Eat, Sleep, Work, Network

You're social life in consulting, is going to vary significantly on your team, project, and location. For those of you who may get posted in a small town in the midwest that has 1 sheraton hotel your options after work may be limited. Having said that, it is likely you will really get to know your co-workers by the end of the internship.

For those of you who are posted in Boston, NYC, San Fran etc, there will be a lot more options. Having said that, your experience will end up being what you make of it.

In consulting, (and i'm sure many other fields) the social life is part of your networking, which is a significant part of your experience over the summer. In order for to obtain my full time offer, I am being evaluated on several factors which include the basics (written, communication, presentation skills, etc). But more importantly, am I a social "fit" within my team.

As a team we spend a lot of hours together, especially considering that we travel. It is not uncommon after a 10 hour work day, to have a 2 hour dinner meeting/discussion. That's a lot of time to spend with people you just met. And if you don't enjoy each others' company it feels a lot longer than 12 hours!!!

Those are just the days where I am on the customer's site (in Boston). On Friday, I am typically in my home office in Chicago where I need to network with the peers at the local office, mentors, partners, etc. OH and somehow find time with the family as well (wife and son).

It is a daunting task, no doubt but that is what we sign up for in consulting. You will find you come become very efficient with your hours, and flexible. One specific example, there was a partner at my firm who I really wanted to meet to learn more about his work and experience. We both happened to be golf fans, so we played a round of 18 holes on Saturday morning, at 5:50am!!! That was his only availability!

The "easy" part about the networking, is the firm knows how important is too network and have made every effort to make it easier for the interns. A sample of events that they have provided to date:

• Every friday happy hour in the office at 4pm. The firm provides food and drinks, which has a magic affect on attracting people
• Cubs game - Attended by associates, partners, interns, etc
• Taste of Chicago festival: Provided free food tickets
• Various nights out at local bars/restaurants etc

In regards to workload, I'm not going to lie. There is a lot of work to do. However, there is no cookie cutter model to predict your workload. It is dependent on a multitude of factors which include

• The client
• The partner/principle driving the project
• stage of the project (starting, mid, ending)
• proposal work vs deliverable work
• location
• team composition

In my case, our project was at the early stages. Within 3 weeks the project was cancelled, and restarted in a lesser capacity with half the team. There have been days where I worked 12 hours, others where I had light 8 hour days. Read other blogs, talk to other interns, there are those who work 14 hours days.

The message here...be prepared for variability. Do not expect a 9-5 lifestyle. But expect variety, interesting work, really smart people, and to be challenged on a daily basis.

Until next time..

Omair

Sleepless in Seattle:         Network, Network, Network

How time flies… I’m in my 5^th week of the internship and I try to network as much as possible. I Network with people in my team, in my division, in my company and with other MBA’s. Most of the network is done through lunch meetings and coffee breaks – you probably know what I’m talking about. Although it is pretty easy to stay in my room, crunching presentations and data to provide some sort of useful output to my group I prefer to fill-up my day with meetings – and my nights with the crunching and reading and processing the data.

My networking can be divided into 3 types. The first is the most important one – the internal division network. I am engaging in meetings and casual conversations with people from my own group and division to learn about them and their day2day work. To understand how they could help me with my project, what is it like to work with and around them and just to enjoy the company of very smart and fun people. The second kind is the future type – I try to meet with people from different divisions and different roles in the company to understand how the big picture comes together, to see the vision of other people in different positions around the company. The third type is the MBA connection – I try to attend all the organized events that the Microsoft recruiters sponsor and the unofficial ones also.

But more than everything I try to manage time to be with my family. I haven’t seen them for 4 weeks and my entire first MBA year was mainly around recruiting and networking, so the time I spent with my wife and kids was pretty limited. I can’t say I have much more time now but it is much better than before. So most of the days I try to be home around 19:00-20:00 be with my kids for couple of hours and back to some work around 23:00.

                                                                                                                Till next time,

                                                                                                                                Barak