Management Consulting

The professional-services industry that advises companies on strategy and operations — a recurring subject across Kyle’s reading. It is the core topic of the long read Bonfire of the Consultancies, which treats it as a ~$900B industry. The recruiting funnel into it surfaces in Case Interview Formats, Victor Cheng’s breakdown of the seven case-interview formats the major firms (McKinsey, BCG, Bain, LEK, Oliver Wyman, and others) use to screen candidates, and the six underlying skills every format tests.

The corpus also carries a skeptical strain. In Charlie Munger: The Psychology of Human Misjudgment, Munger uses the field as his canonical example of incentive-caused bias: “In my long life, I have never seen a management consultant’s report that didn’t end with the same advice: ‘This problem needs more management consulting services.’” That tension — between consulting as an elite, highly-recruited career and consulting as a self-perpetuating sales engine — runs through how the concept is referenced in Kyle’s notes.

Context: Management consulting is a professional-services industry in which firms advise organizations on strategy, operations, and organization. The “MBB” tier (McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group, Bain) is its most prestigious, and case interviews are the standard evaluation method for entry-level hiring.

Where this appears

• Bonfire of the Consultancies — the long read for which the ~$900B consulting industry is the central subject.
• Case Interview Formats — Victor Cheng’s guide to the 7 case-interview formats firms use to evaluate candidates.
• Charlie Munger: The Psychology of Human Misjudgment — Munger’s “this problem needs more management consulting services” line as an example of incentive-caused bias.