I've worked across 5 countries and spoken English in all my jobs but when I joined a Big-4 Consulting firm in the U.S., I was SO confused about so many terms that Consultants used on a day to day basis!

Body language is it's own devil (more on that in a later post) but Consulting has it's own written and verbal language. It took me a few years to figure out some of these, so this will definitely give you a headstart in understanding what your Consulting collegues are talking about!

Bandwidth – Availability – “Do you have any bandwidth to help with a proposal this week?”
Boil the ocean – To address everything all at once. “Let’s pick the top 5 issues to address that can have the maximum impact and not boil the ocean”
Bottoms-up - develop a strategy using assumptions at lower-level to drive numbers at high-level
Bottom of the hour – When the long hand of the clock is pointing downwards. “He asked us to meet him at the bottom of the hour”
Bucket – To categorize. “Let’s bucket these items and address by category”
Buttoned-down - Complete and thorough
Buy-in – Approval. “Let’s get the client sponsor’s buy-in before we conduct this analysis”
80/20 rule - Pareto rule - 80% of value can be achieved in 20% of time
C-suite - all execs with a capital C in their title (C stands for “Chief”)
Chargeable expense/project – Refers to a charge code that is used to capture time/ expense related to a project. This is used to track actual cost vs. budget. 
Circle back - to get together later or answer a question later. “Let’s circle back on this after we get the latest report from Finance”
Cycles – Unused capacity. “Do you have spare cycles to help with a proposal this week?”
Deck – Slides/ Presentation. “How’s the deck coming along?”
Divide and conquer – Split tasks 
Dot the Is and cross the Ts - tie out all loose ends
Drill-down / double-click / in the weeds- to get into the details. “We have the details in the supporting excel file if you want to double click on any of these numbers”
Due diligence - thorough research / study of an area. “
EOD - End of day  - 5pm for your client - for you its when the work gets done!
Facetime  - In person interaction with clients/ colleagues. “You need to be on the client site more often to get facetime with the client’s team”
Get in sync – Agree / Align on approach. “We need a workshop to get all department heads to get in sync and support this strategy”
Get their blessing – Approval. “We are waiting to get the CXOs blessing on this strategy”
Greenfield - new client opportunity
Hard stop - When you absolutely have to leave at a certain time
Hit the ground running - learning / getting up to speed quickly 
Impact - The tangible measurable results of the engagement
Lab / Greenhouse - Fancy name for a workshop
Leverage - Use of resources / people/ knowledge to achieve your goal
Line of sight
Low-hanging fruit / Quick wins - Easy to accomplish areas that have impact
Managing upwards - Helping superiors by providing timely updates
MECE - Mutually exclusive Collectively exhaustive
On the beach/bench – When you are not assigned to a project or waiting for your next project to start
Pipeline - Upcoming projects for a Consulting firm
Proposal - A pitch for a new opportunity/sale/ project 
Real estate (on slide) - White space available to write
Reinvent the wheel – Trying to accomplish the same goal without using a tried and tested approach
Smell test/ gut feel – What your intuition tells you to do
SWOT analysis - Strength-Weakness-Opportunity-Threat
Think out-of-the-box - Being creative  - using a Non-standard way of resolving issues
Top-down approach - Creating a strategy using high-level assumptions to estimate 
Top of the hour – When the long hand of the clock is on top (e.g. 4 o’clock). “We are at the top of the hour – so let’s close and park these discussion items for the next meeting”
smaller-level numbers
Touchbase - get in touch with someone
Triage - to get more than 2 opinions on a matter to help you make a a decision
Value add/ Adding value - Increasing profitability/ reducing cost/ meeting deadlines

Any more Consulting terms you've heard of not in the list above? Share in the comments or write to me at punya@byondgood.com.

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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.