Does anyone know if it is possible to work for PA consulting from London only, i.e. without travelling around much or at all?Anyone recommend a particular practice to do this?I'd be looking to join at consultant level I think, doing predominantly technology based work.

Try BOP - seems to have strong growth potential, client appear broad and aplenty and promotion prospects are generally very good..I heard a guy got a 43% bonus at PC level.

What does BOP stand for?

Bag Of Process mappers.Avoid – unless you want to spend your life process mapping for some obscure part of the public sector.

You could try the Government practice and focus in on central government work.I'm in the projects practice and have been pretty successful to date in controlling where I work.

Thanks for your advice, but what does it actually stand for? Also, where would you recommend instead? I'm pretty open to suggestions, so long as I get to stay in London most of the time.

Why would you want to work for a second tier consultancy like PA? I know one or two people working in BOP (Business Operations and Performance) who absolutely hate it, but can’t find a job in another consultancy.Why not try the public sector practice in one of the Big 4 accounting firms’ consulting arms? I am applying to do Supply Chain stuff with EY BAS, at manager / consultant level. EY are also building up their Government practice, so would have a lot of public sector work in the London area, which probably would be better quality that the small jobs and clients that PA serve.In reality though, no consultancy is going to guarantee you work solely based in London, even in something like financial services (assuming that anyone is still hiring in FS)

Hmm, that's kind of what I'm afraid of. I worked at Accenture for two years and wound up leaving because of the travel. I was kind of hoping some of the other firms would be more London based.I'm looking at EY as well, but PA seems to have more of technology focus than some of the others.

The culture at PA is really rotten though, and they are far less professional than an organisation like Accenture or EY.They pay a lot less than the going market rates, and pay rises this year were very low. PA will defend this by claiming that they pay out large bonuses, which are based on a percentage of your average earnings for the previous year. Don’t forget that any percentage bonus is stated before deducting employers national insurance, a deferred element, and the usual employee taxes, so the net amount you would receive would typically be 40% of the gross amount stated.Their holiday allowance, at 23 days, is also miserly. You can forfeit some of your already below market rate salary, to buy additional holiday, but on balance, I’d counsel you to work somewhere else.

BOP=Bind on Pickup

Oudhorn, what specifically is "rotten" about the culture at PA and how is PA "less professional" than Accenture or EY?

Why not read one of the many other chains slagging off PA and BOP in particular rather than keep kicking the same old corpse?

Agree with Paul. The consensus amongst people that know PA (and BOP in particular) is that it is not a good place to work.Promotions within BOP above PC level are almost unheard of, and no-one has been promoted to partner since 2004. Staff are voting with their feet ... lots of resignations at PC and one at MC level recently, with more to come.To revert to the original question, there will be limited pressure to travel with BOP as most of their work is for low level public sector clients within the M25.

I'm always intrigued as to the extent and viciousness of BOP-bashing on this board. Is there some history here that we show know about? Is this just from one person posting in various guises, with an axe to grind?i also work at PA (not in BOP) and wouldn't recommend it right now.

Some facts:In 3 years at PA in the IT group I have spent 2 weeks ouside the M25, and then only just. So you can stay in London if you are on mainly central Govt jobs.There are better places to be in terms of money, holiday, professionalism and support. Countering that at PA you can get big bonuses if you are a performer.

You don't get nuffin for nuffin

On the topic question, go with Government practices, very little travel IF you agree up front your project (if not, 2 years in some hillbilly place).BOP? It stands for Business Operations and Performance for whoever asked. One of the worst performing practices in PA at the moment too, instead of whinging can you all resign to preserve everyone else's bonuses please :)I've heard a few rumours about pay rises and promotions in certain practices, I'll sit it out til midyear at least and see if anything comes of it.

God, this is boring. Please stop now.

"can you all resign"Anyone with half a brain left a long while ago, you could see the way the practice was heading.Not sure anyone at a senior level has the balls to sort it out though; most PA internal strategies (anyone remember BTG+) turn out to be all mouth and no trousers.If you fancy a laugh at some point whilst off the clock in 123 read the "Strategy into Action" proposition and reflect on how effective PA is at following / achieving this.

Hmmm… 43% bonus at PC level in BOP? I honestly doubt it.Top performers are getting about half that level, albeit based on salaries which are well below market norms.The latest wheeze is for BOP to chase finance and accounting work in the private sector…. Only 5 – 10 years after our competitors realised this was a good spot to be in. Like most other initiatives in PA, the clever money is on it running out of steam in within the year.Nope – stick with process mapping for the public sector chaps. Incredibly boring and poorly paid, but it keeps the partners happy.

I know a load of PCs throughout PA who've had much higher bonus % than that, it doesn't surprise me. Top performers always take the money in PA, just a shame they don't tell you in the interview that it's such a tiny percentage of the people who take the biggest money.

As a PC in BOP (currently sitting at my desk at the client site late at 8pm on a Friday evening), what really irritates me is the lack of respect for personal time.I work 12 - 14 hour days, break all my utilisation targets, and I'm expected to spend my Sunday evenings working on internal PA business (aka practice development)This is not helped by the miserable 23 day holiday allowance. Small wonder my friends think I look tired all the time.

I'd have to concur with weekend worker. PA isn't as good as many of our competitors for work / life balance - I'm currently doing some practice extras on a Sunday evening.As a relatively long serving member of staff (just over 4 years), I'm pretty dissappointed at PAs lack of real attention to allowing staff to get away from work in the evenings and weekends. This same problem impacts our ability to retain female staff when they return from maternity leave - for all the good talk, PA seems to be a place where many of my colleagues do not see themselves working long term.

What percentage of partners are women at PA?

Globally we have 1 female senior partner and 1 female partner in whole of 3000 odd people working in PA. I am leaving it to you calculate the % as i lost touch in math due to long years of process work at BOP.

Dear god, you'd think these poor consultants could draw a process map for a way to find themselves a new job!Quite funnily, if you read other threads work-life balance doesn't really happen in consulting. If you want it, go and do something else.

2 female partners - not true. I can think of at least 4. There might be more, for all I know.

This is very boring.

Ho ! Hum !! Another one of the MCs, the guy that was supposed to be leading the F&PM initiative has jumped ship.Is BOP deliberately trying to push people out??

Maybe he was scared off by the excessive use of meaningless acronyms?

Not very interesting