Friday, June 18, 2010

Consulting - Week 1. Check!

Phew - week 1 of my consulting internship at Booz & Co. is almost over, and I can already feel the heat of the fast paced consulting career! My first week was very similar to what the other Ross-er at Booz has experienced - drinking from a fire hose. Think first week of RLI - on steroids.

The first day involved the "logistics" - laptop, paperwork, welcome presentation and address, etc. The second day onwards, "the game" was on! By "the game", I mean a training simulation where we are all assigned to teams and have to work together on a client engagement. Our engagement working sessions were peppered with training sessions for Excel, Powerpoint, Company culture and policy, etc. "The game" ended with the teams presenting and the team coaches giving each of us feedback. My, how much we all had to learn! The final day involved Booz's version of the follies. Given the high quality of the skits that were put up with less than 45 mins of preparation time, I strongly believe that most people in my class would do wonderfully in the entertainment industry! And oh, did I mention that we all ended every night with copious amounts of alcohol in our systems? Good times.

Today is my first day at my home office - Chicago. I have received my project assignment and couldn't have asked for anything better! I strongly believe that I will get a chance to apply concepts learnt from multiple classes at Ross. My client is based in New Jersey, which is also awesome, because my wife is in New York, and this makes things a whole lot easier! So right now, I have received a couple of project documents and am busy poring over them to make sure that I show up on the client side with an informed view of the current situation. I expect to be challenged significantly - both in terms of analytical skills and organizational skills. Do not underestimate the latter. The number of things that have to be managed, in addition to your regular work, is fairly daunting - timesheets, learning sessions, conference calls, mentor meetings, office luncheons - the list is seemingly endless! But this is exactly what I signed up for, and I am eagerly looking forward to the next 8 weeks of the internship.

And oh yes, before I forget: Viva Argentina!

No comments:

Post a Comment