Attracting the Best Pre-MBA Consultants

What goes into "MBA support"? Well, the most common answer to this question is financial support for your analysts' pursuits of their MBAs — but there is far more opportunity for discussion than making it all about funding.
  
Many consulting companies already recognize that "homegrown" talent is valuable. Business analysts and consultants work intensely for two to four years, becoming intimately familiar with the company culture and offerings of the firm. Providing funding to consultants is a way to lure them back after business school and thus not lose any of that knowledge to other firms.

I recently interviewed a group of representatives from top consulting companies, including firms like Deloitte, AT Kearney, Analysis Group, and Cornerstone Research. One of the representatives suggested that it costs approximately 25 percent less to hire an analyst, train her, and eventually send her to business school than it does to have to recruit her as a new MBA. This evidence suggests that there is significant financial benefit to sponsoring their graduate education.
 
However, there is another aspect of this to consider. Again, returning to the experience of my colleague, I learned that at his firm only 25 percent of those sponsored actually return to their home consultancy. This is supported by my personal experience, through which I have observed that only about 30 percent of my clients return to their home consultancy or business upon graduation. Since funded consultants who don't return typically have to repay their sponsored tuition, this contradicts the notion that MBA funding is the only crucial form of support. Perhaps, while funding is a wonderful opportunity, there is something else that these folks are looking for.

Then what is it that is most highly valued? As an admissions consultant, I talk to a lot of pre-MBA consultants struggling with the balance between work and application prep. The one characteristic that is most common among them all is their stress level. Getting into the best business school programs takes considerable effort. I would classify most of my colleagues in the consulting world as "overachievers," a label that I too wear proudly. But with overachieving often comes being stretched too thin and being stressed. So, when it comes time to prepare for the application process, consultants can often find themselves behind the eight ball in trying to balance client work, internal company support, and application prep.
 
I polled my past and present clients and talked with them about what they would value the most in terms of company support. While it is not surprising that MBA funding ranked high in terms of a desirable form of support, what is surprising is that creation of connections with top business schools was ranked at an even higher level and assistance and guidance with the application process ranked very closely thereafter. This tells me that while I don't recommend that any firms eliminate their funding opportunities, I do recommend that they look at what sort of internal support for the application process itself they do provide.
 
I think that this is particularly good news for smaller consultancies who may not yet offer funding. It suggests that there is an opportunity for companies to set up programs to help their analysts get off to a good start when it comes to jumping on the MBA application bandwagon. It means that there is probably a real bang for the buck in process support.

So, what can you do that will be helpful and also result in a valuable recruiting tool? There are lots of ways to help out your consultants as they ramp up to the application process. When I work directly with firms, I usually suggest looking into ways to leverage available talent in terms of building connections. Also, editing services and other cost-effective support can be provided to the MBA candidates. And, I can't stress enough the importance of creating a process with longevity to leverage what one group of applicants and their mentors has done from year to year.

I have worked with groups of consultants who diligently gather information and create connections, only to watch it all disappear when these guys make their way off to business school. The following year, the next group of consultants finds itself having to start from scratch and figure out how to make the connections and create materials.
 
I think that the schools themselves also respond to a well organized program. The confusion created by a lack of "process memory" can be a detriment. Again, creating an internal process can sometimes be a challenge, since those who would be owning or supporting these services are, like the analysts, stretched, stressed, and working hard. Some firms bring in outside support to get processes off the ground and provide initial direction.

Do all firms offer support? I was surprised to find during my research that there was a wide variety of support. It ranges from a highly organized process to no support at all.
 
A common type of offering is what I will call "informal support." Typically, this means that it is up to the consultant to track down how to find help, but once they find it, they are welcome to it. This can be very difficult for a consultant who is traveling and working long hours. It is also a very inefficient method of offering support, since such a method means that any "lessons learned" are probably lost from year to year.
 
Annually, each MBA candidate has to swim against the tide and track down contacts and assistance. The bigger the firm gets, the more ambiguous this process becomes. I don't think it is any coincidence that the firms that said they offered support but "left it to the candidate" to search out assistance tended to have a significantly lower "hit rate" in terms of candidates successfully getting into their top-choice business schools.
 
Then there are the firms that have historically put forth vast support for their analysts. These tend to be larger, more established firms such as McKinsey, Deloitte, BCG, and Bain, which are reported to provide funding as well as contacts and process support. Many of these firms create formalized programs through which they bring in admissions directors from the top schools for presentations and Q&A sessions.

Deloitte, for example, has hosted an annual graduate school symposium for their consultants. This provides them the opportunity to have direct interaction with the admissions directors from top schools. Another interesting aspect of Deloitte's support is that their analysts manage an internal Web site that captures information about the process. This ensures process memory.
 
Even some firms that may not be quite as large, like Analysis Group, PRTM, and AT Kearney, provide some opportunity in terms of potential for funding, tuition reimbursement, or signing bonuses upon return and perhaps some level of support for connecting with the business schools. AT Kearney is reported to give candidates a full week off to work on their applications and provides a two-day "MBA Forum" to which they invite top schools in to meet their candidates.
 
All in all, the companies that formalized programs with well defined "memory," connections, and processes tended to have a much higher "hit rate" — no matter what their size. Whether funding is available or not, the ability to go where he wants to go seems to be more affected by what kind of internal support the consultant gets while he is preparing to apply and during the application process.
 
One company that caught my eye as I was doing my analysis was Cornerstone Research. They may not have all of the extensive offerings of some of the big firms, but they are approaching the process very intelligently, and I think that they have hit on some great ideas. One impressive idea they are considering is identifying three stages in the years of development of the pre-MBA consultants. At each of these three junctures, the firm's mentors would work with the consultants with the idea of "keeping their eyes on the prize."
 
So, for example, consultants in their second year or so with the firm might work with a mentor to assess how the consultant's experiences are helping him or her grow and develop — specifically in terms of providing the right opportunities that business schools are looking for.
 
This means that they have vision into whether each consultant is getting the type of job experience that will give him or her good material to work with when they have to write essays and talk about experiences. At a later juncture, they would start working on the application process itself. I have to say that there have been too many times when I have worked with candidates who have great potential but at the same time have client exposure or job experiences that were weak. This made it difficult to create a compelling story in their application package. Working with the consultants early in their work experience will enable them to have a more interesting and broadening experience. This translates to better material for essay and interview discussions.
 
But what if your firm isn't ready to offer funding or you're looking for another value-add? Again, there is tremendous opportunity in simply offering support. Hardworking consultants who have provided positive impact at the client site are great candidates for business school. But in order to get there, they need to complete their GMATs successfully, have time to sit down with potential recommenders, visit college campuses, attend information