18Juni

Consulting Project Prepare for a new job

I still remember the knot in my stomach the night before my first big consulting interview. I had spent weeks polishing my resume, practicing case studies until the numbers blurred, and memorizing every possible behavioral question. Yet, as I stared at the ceiling of my tiny apartment, I realized I had forgotten the most important part: preparing for the job itself, not just the interview. That moment taught me a lesson I now pass on to every client I coach—landing the role is only the beginning. The real challenge is stepping into it with confidence, competence, and a clear plan.

This isn’t just another career advice post. It’s a complete playbook for turning your consulting project into a launchpad for your next career move. Whether you’re a mid-career professional pivoting industries, a recent graduate eyeing McKinsey, or a freelancer ready to scale, this guide covers every angle. We’ll walk through mindset shifts, skill mapping, network leverage, interview mastery, and the often-overlooked art of post-offer preparation. By the end, you’ll have a personalized roadmap and the confidence to execute it.

The Hidden Opportunity in Every Consulting Project

Most people treat consulting gigs as transactions—deliver the deck, collect the check, move on. But the smartest professionals I know treat them as auditions. Every client meeting is a chance to showcase executive presence. Every data set you clean is proof of analytical rigor. Every recommendation you defend builds your personal brand.

Take Sarah, a former client of mine. She was a mid-level marketer at a CPG company when she took on a freelance strategy project for a startup. Instead of just delivering the market analysis, she volunteered to present findings to the CEO. That 15-minute presentation led to a full-time offer as Head of Growth. The project wasn’t about the deliverable—it was about demonstrating she could think, communicate, and lead at the next level.

Key Insight: Your consulting work is your most powerful case study. Document wins, quantify impact, and collect testimonials like currency. These become your currency in job negotiations.

Step 1: Reverse-Engineer the Role You Want

Before you update your LinkedIn or practice one more case, answer this: What does your ideal next role require that your current experience lacks?

I use a simple framework called the Role Gap Matrix. Draw four quadrants:

Top Left: Skills you have + role requires
Top Right: Skills you have + role doesn’t require
Bottom Left: Skills you lack + role requires
Bottom Right: Skills you lack + role doesn’t require

Fill this out honestly. The bottom-left quadrant is your action plan. For consulting roles, common gaps include:

Industry-specific knowledge (healthcare regulations, fintech compliance)
Advanced technical skills (Python for data consulting, Tableau expertise)
Client-facing experience at partner level
Published thought leadership

Action Step: For each gap, identify how your current project can close it. Example: If you need healthcare expertise, volunteer for a pro bono project with a digital health startup. If you need partner-level exposure, shadow your project lead in client meetings.

The Consulting-to-Perm Pipeline: Data and Reality

Let’s ground this in numbers. According to industry surveys (which I’ve aggregated from multiple sources over the years), 28% of management consultants transition to industry roles within 2 years of leaving firms. The success rate jumps to 47% for those who deliberately position their projects as stepping stones.

Here’s what separates the 47% from the rest:

Factor	Low-Transition Group	High-Transition Group
Project Selection	Takes any available work	Targets projects in desired industry/function
Client Relationships	Transactional (deliver & done)	Deep (regular check-ins, value-add beyond scope)
Impact Documentation	Vague („improved efficiency“)	Specific („reduced churn 32% via segmentation“)
Network Activation	Passive (LinkedIn updates)	Active (warm intros, coffee chats)
Skill Signaling	Resume bullet points	Published articles, speaking gigs

Table: The Transition Success Formula—What Separates Consulting Project Stars from Statistics

Mastering the Consulting Case Interview (Even If You’re Not Applying to MBB)

The case interview isn’t about getting the “right” answer. It’s about demonstrating structured thinking under pressure. Here’s the framework I teach that consistently lands offers:

The 5-Box Method:

Clarify (2 min): Restate the problem, ask 2-3 smart questions
Structure (3 min): MECE framework (e.g., Revenue = Price × Volume)
Analyze (15 min): Walk through math verbally, show work on paper
Synthesize (2 min): 30-second CEO summary + risks
Next Steps (3 min): Implementation roadmap + metrics

Pro Tip: Record yourself solving cases. The first time I did this, I discovered I said “um” 47 times in 20 minutes. Three weeks of deliberate practice cut it to 3.

