MarquisParker.com // Business Strategist, Speaker, Advisor, and Coach

This is going to be a really short entry with a really short video in which I answer a short email from a medical student who is interested in a career in Management Consulting. She has been looking into the industry lately and wants to pursue a position as a Consultant, but she fears that her work experience isn’t well-suited for it. She asked for my advice on the question and, because I’ve written several entries on this stopic in the past, I gave her a quick response and left it at that.

I’d like to take this opportunity to … Read the rest

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Hello all. Wow, I sure am on a roll in the month of March, aren’t I? And, four entries posted this week alone too. I’m typing this email yet again from about 35,000 feet, but this time I’m on my way back to Chicago from a business trip down South. Once upon a time, traveling for work used to wear me out, but, now that I don’t have to do it often, I actually enjoy the travel experience again. It’s amazing how a change in scenery/environment can change one’s outlook on things.

The message below is from a PhD… Read the rest

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What’s good, everyone. Recently, I’ve had a few emails asking relatively straightforward questions that I’ve been able to crank out pretty quickly. I thought about making separate entries for them, but each would have been so short that it made more sense to consolidate them. The topics of the emails are all over the place, so I won’t try to summarize them, but my responses might be useful to some of you.

Before I go, I wanted to leave you guys with a couple of notes:

1. First, I wanted to pass along a link to a blog of a… Read the rest

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Hey there, everyone. Today’s entry is in response to an email from a PhD in Biotechnology who is interested in a career change to Consulting. He wants to know how to direct his career to position himself as an APD candidate for a consulting firm and, while I’ve never been a recruiter, I’ve tried to give him some good general tips to follow.

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TR wrote:
“Hi Marquis:

I’ve been reading your blog for around 6 months now & I must confess that your blog is what got me interested in consulting in the first place. I think you are… Read the rest

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The email below is from a soon-to-be MD who is trying to decide whether to pursue a residency or consulting career after med school. This situation is a first for me, but, given the entry I’d done on APD candidates a few weeks ago, I believe my words might have been the sort of thing he was looking for.

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AP wrote:

“Hey Marquis,
I am reader of your blog and had a few questions about consulting. I am currently a medical student who wants to go into consulting at a firm such as McKinsey after receiving my MD … Read the rest

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This comment was left on yesterday’s post and I thought that some of you might find it helpful.

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Mike wrote:

“As a soon-to-be Ph.D. starting at McK in the fall, I thought I’d offer my perspective. APDs at McKinsey attend a three-week “Mini-MBA” course in addition to the week of “Basic Consulting Readiness” that all new consultants get. You’d also learn a lot on the job, of course, but friends have told me that after an Associate has been with the Firm for about six months it’s hard to tell the MBAs and APDs apart.

Several APDs have told… Read the rest

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The question below is from a reader who is interested in Consulting, but doesn’t come from a traditional MBA background. She’s got a PhD, which puts her into a whole different candidate category. At my firm, we refer to this group as Advanced Professional Degree (APD) candidates and other firms have similar ways to reference them. I’ve talked to a few APD folks both at my firm and at others and have heard about some concerns, but I’m nowhere close to an expert on this, so I’d encourage anyone reading this to seek out APD people at the firms to… Read the rest

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