Consulting

At their core, consultants—whether independent or part of firms—help organizations solve problems, refine processes, and achieve goals.

Every year, top consulting firms head to career fairs at Ivy League universities like Yale across the country. They end up recruiting a significant population of the student body by graduation.

Specifically, according to an article from careers site The Muse, a management consultant can be loosely defined as someone who is “a problem solver for some of the more complex business and org structures out there.”

Arthur D. Little Inc. was the first management consulting firm. Starting as a chemical analysis lab, the firm evolved to play pivotal roles in projects like developing the NASDAQ system and supporting Apollo 11.

Some also refer to this group as “MBB.” As a nearly century-old company that’s well known for its prestige, McKinsey has some famous alumni—including Chelsea Clinton and Sheryl Sandberg. The other two consulting firms in the Big Three have employed some famous faces over the years, too.

From 2017 to 2021, the consulting firm McKinsey took in $77M in consulting contracts with just the US Food and Drug Administration alone.

The "Big Four" refers to Deloitte, PwC (also known as PricewaterhouseCoopers), KPMG, and EY. They more recently built out their business consulting practices in addition to accounting services.

Consulting firms also often keep their clients private to maximize the sectors they’re able to secure contracts for and avoid any perceived conflicts of interest.

While McKinsey worked with e-cigarette maker Juul, it also consulted for the US Food and Drug Administration's department regulating vaping and nicotine.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, the consulting firm Deloitte worked with the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to create a $44M website meant to help manage the public vaccination process. But despite the large budget, people started to take issue with the tool. Read the full story here.