36.2 Recruitment and selection

The foundations of a successful career in consulting are laid at the moment of recruitment: only candidates who meet certain criteria will have a good chance of becoming fully competent consultants and moving up the career ladder to their own and the consulting firm’s satisfaction. Hence a careful search and a thorough appraisal of candidates are extremely important.

Recruitment criteria

While consulting firms apply different criteria in recruiting new consultants, a comparison of their practices allows for some general conclusions concerning personal characteristics, education, practical experience and age.

Personal characteristics were discussed in section 36.1.

Education is carefully examined in every case. A university degree (first degree, master’s degree or doctorate) is required for all management consulting positions. The relevance of the field of study to the particular field of consulting is considered, and in some cases candidates must have a specific educational background, for example, a doctorate in psychology, or a degree in computer science. The consulting firm is equally interested in the performance of the candidates during their university studies, in particular in project assignments during which the students have practised fact-finding, communication and other consulting skills.

Practical experience (a minimum of five to ten years) used to be required by all consulting firms, but this has changed in recent years. Some important firms have started recruiting up to 30 to 50 per cent of new consultants directly from university or business school, particularly in special fields where it is difficult to recruit people with required technical knowledge and experience