Inside or outside:What is the best consultancy career for you?

Considering a career in management consulting? Today, candidates can opt for two tracks: internal or external consulting. The former is much less well known but can offer an exciting career path.

In January, MBA-Exchange hosted an online panel discussion to explore the options during its MBACareerDay on careers in internal consulting and corporate strategy.

Over one hundred candidates joined the session to hear the views of the panel experts: Tom Bila, COO Office, BNP Paribas, Raphael Prezerowitz, founder of Internal Consulting Services which helps businesses develop internal consulting capabilities, and Stephen Bauer, global learning director at Eli Lilly and European chapter head of the Association of Internal Management Consultants (AIMC).

The challenge of global transformation

All three speakers agreed that many large organisations were going through major global transformations to become fit for the 21st century - a process which could take years to deliver. In these circumstances, consultants were much in demand both internally and externally. The big difference between the two was that external consultants tended to be involved in short term strategy execution while internal teams were in it for the long haul, said Bauer.

"A global transformation can take a decade: at Eli Lilly we want to focus on improving outcomes for customers. It's a wonderful, challenging task for consultants. We work and collaborate with external consultants for some of this - for the relatively small but important aspects.

But when it comes to implementation it is led by us. The difference between working as an external or internal consultant is whether you are interested in relatively short term strategies or do you find it more interesting to see the full implementation of a corporate transformation?"

Tom Bila described the challenge facing internal consultants working at BNP Paribas, also engaged in a global transformation.

"You work on interpreting the strategy set by the board. We have to translate that into a project plan across borders, across business lines and across corporate entities. Then we look at what we are trying to achieve in the next few years."

Being involved in tackling these long term challenges makes internal consultants very visible to top management, adds Bila.

"You have a very high exposure to top management, working on the hot topics. The learning curve is significant. You read what is available internally and externally and you acquire incredible amounts of new knowledge.

You need to translate big external changes like the Basle III regulations in banking and integrate them into your company's operational efficiency plans. You have to get everyone on the same page and working together, which is for me the most interesting part of the job."

The skills you need

So, if you do want to go down this road, what kinds of skills will you need? This depends on the company, said the experts.

"You see about 50% of internal consultants coming from other divisions in the same company," commented Raphael Prezerowitz. "The other 50% of external recruits sometimes have work experience and sometimes don't."

"There are three levels of skills you look for," says Bila. "First, what are the candidate's consultancy aspirations? What keeps him or her happy? Second, how change resistant is he? Can he motivate people to work with him? How much knowledge can he acquire? And third, what are his project management, time management and cost saving skills like?"

Both Bila and Bauer took the same route from being an external consultant to working in an internal role in their respective organisations.

"A one year project turned into a full time consulting project," recalls Bauer, who works in the HR part of Eli Lilly. "Most organisational effectiveness experts come from internal consulting from other organisations. When it comes to Six Sigma we look more broadly to recruiting change agents from across the organisation including many MBAs."

So, why might you choose to go for an internal or external role?

Prezerowitz summarises the differences.

"As an external consultant, your satisfaction may come from the diversity of the role and the variety of what you deal with - you get so many different types of clients - at the same time, you're never really part of the final success. You'll never know the company as well as your clients. As an internal consultant, you're much more likely to participate in a confidential project and know all the political nuances and be more involved in the long run."

WE WANT YOUR FEEDBACK
What are you experiences about this topic? What are your thoughts? Do you have any questions or comments on this debate? Would you like to see a panel discussion on a different topic? Why not post your comments at the end of this article.

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