I'm a bit confused about the various job titles at different consultancies and how they compare. Although there are generally broad similarities between consultancies there are also some inconsistencies and sometimes I find it difficult to understand how positions at one company compare with another.So, I'll start. At KPMG the structure is basically as follows:E - Analyst (most junior position, first two or three years out of uni, generally doing tedious research work)D Consultant* (next 2-4 years, doing more interesting consulting work under supervision of managers and senior managers)C Manager (next 2-4 years, managing small to medium sized projects, some client relationship management responsibilities)B Senior Manager* (next 2-4 years, experienced consultants managing larger projects and with more business development and client relationship responsibilities).A Director (senior team manager with oversight of client relationship development, significant business development objectives and oversight of major projects. Participate in limited profit-share programme.)P Partner (sits on backside in nice office, gets paid a lot)*There are also people whose job titles are "Associate Manager" and "Associate Director". I think they fit in respectively at the top end of D-Grade and B-Grade, but I'm not entirely sure.By way of comparison, at my last company, which was a small boutique firm, the job progression (with approximate equivalents to the KPMG grades) went: Researcher (E) - Associate Consultant (E-D) - Consultant (D)- Senior Consultant (C) - Associate Director (B) - Director (A), then some heads of department/senior executives who I suppose were equivalent to partners (it wasn't a partnership, so the structure at senior levels was different). It would be interested to understand how the structure differs at other major consultancies.

Accenture's structure (minimum no. of years at each level before you're eligible for promo)...Analyst - 2 yearsConsultant - 3 yearsManager - 4 yearsSenior Manager 4 yearsPartner - for as long as you keep selling work

…correction: Partner is now termed 'Senior Executive'

The Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) System is a United States government system of classifying occupations. It was developed in response to a growing need for a universal occupational classification system. Such a classification system would allow government agencies and private industry to produce comparable data. Users of occupational data include government program managers, industrial and labor relations practitioners, students considering career training, job seekers, vocational training schools, and employers wishing to set salary scales or locate a new plant. It will be used by all federal agencies collecting occupational data, providing a means to compare occupational data across agencies. It is designed to cover all occupations in which work is performed for pay or profit, reflecting the current occupational structure in the United States. The USA's SOC includes 822 occupational types. The national variants of the SOC are used by the governments of the UK, Canada, and many others.