Hi,I'm looking for advice in differentiating between 2 top MCs in the UK. Which provides the better experience at the analyst level - I guess the proxies I'm looking at include:1) Which one provides the best routes into venture capital/ private equity and entrepreneurship?2) Which firm has the better training program?3) Which firm provides more challenging and interesting work at the lower levels?Thanks!

I think Bain would win all ends up. Bain has a private equity arm - Bain Capital. More importantly it is smaller and therefore has a less structured and rigid programme than the big M. Hence u gain much more exposure at a younger level.Bain is more pure strat focused than McKinsey whose business model seems to be focused on being big and hence trying to bring in revenue through operational consultancy assignments. This is my personal opinion. I'd be interested in others views aswell.

I agree with Informer on point 1. Bain has the Bain Capital link which would be very helpful if you want to get into PE.Although McKinsey is larger and does more operational work, this gives more opportunities for analysts to get involved and have meaningful responsibility. McKinsey also has the scale to run a proper training programme (not that Bain's training is terrible) and to guarantee you a range of projects and more choice to get broad exposure at the lower levels. At Bain you tend to have less control of that element of staffing at the lower levels.

DISCLAIMER: I work at Mckinsey. But know people at both firms.1). If you want to work in private equity or venture capital either will stand you in good stead - every year, loads of people leave both to join PE/VC. While Bain has a traditional link to Bain Capital - Mckinsey now has a rapidly growing PE practice with links to most of the top PE firms.2) The best sort of training is on the job training. You need to spend time with people from both companies and decide which feels like it has the more supportive and coaching environments. Having really inspiring managers and coaches is more worthwhile than 3 hours of organisational theory training on a friday.3). The role of an analyst is going to differ more between projects than it does between firms. My experience of Mckinsey has been that analysts get involved in all aspects of projects from the analytics through to problem structuring and client leadership. I believe the same is true at Bain. I would play down the importance of mckinsey's size - to be honest, you spend most of your time on teams and these have 3-5 people - you get massive exposure at either firm.The types of work do differ slightly between the two companies - Mckinsey does more non-strategy work. I frankly think this is an advantage because it means you can do a range of projects across all major business functions (and organisation studies are frankly fascinating). But to be honest, should you just want to do strategy work there is reasonable autonomy to focus on what you are interested in.Overall - either are great. Should you get/have an offer with both of them, then you won't be going wrong whichever you pick. My advice is to spend as much time as possible with people (both senior and junior) from the two firms, to see what you think of them.

Thanks a lot for all the advice guys. Really helpful stuff.My actual situation is a bit more complex than both firms - I interned at a bank over the summer and I'm considering consulting as a starter industry vs. i-banking. But that's a different story!I was lucky enough to get an offer with one of the firms mentioned but also have a friend at the other who says good things about it, so I wanted to get some perspective on how both are viewed by the general consulting community.Thanks again.

I am fortunate enough to have an offer from both these companies (AC entry at Bain and JA at McK). I realise I will work a LOT with both companies and am fine with that. I am very keen however that I get home to my own bed at night and not be in a hotel. Which company is more likely to allow me to work from London and which is more liekyl to have me at the client site extensively. Any advie from people who work at either or have worked at both would be much appreciated.

This thread very much chimes with my own experiences of strategy consulting firms - namely that the single most important consideration is figuring out whether the people you'll be working with are people you will enjoy spending time in the company of and whether they are people you are going to learn a lot from...In the McK vs. Bain debate, I would err on saying that McK has greater CV points if you really want to keep your career options open across the board - but if becoming an entrepreneur is your thing then Bain maybe has a more pronounced track record of turning out these types of individuals... On the private equity route it's probably a tie between the two.Wanted to address the last question from "SL" regarding which of the two will allow you to spend most of your working life living from your home rather than from a hotel. To anyone entering strategy consulting, I would counsel that this simply isn't a realistic expectation - unless you want to specialise in consulting to City institutions.Strat firms advise the FTSE 100 and their international counterparts. By definition, each country only has a handful of potential clients in each industry sector. So a consultant who has become a specialist in consumer goods, aviation, retail banking, oil & gas, mobile telephony.... whichever sector you care to mention you are going to find you work one assignment for a leading player headquartered in London (or somewhere else in the UK) and then the next project is going to be working for their equivalent in Germany or France or the US or Asia. Or perhaps in the UK but based out in the sticks somewhere.I'd love to hear the thoughts of those at the leading strat firms, but I simply don't believe any top strategy firm can promise its staff that the majority of their working lives will be spent based from home rather than away in a hotel. If this is a major stumbling block for you SL then I would rather you became aware of this now than 6 months into your first job....Tony Restell(Top-Consultant.com)

Tony is right, but the noises I've heard definitely suggest that there are variations even within the top firms. Bain London reputedly allows more scope for working from your home office for example.

Tony's right, but if either of these companies encourage you not to specialise in an industry practice (I know Mck don't) then you potentially have more flexibility to choose your geography. I would say that if staying in London is important to you, then I'd choose the firm that gives you the greatest autonomy over staffing decisions. I would suspect (given its larger size) that this would be Mckinsey, but the difference would be marginal.