The author reflects on their experience at Boston Consulting Group, joining as an idealistic graduate but quickly encountering the uninspired conformity of management consulting culture. Despite the high ambitions typically associated with top firms like BCG, many employees, including the author, engage in performative conversations to gain social approval. As they began actual consulting work focused on social issues such as migrant services, the author grappled with the gap between their initial motivations for change and the mundane reality of the industry's operations.
We were a group of selfish conformists who chose to stay on the hyper-tracked path to management positions in powerful American institutions.
In truth, the conversations were boring. There may have been some true believers, but many of us were playing a cynical roleplaying game.
Collection
[
|
...
]