Consulting - Alumni Report 2018 - InsideIIM Alumni Report

This is the 6th Edition of the InsideIIM Alumni Reports. In this part of the report, we will focus on one of the most sought-after post-MBA domains: Consulting. This report will analyse the various trends pertaining to the alumni strength of various top b-schools at the most desired Consulting firms. The top firms have been selected based on the InsideIIM Recruitment Survey Reports. We will look at absolute numbers of alumni in each company and compare percentages of alumni in 2 ways –

1. Which school has the highest representation of a company among its ‘peers’?
2. Which company has the highest percentage of alumni for a given business school?

(Peers are defined based on the year of establishment of the business school. More details below) Why do we create this report every year? 1) To help potential aspirants know about a business school’s reputation in the corporate world – alumni stats are a good indicator – both numbers, as well as diversity, are important. 2) It helps current students and alumni get an overall picture of their own alumni and facilitates more targeted networking Creation of 2 Business School Clusters – Pre 1966 and Post 1966 Top b-schools in India are divided into two categories based on the years in which they were established. The rationale behind such as a selection criterion is to ensure that the alum base is strong and comparable for the b-schools under consideration. As there was no top b-school established between 1965 and 1973, the cut-off year chosen for dividing the schools is taken to be 1965. This criterion divides the schools in two clusters – Cluster 1 – Pre-1966 and Cluster 2 – Post-1966 – having 8 schools in each cluster. The table summarizes these clusters with the year of establishment. Analysis of Alumni in Consulting Companies: A total of 17 companies were considered to represent the consulting sector. These companies are among the top rated names in InsideIIM’s Annual Recruitment Survey. The list of companies is considered to be comprehensive in the sense that they are not only prominent companies every MBA aspirant/graduate looks out for but also cover the entire spectrum of strategy consulting, IT consulting, supply chain consulting & others. The Pre 1966 Top Business Schools Given below is the raw data from LinkedIn for the 8 Schools in this cluster of schools established prior to 1966. The analysis done below gives a detailed look into:

1. Company wise slicing of Alumni across Pre-1966 b-schools.
2. Cumulative percentage of alumni working in different companies.

% of Alumni in each Company from each of the 8 Top Schools established prior to 1966

Reference - In the above table, wherever the percentage of total alumni from a b-school in a particular company crosses 20%, it has been marked in Blue. Key takeaways:

1. The MBB* firms are dominated by the old IIMs who make up a colossal 77% of the total alumni working there. This is in line with the fact that these firms hire only from a select few b-schools of the country (and globally).
2. XLRI Jamshedpur is almost at par with IIMs A and C, both in the HRM (People advisory) domain as well as Management Consulting domain. XLRI alumni presence is significantly high at Accenture, EY, Capgemini, PwC, and KPMG, where the majority of alumni are Engagement Managers, People Advisory Consultants and Strategy Consultants.
3. FMS alumni may not feature in great numbers at other consulting firms but at Arthur D. Little, they have maintained a consistent representation over the past 4 years. They share this characteristic only with IIM Ahmedabad, and with IIM Calcutta to some extent.
4. The maximum number of alumni are present at Accenture, McKinsey and Deloitte (in that order), who make up almost half the total number (46%) of alumni across all firms.
5. NITIE, JBIMS, TISS and IIFT are some of the oldest Business Schools of the country with the least representation in this cluster. However, for TISS, this is understandable due to the smallest batch size in this cluster, as well as the dominance of XLRI alumni in terms of HRM roles at these top Consulting firms.

*MBB stands for McKinsey & Company, The Boston Consulting Group, and Bain & Company. These are three of the oldest and biggest names in Consulting. 

% of Alumni in each School from each of the 8 Top Schools established prior to 1966

In the above table, wherever the percentage of total alumni from a b-school in a particular company crosses 18%, it has been marked in Blue. Key Takeaways:

1. Accenture is the biggest recruiter in this cluster and has been for the past 5 years.
2. If you are from TISS Mumbai, your chances of being in a People Advisory/Talent Acquisition role at Deloitte, KPMG EY and PwC are quite high. The same goes for Operations roles for those who are from NITIE.
3. For IIM A and IIM C graduates, chances of being at an MBB firm are the highest as compared to other b-schools in this cluster. This holds true for A.T. Kearny as well.

