Interesting discussion here. A few things spring to mind:
- Consulting training still has an element of programming, but I suspect that will go when Core Analyst School moves to Bangalore later this year. The value is not that those guys will ever code, but to give them a feel for the types of problems that the engineers face.
- Solutions delivery (offshore or on) has pretty much taken development work off the plate of a consulting analyst.
- Consulting recruitment is swinging to favour engineering and technical disciplines more than it has historically.
- This group naturally favours high risk/high reward, deep technical competance, and engineering as a craft. This is antithetical to firms like Accenture that favour low risk (imply your own corrollary), relationships and business knowledge, and engineering as an industry. This is also favoured by our clients, which is why it's a very successful business.
- I've seen some projects in pretty dire straits, and I've seen over-committments. I've also seen some very effective cross-discipline teams dealing very well with difficult client situations. I've met a lot of very impressive people, and I've learnt a great deal from them.
- It's a truism that Accenture wouldn't be there unless there was a difficult business problem that the client felt that they couldn't solve on their own. Sometimes they couldn't have, but more frequently, in my experience, they could have done it themselves if it weren't for a paralysing fear of change.
- Internally, the firm changes org structure most years. This results in a very strong culture of personal network above business organisation. People are astonishingly willing to help someone they've never met, even when they are on the other side of the planet, and there's absolutely nothing in it for themself.
- I've never seen behaviour that I would regard as remotely unethical.
- The comment about NHS is right - Accenture UK took a massive financial hit, which resulted in a promotion freeze, and pay rises of less than inflation that year.
- My feeling at the moment is that Management Consulting will become much more distinct from Technology, which in turn will become more like a "normal" technology company.
Finally, it strikes me as a bit ironic that no one has yet highlighted the similarities between a "classic" Accenture project team and a startup. Both arrogantly believe that they can change things for the better by working very hard, learning a lot as they go and blending a variety of hard and soft skills. Sound familiar?
It sounds like you work for Accenture, out of interest, have you ever worked at a startup?
[Edit: I'm not asking to be snarky, just curious as I know a few people who have worked for big consulting firms and who now work for early stage companies and who relish the difference in environment. I was curious to see if anyone has gone in the other direction.]
I worked at Accenture for 10 years and am on my second yC-funded company after leaving there. While I would never go back to that environment, I praise it for what it is to this day. I strongly believe more than ever you just need to understand yourself and "how you're built" and choose the environment that is most appropriate for you. And that may change over time like it did for me. But some people don't like the risks inherent in startups, or they need more structure to their day and know they don't do good with minimal direction and if that's the case, a place like Accenture is a pretty good place to work.
I wouldn't give back the skills I learned at Accenture and they've been invaluable for working on Inkling, our first B2B business. From day 1 I knew how to deal with large corporate cultures, understood the procurement process, how to manage projects, create a budget, write proposals, deal with various personalities, run a meeting and conduct workshops, conference call etiquette. It may sound simplistic, but I can't tell you the number of deals I've seen blown up simply because people don't really understand the business of business. Those skills are a lot harder to pick up in a startup.
I've done what I'd call an "internal startup", which was successful, but with which I no longer have a great deal of involvement. I used a few hundred k of seed funding and a team of 4 to build a web app over about 4 months. It's in use at about 20 customers internationally, and is now delivered as a service model, sold internally through cross charging. i.e. we deal with internal partners and they do their own deal with the customer. I like to think it gave me a feel for some of the issues faced when doing a startup, but without many of the risks.
- Consulting training still has an element of programming, but I suspect that will go when Core Analyst School moves to Bangalore later this year. The value is not that those guys will ever code, but to give them a feel for the types of problems that the engineers face.
- Solutions delivery (offshore or on) has pretty much taken development work off the plate of a consulting analyst.
- Consulting recruitment is swinging to favour engineering and technical disciplines more than it has historically.
- This group naturally favours high risk/high reward, deep technical competance, and engineering as a craft. This is antithetical to firms like Accenture that favour low risk (imply your own corrollary), relationships and business knowledge, and engineering as an industry. This is also favoured by our clients, which is why it's a very successful business.
- I've seen some projects in pretty dire straits, and I've seen over-committments. I've also seen some very effective cross-discipline teams dealing very well with difficult client situations. I've met a lot of very impressive people, and I've learnt a great deal from them.
- It's a truism that Accenture wouldn't be there unless there was a difficult business problem that the client felt that they couldn't solve on their own. Sometimes they couldn't have, but more frequently, in my experience, they could have done it themselves if it weren't for a paralysing fear of change.
- Internally, the firm changes org structure most years. This results in a very strong culture of personal network above business organisation. People are astonishingly willing to help someone they've never met, even when they are on the other side of the planet, and there's absolutely nothing in it for themself.
- I've never seen behaviour that I would regard as remotely unethical.
- The comment about NHS is right - Accenture UK took a massive financial hit, which resulted in a promotion freeze, and pay rises of less than inflation that year.
- My feeling at the moment is that Management Consulting will become much more distinct from Technology, which in turn will become more like a "normal" technology company.
Finally, it strikes me as a bit ironic that no one has yet highlighted the similarities between a "classic" Accenture project team and a startup. Both arrogantly believe that they can change things for the better by working very hard, learning a lot as they go and blending a variety of hard and soft skills. Sound familiar?