Behavioral Stories: Your Secret Weapon

Consulting firms live and die by stories. The STAR method (Situation, Task, Action, Result) is table stakes. The differentiator is specificity + reflection.

Weak: “I led a team through a challenging project.”
Strong: “When our client’s legacy system crashed mid-implementation, I rallied a cross-functional war room of 12 people. We mapped 47 integration points in 36 hours, prioritizing revenue-critical paths first. The result? We launched on time and saved $2.3M in projected losses. This taught me that technical solutions fail without stakeholder alignment.”

Action Step: Mine your consulting project for 5 STAR stories. Categorize by leadership, analytical thinking, client management, and resilience.

The Post-Offer Playbook: 30-60-90 Day Domination

You got the offer. Now what? Most new hires coast through onboarding. The top 10% treat their first 90 days like a consulting engagement.

Week 1-2: Listen and Map

Schedule 1:1s with every team member
Create an org chart with influence lines (not just titles)
Identify the 3 burning platforms no one talks about

Week 3-4: Quick Wins

Pick one process that’s universally hated but low political risk
Fix it in <2 weeks (e.g., automate a weekly report)
Present results in a team meeting

Month 2-3: Strategic Impact

Propose one initiative tied to leadership’s stated goals
Build a coalition of 2-3 allies before pitching
Deliver a measurable pilot by day 90

Real example: A client of mine joined a Fortune 500 as a Strategy Manager. In month 2, she noticed the quarterly planning process took 400+ hours across teams. She built a simple Airtable dashboard that cut it to 80 hours. By day 85, she was leading the enterprise rollout. Six months later? Promoted to Director.

FAQ: Your Consulting-to-Career Questions Answered

Q: I’m a solo consultant. How do I get client exposure without a firm’s brand?
A: Create your own case studies. After each project, write a 1-page anonymized summary: problem, approach, results. Share selectively with prospects. Bonus: Turn these into LinkedIn posts or a newsletter. I grew my coaching practice 3x by sharing “behind the scenes” of client wins.

Q: Should I target consulting firms or industry roles directly?
A: Depends on your gap. If you need structured training and brand, go firm (2-3 years). If you have deep domain expertise, skip straight to industry—your consulting track record is the brand.

Q: How do I negotiate when my consulting rate is higher than the salary?
A: Reframe. “My consulting rate reflects project-based work without benefits. For a full-time role, I’m targeting $X base + bonus, which aligns with my impact.” Always anchor to value delivered, not hours billed.

Q: What if my project is in a “less sexy” industry?
A: Skills transfer. A logistics optimization project teaches supply chain rigor that applies to e-commerce, healthcare, or CPG. Translate: “Reduced delivery times 28% via route optimization” becomes “drove $4.2M in margin improvement through operational excellence.”

Q: How many hours should I invest in job prep while consulting?
A: The 5-Hour Rule. Dedicate 5 hours/week minimum: 2 for skill-building (courses, cases), 2 for networking (coffee chats, events), 1 for personal brand (writing, speaking). Consistency beats intensity.

Q: I bombed an interview. Is my project ruined?
A: No. Every rejection is data. Debrief: What surprised you? Where did you hesitate? One client turned a McKinsey rejection into a BCG offer by fixing her “overly academic” case style after feedback.

The Long Game: Building a Career Flywheel

Here’s the truth no one tells you: Your next job isn’t the destination. It’s the next rotation in a career flywheel. Each consulting project adds mass—skills, relationships, credibility. The faster it spins, the easier future transitions become.

I once coached a data scientist who started with freelance Tableau dashboards. Project 1 led to a fintech client. Project 2 (with that client’s referral) landed him a role at a Series C startup. Within 18 months, he was Head of Analytics at a unicorn. The flywheel? Each gig compounded his network, portfolio, and negotiation power.