The Post 1966 Top Business Schools Given below is the raw data from LinkedIn for the 8 Schools in this cluster of schools established post the year 1966. Please note that: 1) All possible business of a consulting company has been considered. For e.g. – Accenture consists of employees from Accenture Strategy, Accenture Technology etc. 2) A higher number does not necessarily mean that alumni from that campus have more influence or that they bag coveted roles. Seniority of alumni, quality and diversity of roles play a bigger part. 2 Directors from the same campus can wield more influence than 4 Junior Associates. Unfortunately, this cannot be captured with exact accuracy given the paucity of time and subjectivity involved. 3) NMIMS also has many undergraduate degrees. The figures for NMIMS could be influenced heavily because of this as B.Com, BBA, B.Sc. Eco grads are also counted along with the post-grad MBA. Also, we have seen many examples of Narsee Monjee College of Commerce and Economics graduates label themselves under NMIMS by mistake on LinkedIn. The analysis done below gives a detailed look into:

1. Company wise slicing of Alumni across Pre-1966 b-schools.
2. Cumulative percentage of alumni working in different companies.

% of Alumni in each Company from each of the 8 Top Schools established post-1966

Reference - In the above table, wherever the percentage of total alumni from a b-school in a particular company crosses 20%, it has been marked in Blue. Key Takeaways:

1. IIM Bangalore and the Indian School of Business completely dominate in this cluster. In Consulting, this has been the trend for the past 5 years. IIM Lucknow and NMIMS also have a significant alumni base across a lot of firms. IIM Lucknow has just missed out on the 20% mark at 3 firms, which still indicates towards the dominance of the institute.
2. EY, PwC and Deloitte have the largest alumni base across all firms, and they constitute 50% of the total number of alumni of b-schools in this cluster. On the other end of the spectrum, Oliver Wyman, Arthur D. Little and Roland Berger have the lowest number of alumni from these b-schools.
3. IIM Indore, IIM Kozhikode, MDI and SPJIMR are the premier business schools of the country but are the least represented firms in this cluster.
4. An obvious observation here would be the impact of batch strength on the numbers. The dominant b-schools in this cluster also have the highest batch strength with over 400 students in each b-school. The rest have a batch strength of less than 200, which shows in the table above. IIM Indore is an exception to this, considering it has an intake of 400+ students for its PGP programme.

% of Alumni from each School in the Top Consulting Companies 

Reference - In the above table, wherever the percentage of total alumni from a b-school in a particular company crosses 18%, it has been marked in Blue. Key Takeaways:

1. EY and PwC are the biggest recruiters in this cluster and have the maximum number of b-school alumni currently employed there, followed by Deloitte.
2. The majority of the MDI alumni are spread across EY, PwC and KPMG, while SPJIMR alumni are spread across Deloitte, EY and PwC. So if you belong to either of these two premier B-Schools, chances of you being in a Consulting role at the Big 4 of Accounting are relatively high.
3. A large chunk of ISB alumni is at EY. The same can be said for IIM Lucknow alumni at Deloitte.

Limitations of the report : Given below is the raw data from LinkedIn for the 8 Schools in this cluster of schools established prior to 1966. Please note that –

1. The first evident limitation is the fact that not everyone is on LinkedIn. And even if they are on LinkedIn, they may not necessarily update their employment/b-school data. For instance, IIM Kozhikode alumni are present in relatively fewer numbers due to a technical issue with the Kozhikode official LinkedIn account, as a result of which alumni have not been mapped to the official account.
2. Often, some LinkedIn users fail to update their profiles, as a result of which the profile shows that they work for 2-3 companies simultaneously, which is highly unlikely.
3. The report includes summer interns, as well as those who may hold certifications from these institutes or were a part of SDP (Short Duration Programs) at these institutes.
4. All possible businesses of a consulting company have been considered. E.g. – Accenture consists of employees from Accenture Strategy, Accenture Technology etc.
5. A higher number does not necessarily mean that alumni from that campus have more influence or that they bag coveted roles. Seniority of alumni, quality and diversity of roles play a bigger part. 2 Directors from the same campus can wield more influence than 4 management trainees. Unfortunately, this cannot be captured with exact accuracy given the paucity of time and subjectivity involved.

Check out the Consumer Goods - Alumni Report 2018 here. Note - This report was initially published on June 4th 2018, and was updated on 6th June 2018.