Structure a Great Management Consulting Resume/CV

Considering to enter the management consulting industry? The first step is to write your resume and cover letter. This is regardless if you are applying to a boutique consulting firm, or a top tier management consulting firm as McKinsey, Monitor Group, BCG, Bain, Booz or AT Kearney. Read this article to get some best practices on how to structure your resume/CV.

A great management consulting resume always adds to your advantage when competing with thousands of others. When structuring resumes, candidates tend to stuck in two pitfalls. Number one, many candidates can't tell the differences between consulting-targeted resumes from regular resumes. Hence, they use one resume for all interviews. Number two, those who have the resumes already won't work on improving them, and will let obsolete resumes become obstacles on their career path. We will help you avoid to make these mistakes.

Firstly, pay attention to the content of your resume. In general, standard management consulting resumes should include these sections: header section with your personal info, section for work experience and educational background, and a section for interests/skills/activities. Most of resumes are limited to one page. If you have plenty of working experiences or you just job-hop frequently, 2 pages will be the limit. An outstanding resume must have highlights which can either be academic achievements or working spotlights.

For instance, if you have high GPA or standardized test scores (GMAT, GRE, SAT, etc), you should include them in the resume. If you have special experience with big projects, you should also have it in this page to demonstrate your problem solving skills and leadership. Consider to include a summary section in the beginning of your consulting resume (most people avoid this). The summary will certainly add some value to your resume.

Secondly, put yourself into a recruiter's shoes. Recruiters receive hundreds of applications and will have very short time to look at your resume. So, a recruiter doesn't have too much time to decide whether this person deserves an interview. What will a recruiter focus on? Probably whether this candidate has one or two impressive achievements. Take these steps and think about how you can improve your resume:

1. State niche skills you have for this consulting job, using concise and to the point language. Remember, no recruiter would like to take time search though paragraphs for your merits.

2. Make your Interests/hobbies section more interesting, but keep it short, expressive and not taking the spotlights from your body sections.

3. In order to avoid all kinds of typos and errors made by grammar and alignment, you need to check your resume again after you finish it. Because if you make one mistake, that might be the only thing a recruiter will remember.


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If you want more tips on how to prepare for consulting interviews, then download a free guide. ConsultingFact.com offers guides for resumes, cover letters, case interviews, case frameworks, and other material that will help you land a consulting job. Visit at: www.consultingfact.com