Your 90-Day Challenge

Ready to turn your current project into a career accelerator? Here’s your action plan:

Days 1-7: Complete the Role Gap Matrix. Identify 1 gap your project can close.
Days 8-30: Document 3 quantifiable wins from your project. Turn 1 into a LinkedIn post.
Days 31-60: Schedule 5 coffee chats with people in your target role/industry. Ask: “What surprised you most in your first 90 days?”
Days 61-90: Apply to 1 dream role using your project as the centerpiece of your narrative.

Track progress in a simple Notion doc or Google Sheet. Celebrate small wins—each is compound interest on your career.

The knot in your stomach? It’s not fear. It’s potential energy. Channel it into deliberate preparation, and your consulting project won’t just pay the bills—it’ll write your next chapter. You’re not just delivering value to clients. You’re building the most important case study of all: your career.

20Jan.

Developing the Proper Business Performance

The Quiet Art of Turning Potential into Profit

I still remember the first time I watched a business die. It wasn’t dramatic—no bankruptcy filings, no tearful staff meetings. Just a slow fade. The owner, a brilliant engineer named Marcus, had built a software tool that solved a real problem for mid-sized manufacturers. His product was elegant, his customers loved it, and his margins were healthy. Yet every quarter, the numbers crept downward. Cash reserves thinned. Talented developers left for “better opportunities.” By the time Marcus called me, his company was a ghost ship—still sailing, but with no one at the helm.

What killed it wasn’t competition or bad luck. It was the absence of business performance—that invisible architecture of habits, measurements, and decisions that keeps a company alive and growing. Over the next eighteen months, we rebuilt the ship plank by plank. Today, Marcus’s firm is valued at eight figures and employs forty people who actually enjoy Monday mornings. The difference? A deliberate, almost obsessive focus on performance at every level.

This isn’t another rah-rah productivity post. It’s a field guide to the systems, mindsets, and micro-behaviors that separate thriving businesses from the merely surviving. We’ll walk through the psychology of high performers, the mathematics of sustainable growth, and the street-level tactics that turn abstract strategy into daily reality.

The Hidden Engine: What “Business Performance” Actually Means

Most people think performance is about hitting revenue targets or shaving minutes off production cycles. Those are outcomes. Real performance is the engine underneath—how clearly you see reality, how quickly you adapt, and how consistently you execute.

Think of it like a racing car. The engine (strategy), suspension (culture), tires (processes), and driver (leadership) must work in harmony. If one part fails, the whole machine underperforms. In business, the parts are:

Clarity: Knowing exactly where you are and where you’re going.
Alignment: Ensuring every person and process pulls in the same direction.
Velocity: The speed at which decisions turn into results.
Resilience: The ability to absorb shocks without breaking.

Marcus’s original sin? He had a powerful engine but no dashboard. He felt the business slowing down but couldn’t pinpoint why. Once we installed the right gauges—weekly cash runway, customer effort score, employee pulse surveys—the path forward became obvious.

The Psychology of Sustained Excellence

High-performing businesses don’t run on adrenaline; they run on dopamine loops designed into the work itself.

I once consulted for a logistics company whose drivers were burning out at twice the industry rate. The CEO’s solution? Bigger bonuses. It failed spectacularly. Why? Because money is a lagging motivator. What the drivers craved was progress—seeing a shipment move from “delayed” to “delivered” in real time.

We built a simple app that gamified their routes. Each completed stop triggered a micro-celebration: confetti animation, leaderboard update, personalized voice note from the dispatcher. Turnover dropped 60% in four months. The bonuses stayed the same.

The lesson: Performance isn’t about working harder; it’s about designing work that feels like play. Neuroscientists call this “flow state.” Businesses call it retention.

Three Psychological Levers Every Leader Must Pull

Autonomy within guardrails – Give teams freedom to choose how they hit targets, but never whether they hit them.
Visible progress – Make incremental wins impossible to miss. Use physical boards, Slack channels, or Monday all-hands “win parades.”
Social proof – Celebrate outliers publicly. When the quiet accountant finds a $40,000 tax credit, make her the hero of the week.

