Nope.....a day just didn't cover it. So I had to write about a travel week.

No day in the life of a Big4 Consultant is ever the same. If there’s 1 thing you need to get comfortable with as a Consultant is that things are always changing. As much as I loved my decade in Management Consulting, it is true that the following Murphy’s laws apply to everything you do:

  • Nothing is as easy as it looks
  • Everything takes longer than you expect
  • And, if anything can go wrong, it will, at the worst possible moment

So I will break it down by days of the week. And yes, the week starts on Sunday.

Sundays: Roughly an hour to pack, half-hour to prep and 2 hours spent in travel anxiety
You spend roughly 30 minutes packing your bags for the coming travel week…10 minutes if you’re a guy (I’m told!). Another 30 minutes addressing any other things you may need for the week (clothes, shoes, accessories, special foods/coffee etc.) You may not need this if you’re less fussy.

Some people reserve this for the 5am flights, but I like to know which meetings I am leading/ participating in at the client site on Mondays. It just adds a bit of predictability to a career that has so much inbuilt change and ambiguity.

This may not be true for you, but I was a very anxious traveler. Still am. I always think I have forgotten to pack something important. For some time, maintaining a travel kit of cosmetics worked well, but then I forgot to replenish it and that was annoying.

Also, the 5am flights were my nemesis. I couldn’t get to sleep till 12am thinking about how I’d get up the next morning - would my alarm go off? would i wake up my kids? would they cry that I was leaving them? would I not get up at all? UGH! Ironically, I could finally get some sleep when I had actually boarded that 5am flight!

Mondays: Land sleep-deprived at whatever client location.

Does it matter? I have to be in a board room all day. Lucky if it’s one with windows. But, hey! I have a plan ….I did that prep last night, remember? There’s a 50% chance my day will go as planned.

Meet with my team and set priorities for the week. Facilitate/lead sessions with clients that could be workshops, 1-on-1 meetings/interviews to deep dive into issues and get a better understanding of pain points, a review of deliverables etc.

Consulting projects are usually high-burn, especially strategy projects that have a. 6–8week time limit. The team usually orders dinner and eats in while finishing up deliverables or discussion documents for workshops/ meetings the net day. Mondays don’t get too late, mostly everyone (there are exceptions!) checks into their hotels and hits the sack early.

Tuesdays & Wednesdays: Quick checkpoint with the team and set priorities and checkpoints for the day.

Work on the feedback received from client meetings on Monday and do more analysis/research or update deliverables for the next review or meeting. There is a good chance that by now, the client has a change in priorities or a completely new issue has arisen. In that case, recalibrate - reprioritize - and - keep the client informed on the impact this change in approach may have on the timelines/ deliverables you were already working on.

Tuesdays and Wednesdays tend to run late mainly because most Consultants (unless they are local), fly back to their home location on Thursday afternoon and there is immense pressure to show the value-added during the week to the client before then.

Usually, the team gets dinner outside after work. This is the only opportunity for Consulting teams to bond/network and discuss things outside of work where the pace is mostly go-go-go! This is also the more glamorous part of Consulting - the lavish dinners, new restaurants every night, points from weekly hotel stays and flights, all expenses paid (up to the limits of course!)

Thursdays: Fly Day!

This is the day where all the homebodies head home and the footloose do Alt Travel.

Let me explain more. In most Consulting firms, Consultants are given an allowance to travel back to their home location every week. It doesn’t matter where your home is - to the firm or to the Client (who eventually is paying for this btw as part of the contract). So you are allowed to say, fly to Chicago instead of flying back to LA from Charlotte. This is a major attraction for travel buffs.

Usually, the Consultants pack up by Thursday afternoon and head to the airport. Not to say their work ends at 2pm on a Thursday! On the contrary, their calls keep going till the airline staff has given them 3 warnings and their laptops pop up as soon as the announcement to use devices is made in the air!

Personally, I never liked working on flights, and tried to avoid it as much as I could! I didn’t succeed all the time though. Especially when my flights were delayed by 2 hours every week and I was sitting in a stationary plane on the runway. It made more sense to finish my work and make more time for family when I actually got home.

Fridays: ‘Net-work-to-get-work’

These days are mostly spent in the local Consulting office. Partners and Managing Directors in leading firms make it a point to be present in the office on Fridays to meet new talent, participate in internal firm initiatives (recruiting interviews, trainings, firm cultural events, networking events, business development - working on proposals and prep for Oral presentations for potential projects, etc.)

It makes sense to be part of 1 or more such initiatives to organically network with Partners to keep a good pipeline of projects and be top of mind for them to consider you for future opportunities.

Big Consulting firms usually have a LOT going on - a lot of events, initiatives, trainings, business development/sales work. It can get overwhelming! Best to pick and choose a few targeted networking opportunities that help you grow the type of network you want.

Saturdays: This is the one day that was yours and yours only!

Unless you’re working on a Sales proposal that is due or needs meetings with Partners/MDs who have not had the time to review it during the week. Then this lovely haven of a day can quickly turn into another go!go!go! situation.

This is what a typical week in Consulting used to look like until March 2020. But the lines are blurring with this new COVID situation (my Consulting friends tell me). Travel restrictions and conference calls have added another layer of complexity to the way we network, interact with clients, and keep our personal boundaries (if any).

More on that in my next post. Are you a new Consultant? Share your experiences in the comments below.

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 Punya is a former management consultant with 15 years of experience at 2 Big4 firms, serving top Fortune500 clients. She has lived and worked in 6 countries and changed 3 careers working across several industries. Punya is passionate about coaching new and aspiring Consultants to succeed in Management Consulting.