Recruiting Blog

Myth Buster: Consulting = Constant Travel, Airport Lounges and Hotels

The first response I got from EVERYONE I told I was going into the Consulting Industry was don’t expect to see your friends or sleep in your own bed for long periods of time. Being right out of undergrad, I was excited to travel, see different places in the US and maybe, if I was lucky around the world.

Now, two and a half years in, I am yet to leave New York for a project. Don’t get me wrong, I love living in New York, being able to hang out with my friends and sleep in my own bed every night, but I’m the only person who got excited about going to the American Airlines Training Center in Dallas, TX, which has been the only time I have traveled for work! My colleagues in my group are all over the place, Horsham-PA, Columbus-GA, Orlando-FL and some lucky ones have been to Germany, England, India and so on.

Now don’t get ahead of yourself, this case is not closed. The same day I joined Capgemini, I met a to-be colleague (lets call her Susan). Surprisingly we found out we were both going to be working in the same group (Wealth Management out of New York). Now Susan’s first project was in California, where she commuted (almost every week) across the country for about eight months. Next she was in Columbus-GA for next six months and so on. For the time that I have NOT been traveling, she has been traveling!

So if you decide to enter the wonderful world of consulting, don’t do it because you want to travel, or don’t want to travel. Work, like everything else in life is unpredictable.

Do it because you want to be in a fast paced, highly motivated and dynamic work environment. Do it because you want things to be changing in your work life, new projects, new work locations, new bosses on each project. Do it because you don’t want your life to be mundane and repetitive. Do it because you want to have ownership and accountability, work collaboratively with people from all over the world and solve some very complicated problems. Do it.

Verdict: ‘Consulting = Constant Travel, Airport Lounges and Hotels’ : MYTH or TRUTH? I’d say MYTH but it doesn’t really matter because that is not what defines who we are and why we are consultants.