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Comment by shostack | Hacker News Reader

Having watched way too much "House of Lies" where consultants often seem to be brought in to back-up the viewpoint of a given executive and make the case for whatever that person's agenda is...what would such consultants likely be doing in this case in "the real world?"

I admittedly haven't had the experience of working with any consultants, so I'm curious for opinions from those who have what happens when they come in during a "typical" engagement of this nature.

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I spent a few years as a management consultant. Consultants are almost never hired to provide truly objective analysis. In most cases, they're hired to "back-up the viewpoint of a given executive". This is done by the executive to hedge the political risk required to go through with their action. They can point to McK when they defend their strategy to the board and then throw them under the bus if things don't pan out.

The rewards for the consultant are high fees and living a luxe lifestyle of staying at high end hotels, traveling first class, and dining at michelin starred restaurants (all of course on the client's dime). Plus of course guaranteed future work. Even if the project tanks and the executive is fired, they'll be sure to hire McK again at their next gig.

What most people don't realize is that consulting engagements are a careful collaboration between consultant and client. The findings are almost always driven by an iterative process where you go through review cycles with the buyer until you reach your "objective" conclusions, which by the very nature of how the work is performed, is totally subjective and biased. Doubly so for turnaround projects like this one. (not to mention that consultants are constantly trying to recycle previously performed analysis, regardless if it at all fits or applies in the target project).

Management consultant is the biggest circlejerk profession. Even moreso IMO than ibanking. Classic self-serving MBA type job. Management consultants are to entrepreneurs what food critics are to chefs.

Without being too cynical, there's a lot of truth in that. The one time I worked closely with management consultants, a few were sharp, one or two not so much. At the end, they came to similar conclusions that we had already come to anyway but they sold that analysis to the executives.

>Management consultants are to entrepreneurs what food critics are to chefs.

Eh. Good food critics cut through a lot of trendiness. Of course, a lot of food critics aren't good.

Yap pretty much. Remember reading an expose with some examples of how consulting firms would hire fresh grads from Ivy Leagues, and then send them to big companies, for top dollar, (or to other countries like Saudi Arabia) to basically do what you describe -- support the viewpoint of the executive who hired them. Of course all done officially with power point slides, excel spreadsheets and pie charts.

At the top tier firms, the creation of slides, charts, etc is usually outsourced to a back office dedicated to the job. I'm not sure if this is still the case at McK, but this office used to be stationed in the developing world...

Consultants would draw and describe what they wanted, goto bed, and awake to slides, charts in their inbox.

Same thing with models. Most firms have "rockstar excel jockeys" (usually analysts/associates/etc.) that are pimped out to project teams to serve this singular role (making models, building business cases, etc.).

Management consulting, such a surreal profession...

This is also a large part of why the "Ivy League" is perpetuated. Not because the graduates or the education is special, but because it provides a "stamp" that its alumni can give out to clients to give authority to client decisions and absorb heat from cover clients' mistakes.

I wonder why if this is the case that someone hasn’t tried to create a “discount” management consulting service which aims to give management cover, but without all the first class travel and high living. It can’t cost that much to put together a flashy powerpoint presentation.

The high cost is part of the service. "We spared no expense planning this failed initiative and hired the best consultants. What more could we have done?"

Prestige is part of what you're paying for, though.

That is not part, it is ALL that you are paying for.

What is the difference between McK and Deloitte? One has Harvard grads the other has Cornell grads. The analysis is the same, but one is just wrapped up in a prettier package and more prestige.

Are there not managers looking for cover that don’t care about prestige? I can understand the need for cover when making controversial decisions, but not why it needs to be expensive.

The same reason there aren't "discount" Rolls-Royces:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veblen_good

Couldn't agree with you more on all major points. Let's try the closing analogy one more time, though.

Consultants:entrepreneurs = husbands:Kardashian sisters.

Where did you land after consulting?

I went from Accenture's management consulting practice to Goldman Sachs. Sweet gig. Totally on point to what the parent says.

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