grass is greener over there.
thanks for all frank input
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