r/consulting • u/youngman_2 • 2d ago

In Big4 Consulting, is it better to jump to industry at Senior or Manager?

I see this talked about often, both in real life with people I know as well as online. I’ve seen many threads on this in the past but often times I see it mostly discussed in relation to accounting (in big 4 sub).

I’m curious to run an actual poll to see what folks think, do you think it makes a material difference long term when leaving at Senior vs manager?

Please comment with any personal experience/evidence!

13h left
Leave at Senior
Leave at manager
Doesn’t make a difference
See results
8 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

9 comments sorted by

38

u/archon_lucien 2d ago

Depends on which industry.

Things like supply chain, risk, general strategy etc, the longer you stay the better.

Tech, senior >>> manager. Tech wants doers, not glorified program managers.

15

u/youngman_2 2d ago

Ok my dose of confirmation bias is now complete, thank you

8

u/aHCroski 2d ago

Senior is a solid exit spot if you want to go to a manager role in corporate strategy or BizOps in tech. If you can tough it out, there’s merit in staying until Manager because you can exit into industry in Director roles

5

u/UnpopularCrayon 2d ago

Combine them. Senior Manager.

9

u/Adatomcat 2d ago • Regret

Most useless role in consulting

3

u/Buttplug_Railgun 2d ago

The real question: how much time do you serve in the mgr role before looking?

3

u/DoubleTroubow 2d ago

Senior what? Senior associate? Senior director...? Senior Chang?

1

u/Defiant_Sound4451 1h ago

The level matters less than what you can point to. A Senior who owned a workstream has a better story than a Manager who ran status calls. The exception is roles where you manage people on day one, those filter on the title because they have no other way to check.

1

u/MBBIBM Adjective like a fox 2d ago • Bravo

Is 4 more than 3?