The Mathematics of Margin

Numbers don’t lie, but they do whisper. Learning to hear them is a superpower.

Let’s dissect a real P&L from a $3M SaaS company I advised last year (names changed, numbers real):

Line Item	Previous Year	Current Year	Delta	Hidden Story
Revenue	$3,120,000	$3,400,000	+9%	Growth masking churn
COGS	$780,000	$1,020,000	+31%	Vendor lock-in + scope creep
Gross Margin	75%	70%	-5pts	Death by a thousand cuts
Sales & Marketing	$624,000	$850,000	+36%	CAC up 28%, LTV flat
G&A	$468,000	$510,000	+9%	Headcount bloat
EBITDA	$1,248,000	$850,000	-32%	Profit engine stalling

At first glance, 9% revenue growth looks fine. Dig deeper, and you see a company spending its way to mediocrity. The fix? A 90-day “margin sprint”:

Renegotiated three vendor contracts → $180K savings
Killed two underperforming ad campaigns → $120K savings
Automated 40% of customer onboarding → 2 FTEs redeployed to revenue

Result: Gross margin back to 74% without losing a single customer.

The 80/20 Rule on Steroids

Most businesses waste 80% of their optimization effort on 20% of the levers. Flip it. Identify the vital few metrics that move the needle:

For SaaS: Churn rate, expansion revenue, magic number
For e-commerce: Return rate, AOV, email open rate
For services: Utilization rate, project margin, referral percentage

Track these religiously. Everything else is noise.

Building the Performance Architecture

Great performance doesn’t happen by accident. It’s engineered.

Phase 1: Diagnosis (Weeks 1–2)

“You can’t improve what you don’t measure.” – Peter Drucker (but he was only half right)

Measurement without context is useless. Start with a performance audit:

Financial pulse: 13-week cash flow forecast, unit economics dashboard
Customer pulse: NPS deep dives, lost customer interviews
People pulse: Anonymous “start/stop/continue” surveys
Process pulse: Time-motion studies on your top three revenue activities

I once discovered a $12M manufacturer losing $40,000/month because their ERP system defaulted to FIFO inventory accounting during supply chain disruptions. A two-line code fix saved them six figures annually.

Phase 2: Design (Weeks 3–4)

Create a Performance Playbook—a living document with:

OKRs (Objectives & Key Results) at company, department, and individual levels
Cadences: Daily huddles (5 min), weekly tactical (45 min), monthly strategic (3 hrs)
Scorecards: Green/yellow/red for every critical metric
Decision rights matrix: Who owns what, when

Pro tip: Limit company OKRs to three. More than that, and you’re managing a wish list.

Phase 3: Deployment (Weeks 5–12)

Roll out in sprints:

Sprint	Focus	Sample Initiative	Success Metric
1	Cash	Accelerate receivables	DSO < 35 days
2	Customers	Reduce support tickets	First response < 2 hrs
3	Team	Cross-train top 3 roles	Zero single points of failure
4	Growth	Launch referral program	15% of new revenue

Celebrate process wins, not just outcomes. When the accounting team shaves two days off monthly close, throw a pizza party. Culture compounds.

The Leadership Multiplier

I’ve never seen a high-performing business with a low-performing leader. The correlation is 1:1.

The best leaders I know practice radical transparency paired with fierce empathy. They share the unvarnished truth (“We’re burning cash too fast”) while making it safe to fail (“What experiment should we run this week?”).

The 4-Hour CEO Week

Yes, you read that right. The highest-leverage leaders I coach spend only four hours in meetings. The rest?

2 hours – Deep work on the #1 OKR
1 hour – Coaching direct reports (walking 1:1s preferred)
30 min – Reading (industry reports, customer tickets, competitor teardowns)
30 min – Personal recharge (gym, meditation, or staring at trees)

The secret? Ruthless delegation + airtight systems. If you’re still approving expense reports over $500, you’re doing it wrong.

