Kearney reviews

The main problem with A.T. Kearney lies in its poor brand name. Everybody in the market knows about it and have it in high esteem, but within less informed circles the name does not mean a lot. Many even confuse ATK with other Big-4 audit firms. Ironically, from the perspective of the partners, this is actually good for business. After the financial meltdown ATK did pretty well. Many longstanding clients hired us because of our operations focus (i.e. lots of sourcing, cost-reduction, transformation projects) and we did not have to compete head-to-head with MBB. However, for the vast majority of the employees the lack of a strong brand name does have significant cons: (1) There is a Catch-22 in terms of work content. Clients do not see us as strategic advisors and we limit ourselves to operations-focused work, which in turn limits the experience that consultants get, and ultimately leads to fewer exciting projects in the long run. (2) There is also a Catch-22 in terms of image. Although other firms do plenty of operations work, people in ATK view themselves an edge lower than those at MBB, which in turn leads to a lack of swagger and pride shown to clients, and in turn having a weaker brand name. Actually, in an annual partners meeting, a big-name client (CEO of Fortune 100 company) told the audience that ATK consultants lacked confidence and could benefit from being more assertive. (3) Exit opportunities beyond the analyst/associate role are quite narrow. The longer you stay the harder it is to leave. Most managers and principals leave to become sourcing managers/directors at former clients. Perhaps many stay because they can’t leave elsewhere. Cool jobs in the Valley (Google, Apple, Facebook, Uber) or investor-side private equity gigs (Apax, Blackstone) are a quite a stretch. The only private equity role you can realistically bid for, not surprisingly, is on the operations team. As everyone that leaves consulting, many of my friends from MBB firms struggled to find attractive jobs but I've found that very few managers or principals from A.T. Kearney have made stellar transitions. The lack of brand name and operations-focused roles significantly limits your job prospects. While I was recruiting for general manager roles at the Valley and other startup hubs I had to carefully outline who A.T. Kearney was. I commonly told my interviewers: "It's like an MBB consulting firm". (4) Travel seems to be a bit higher than the norm but not excessively so. Old-time partners prefer a very "on-hands" approach, which essentially means working 4-days a week at the client site. The problem with having a weak brand name is that partners want to “impress” clients and try to "over deliver" by having as many troops as they can at the site. Of course clients care about the presence of consultants but trying to over deliver through that way seems to be missing the point. (5) While progress has been made in improving alumni programs, those that leave A.T. Kearney are still seen somewhat as "defectors" and not really as a natural thing of the industry. Very few ever become a partner, and that is anywhere in the industry. ATK consultants (non-partners) rarely attends alumni events. The few that attend those events are mainly former staff members (whom I love and admire...but you get the point).

Absolutely hopeless joke of a firm. There is nothing called research that happens here. All I am asked to do is to download reports and forward them. No one has a clue as to what there is, in those reports. Being a part of ATK GSC is like entering a geriatric care ward. People come to chill, create kids, and retire. The work is soo retarded that employment prospects post this place would be that of a call centre or security personnel . The senior management is not concerned about employees or work quality. All they care about is Glassdoor ratings. When ever the ratings go down, we are given a sermon. Why don't they understand that in order to get good ratings , one needs to do good work. Artificially improving things won't work