Pure Potential

McKinsey & Co

Management Consulting at McKinsey

Management consulting can seem a pretty vague concept, and a lot of people call themselves management consultants. What do we - McKinsey - actually do, and how do we do it?

At McKinsey, we help some of the world's leading organisations. We give them impartial, objective advice so that they can make good decisions and be more successful in whatever they do. We might help them grow their company, make their manufacturing more efficient, organise themselves differently, acquire or merge with another company, adapt to changing consumer tastes, develop their 10 year strategy or understand how their business can become more global. We work with the public sector as well as the private sector, and sometimes also for charities.

We make sure our work will have lasting impact on the organisation. We always focus on the biggest issues - those that keep the senior leadership team awake at night. We bring together the best people from across the world and we work in close partnership with the client team.

A career at McKinsey

As a Business Analyst at McKinsey, you will have the opportunity to have immediate and direct contact with some of the world's top people in business and the public sector. You will have the opportunity to work in a wide range of industries and on a variety of business problems. And most importantly, your opinions will be encouraged and valued.

A career at McKinsey will not only provide you with invaluable skills and hands-on experience, but also a thorough grounding in the commercial world. We will support you with day-to-day mentoring and coaching, supported by comprehensive formal training programmes. Our commitment to development begins before you join, with funding for overseas language tuition and training in business basics.

What we look for

As you start thinking about University, it is normal to have no clear outline of your future career. We encourage you to get involved in a variety of activities that will help you identify your true passions in life. We expect graduates we hire to have made the most of their university life developing a wide range of skills, as well as achieving academic excellence.

We believe that bright, highly motivated newcomers to the business world can bring a fresh and bold point of view to bear on our clients' problems. Each year, McKinsey hires a number of outstanding graduates from a diverse range of academic disciplines as Business Analysts. We identify these graduates by looking for a variety of skills and experiences, including academic achievement (at least AAB at A Level or equivalent and a 2.1 degree), teamwork and leadership. You can demonstrate committed team participation in a number of ways - sports teams, elected society roles or academic project work. We also view work experience in any professional environment favourably, but ultimately we would like to see that you have made the most of the opportunities available to you at university. Whether through travelling, voluntary work or entrepreneurial enterprises, the graduates that will stand out to us are the ones who have used their time wisely.