Technology: Servant, Not Master

Tools amplify performance; they don’t create it.

I’m obsessed with the 80/20 tech stack—the minimal set of tools that deliver maximum clarity:

Finance: Cloud accounting + scenario modeling
CRM: One source of truth for customer data
Project: Visual workflow (Kanban > Gantt for most teams)
Communication: Async-first (recorded looms > live meetings)

Avoid the “shiny object” trap. Every new tool should pass the Grandma Test: If you can’t explain its ROI to your grandmother in one sentence, don’t buy it.

The Dark Side: When Performance Becomes Toxic

I’ve seen companies chase metrics into the ground. A call center once optimized “average handle time” so aggressively that customer satisfaction cratered. Employees gamed the system by hanging up on difficult callers. Revenue followed satisfaction off the cliff.

The antidote? Balanced scorecards that measure:

Output (revenue, units shipped)
Quality (NPS, defect rate)
Sustainability (employee engagement, cash buffer)

Never optimize one variable at the expense of the system.

Case Study: From Chaos to Compound Growth

Let’s return to Marcus’s software company. Here’s the transformation in numbers:

Metric	Year 0	Year 1	Year 2	CAGR
ARR	$1.8M	$2.9M	$5.1M	68%
Gross Margin	68%	74%	78%	—
Churn	22%	11%	6%	—
Employee NPS	42	76	89	—
Founder Hours/Week	80	55	40	—

The playbook:

Product: Shifted from custom dev to standardized modules (reduced delivery time 60%)
Sales: Implemented value-based pricing + customer success check-ins at day 30/90/180
Operations: Built a “single source of truth” dashboard updated in real time
Culture: Introduced “failure Fridays” where teams presented experiments that bombed—and what they learned

Today, Marcus spends August in Italy. The business runs without him. That’s the ultimate performance metric.

FAQ: Your Performance Questions, Answered

Q: My team resists new processes. How do I get buy-in?
A: Start with their pain. Ask: “What’s the most frustrating part of your week?” Build the first process to solve that. Early wins create momentum.

Q: How often should we review OKRs?
A: Grade them weekly, reset them quarterly. Annual OKRs are fantasy football.

Q: What if we’re a tiny team—can we still do this?
A: Especially. Small teams have less inertia. One founder I know runs a seven-person agency with a single Notion page: OKRs on the left, wins on the right, blockers in the middle. They’re profitable and fully remote.

Q: Isn’t all this structure going to kill creativity?
A: Constraints breed creativity. Think haiku, not free verse. The most innovative teams I know (design agencies, R&D labs) have the tightest performance cadences.

Q: How do I know if our culture is performance-oriented or just busy?
A: Ask departing employees: “When was the last time you felt truly proud of something you shipped?” If they can’t answer immediately, you’re busy, not performant.

Q: Can I copy another company’s system?
A: Copy the principles, not the practices. Amazon’s two-pizza teams work at Amazon. Your equivalent might be “three-latte projects.”

The Long Game: Performance as Identity

Years after saving Marcus’s company, I bumped into him at a conference. He was calmer, tanned, and—oddly—more intense. “You know what the real change was?” he asked. “I stopped thinking of performance as something we do. It’s who we are.”

That’s the endpoint. When your team reflexively asks “How do we measure this?” before starting any initiative… when a junior developer suggests A/B testing a new feature unprompted… when your CFO celebrates a cost saving with the same enthusiasm as a sales win—that’s performance baked into the DNA.

It’s not sexy. It’s not a hack. It’s the quiet accumulation of better questions, clearer data, and braver conversations. But it compounds. And unlike venture funding or viral marketing, it never runs out.

Your next step? Pick one metric that’s been nagging at you—churn, margin, response time—and build a 30-day experiment around it. Involve your team. Measure ruthlessly. Celebrate obsessively. Then stack the next experiment on top.

The race isn’t to the swift, but to the consistent. Start running.