When I started my job at McKinsey last March, I was looking for three things:
• Be challenged and learn while helping clients solve their most complex issues• Work with an international team and discover new cultures
• Deliver meaningful results for clients and society
I did not expect all this would come true in my first month at the firm.
My journey started with two weeks of training. This gave me the opportunity to meet incredible people, from young graduates like me to experienced professionals making a career change. Very quickly, my peer group became my first McKinsey family.
The week after, I worked with a manager from our Moscow office on a methodology for a client who wanted to transform their sales organization. While wrapping up the engagement, I received an email from a partner concerning an operations project in India. I quickly called him back to get more details and after a couple of hours and an interview with the engagement manager, I was organizing my visa. Three days later I landed in India!
The first week of this project was a perfect reflection of the blend of capabilities only McKinsey can offer. To quickly identify how to improve the performance of the client’s plant, we assembled a diverse team of experts: a senior manufacturing expert and an automation specialist from the US, a data scientist from the Netherlands, two French consultants, one partner and one implementation specialist from India, and a Swiss manager.
This amazing mix of expertise enabled us quickly define an impact target and select the initiatives to implement over the next few months.
Now, three months later, I have developed deep ties with my colleagues and learned an incredible amount about different cultures. In a couple of weeks, I will travel back to Europe for a workshop at the client’s headquarters where future initiatives will be defined.
I came to McKinsey with high expectations and was not disappointed. I am now looking forward to where the next project takes me.