Pay, work-life balance & job satisfaction in and after consulting

Consulting is strange. It's one of the only careers that people will start, in full knowledge that they don't intend to stay. I did exactly that and most of my friends did too.

But it creates a big problem.

Too much choice.

The skills you build in consulting are so transferable. They open the door into almost any industry and all sizes of company. Plus a wide range of teams / job types too.

It's so hard to compare options and work out what's best for you.

As you get more senior, it's common to move out of the normal "post consulting teams" (strategy, transformation etc) and into e.g, commercial / operational roles.

Yet another big decision.

Last year, I did a quick survey.

I'd posted about the above problems on LinkedIn. And was overwhelmed with the response. So I set about trying to help.

I launched a quick survey and a few thousand current & former consultants took part. The results were sent out to everyone who participated and showed:

which industries have the highest pay, best work-life balance and greatest overall job satisfaction.

It's back. And it's better.

I've still kept the survey extremely short - it takes just 3mins to complete (via the link here and below)).

But I've improved the structure, so this year you'll also get data on the following (and don't worry, you'll still get data on pay, work-life balance and job satisfaction)

• How job types compare (think strategy vs partnerships vs operations i.e, not just industries)
• How company sizes compare (think "growth startups" (i.e, 50-150 people) vs "big corporates" (i.e, 5,000+ people)
• Best for: learning & development
• Best for: career progression
• Best for: workplace culture & environment

I'd love you to join in.

Reasons to join in include:

1. If you're a current or former consultant (no matter how long ago you left), it will help you.
2. The more people joining in, the more helpful (i.e, accurate) the results. Let's all help one another.
3. It's actually quite fun to complete the survey (I promise).
4. It only takes a few minutes to do (genuinely).
5. It's free (I'm just trying to be helpful).
6. It's global - you can join in where ever you are in the world (and we'll share results by country too).
7. As an immediate thank you, you'll receive the results from last year's survey (they're still really interesting).
8. You'll get sent the 2023 results first (way before they are publicly available).
9. You're a current or former consultant, so you love data :-)

Follow this link to join in.

Please help me to help you and all of our current & former consulting friends around the world, by completing the survey here .

Many thanks.

Please consider sharing the survey link with friends.

My aim is for at least 10,000 people to complete this survey. With your help, I think we can smash that and go well beyond.

It's simple - the more people who join in, the more helpful this will be for everyone.

So please spread the word to all of your current and former consulting friends.

Thank you.