Graduating Uni this Year? 6 Reasons to Consider a Consulting Career
First off, congrats grad! Getting to the end of your degree is no mean feat, and that’s just talking about the mouldy bathrooms, the poorly insulated student houses, and the general cozzie livs!
As you’re preparing to graduate and celebrate that well-earned bachelor or masters, thoughts may turn to what to do next. Further study? A gap-yah? Or… the world of work.
Consulting is a career that spans many skillsets. Whether you’ve specialised in maths, social sciences or business studies, consulting pools a myriad of talents to help corporate firms, flourishing companies and enterprising individuals improve their processes. If you’re interested in what a consulting role might look like, and the benefits of pursuing a career in consulting, this article is for you.
Read on to find out 6 reasons why you should consider a consulting career if you’re graduating this year, and how you can avoid common risks in the consulting industry to find a position that is good for you now, and sets you up for a fulfilling career..
1. Diverse industries and projects
As a consultant, you’ll open the door to working with clients from all around the globe. Consulting can be an excellent career for those who enjoy variety.
One week, you might be working on a project to improve gender equality for an internationally recognised law-firm. The next, you could be assessing the progress of a local, government-funded community gardening project to help economically disadvantaged groups.
Projects can range in terms of length. You might centre in on work with just one client, collaborate with multiple in one specialised industry, or work on various projects simultaneously. Consulting offers plenty of room for creativity, but in each project you’ll be tasked with identifying an issue, weakness or risk, and coming up with a strategy to fix or improve it.
2. Developing strong, transferable skills
Working on various projects allows you to refine your abilities and learn new skills. You’ll primarily be developing problem solving, communication and analytical abilities. But you’ll also be learning how to interact effectively with all kinds of people.
Working at an agency typically means working with multiple clients at once, which can lead to an exciting environment, moving quickly from project to project. These sorts of consulting jobs offer the right kind of challenge for those who thrive under pressure. If you prefer a more stable set-up, you could become part of an in-house consulting team or a HR consultant for a large firm.
3. Competitive salary & compensation
As consultants are specialists in their fields, they typically earn high salaries. Consulting itself requires long hours and hard work, so be prepared to put in the effort for those zeros..
Global consulting firms tend to offer higher salaries, benefits and prestige, providing financial security regardless of specialisation or location. Freelancing provides more freedom, as you’ll be in control of setting rates and arranging your own working hours. If you prefer this more autonomous working lifestyle, it’s still a good idea to build up your portfolio and experience with a reputable company first.
4. Career growth opportunities
Hard work can help consultants advance quickly in their careers. Working with one of the country's top firms to start out with will help you, even if you’re not set on sticking with them forever. You’ll be thrown in the deep end, yes, but you’ll learn quickly – as well as figure out pretty quickly whether consulting is an industry you see yourself wanting to progress in.
The good news is that plenty of these big name companies offer graduate schemes designed for students fresh out of university, to put those freshly learned skills into industry practice. If all goes well, they’re set up to offer more standard, fixed positions after an initial one to two year learning period.
5. Work that has an impact
Purpose is key in job satisfaction. If you enjoy helping companies and people solve their issues and improving their processes, consulting can be an enjoyable way of doing that. If you’re able to untangle a knot that has had others stumped for weeks or months, you’ll get a great sense of value.
Seeing solutions you helped implement that make an enormous difference to people's lives and livelihoods is a very rewarding experience that provides job satisfaction beyond your pay packet.
6. Strong networking opportunities
Working with other businesses and people will help expand your personal and professional networks, particularly if you work across different industries. An expansive network will give you access to more clients and opportunities.
Don’t be afraid to ask for testimonials from happy clients, that you can use to build up your portfolio. Future clients will trust the opinions of people you’ve worked with before much more than the promises you make them! Attend networking events, join Facebook groups, and try to adopt a mindset of collaborative learning and support, rather than an ‘every-consultant-for-themselves’ approach.
For example, if a client is seeking a service you don’t quite have the expertise in, you can still prove yourself to be a valuable resource by pointing them to the person who can, and in exchange they’ll do the same for you.
Whether you’re graduating from the highly-esteemed University of Exeter or somewhere further afield, now is a great time to start thinking about the sort of job you want to look for.
These are just 6 reasons to consider a consulting career, but there are many more which will depend on what matters to you, and what consulting firm you choose to work with, such as more flexible working hours (if you work remotely), holiday bonuses (if you work with a large firm), or company benefits (if you work internally with one business).
Ultimately, you won’t truly know whether consulting is for you or not unless you give it a shot. So start reaching out to individuals on LinkedIn, apply to some job posts and have a go at some interviews.
And if that doesn’t work… easyJet has some pretty cheap flights to Thailand around this time of year.
