Tony - putting you on the spot, if you were an analyst at a decent consultancy (e.g. Acc, Cap, PA, Deloitte, etc not a top tier one though) would you seriously consider joining EY BAS. There marketing angle to analysts and junior consultants seems to be joining a start up consultancy/company with a brand as strong as EY doesnt come about everyday bla bla bla and that joining now can see your career blossom more than at rival firms as it's a start up bla bla bla.Now my quesstions to you are:1) If you were an analysts with say 1-2yrs experience and content but not overly happy at with your current employer would you SERIOUSLY think about moving2) How realistic is the notion that career progression/salary etc can be better achieved at EY BAS as it's a start up etc3) Would you consider joining EY BAS now as a risk to ones career at analyst level? At least if your experienced you have something to fall back on, analysts these days are two a penny4) Going back to lists, as an analyst looking to be exposed to clients, have good training, etc where would you place the following firms in order in terms of business not IT cosulting. Deloitte, PA, PwC, EY, Cap, Acc

"Acc, Cap, PA, Deloitte, etc not a top tier one though"Not top tier ?? I beg to differ.Lets turn the question back on you: "Why leave a proven repspected consulting organisation to join an audit offshoot in an experiment that has been tried and failed by said audit firm before ?"

How exactly did EY fail last time? They sold their MC wind to CG due to the fall out from Enron. How is that a failure to grow a business then sell it to make a profit?

Sorry perhaps I should have been clearer. I consider top-tier to be firms such as McK, BCG, Bain, Mercer, Marakon, OC&C, BAH.

Those are Strat firms. Saying their top tier depends on the category - they're not top tier for implemention or operational consulting. I would argue whether OC&C and Mercer are top tier in Strat. Mercer are mainly and HR firm.

Paul - If you have an offer from those firms you would be silly not to take it. ( especially Mck, Bain, BAH and BCG) I suppose you dont have an offer from these companies because you are in the 'grey' area for thier recruitment. They generally dont recruit people with 2 years of experience. They recruit massively at mba, then at experienced hire and lastly a few oxbridge lads at milkround. They see a person with 1/2 years experience as a hinderance: you dont have enough training to be auotonomous and an industry expert, yet youre not still a blank slate - youve been already directed towards something by someone.. however if you DONT have an offer from these, then BAS is a goldmine in respect to the other 'big' consultancies. It is a great opportunity for an analyst - if it does flop - and its impossible - no one will blame the analyst for it. or the consultant, and probably not even the manager. on a plus side it will show that you are willing to take risks, and it will add an entrepeneurial zest to your CV. You will also have more opportunity to grow and shine than you would in other consultancies. Ands most importantly you will have more FUN ( yes you still should have some fun in your job as well). Its a risk / reward situation. And if i were you the choice would be simple:Have an offer from Mck - go there. Have an offer from PA / Deloitte / KPMG / ATOS etc ? No way. Show that you have balls and take the bull by the horns.

I think I can best answer this by referencing the career decision I took when I graduated. I was going through the interviewing process with most of the top strategy consultancies and got made an offer by Roland Berger Strategy Consultants. At the time they only had ~20 staff in their London office and the brand was barely known in the UK. Obviously the parent company was very well respected in Germany, but in the London office my fortunes would be tied to the abilities of a few partners and we would have to overcome the difficulties of having a brand that was relatively unknown. None of these were problems I would have faced had I joined a more well-established strategy consultancy.For me the positives were that I would have the chance to make a real difference in the business, to make a mark in a way that a junior consultant in a bigger office would find it hard to do. I knew I'd be promoted faster than at other firms if my performance merited it. I knew the atmosphere would be entrepreneurial and "every hand to the pumps". And I knew I'd have a more varied role than if I were a junior in a larger office environment.Sure enough I got promoted very quickly and after four years had risen from Business Analyst to Junior Consultant to Consultant to Senior Consultant. That would have been pretty much unheard of had I joined a larger strategy firm.But on the downside, the culture of the office and the success of the office was very much influenced by the coming and going of Partners - in a way that was much more pronounced than it would have been in a more established organisation. And most worryingly of all this was totally outside of my control!By the time I left RB, the office had grown from the original 20 to something like 125 consultants. But the Partner team changed again around the time I left and the office contracted again. Not sure of the numbers, but back to around 50 consultants at the low point I think. So clearly there are risks to joining a "start-up" and these aren't all risks that you can influence or mitigate.With regards to E&Y or any other business that's offering you the opportunity of getting on board during the "start-up" phase, early in your career I would say take the risk. At the very worst you are going to end up with a good brand on your CV and you will have had a good set of client brands in your assignments portfolio. That isn't going to look bad or harm your future career. Just ask all those that were juniors at Arthur Andersen. AA may have gone out of business because of the Enron scandal, but no-one blames the juniors for this. And their client experience made them highly employable elsewhere in the economy.I would say joining these types of firms are one of the rare opportunities for leapfrogging your career by having the chance to make more of a mark while you are still a junior. By contrast, later in your career when you have more to lose and greater family responsibilities, it is more difficult to take such risks.But that's just my personal view. I'm not risk-averse. For others the security offered by a more established brand will outweigh all of the above. It's a personal call in the end.Good luck. TonyTony Restell (Top-Consultant.com)

In response to A, above, I'd call a forced sale, due to industry malpractices, and not Andersen's alone, to be failure on a truly magnificent level. The FT reported in September that E&Y's offices in London were raided by regulators investigating the distance (or lack thereof) between the consulting / advisory part of E&Y and the audit firm that owns and controls them. A case of déja vú, I'm sure you'll agree!!To borrow a famous malapropism: "Those Who Do Not Learn From History are Doomed To Repeat It" EY BAS are acknowledged by most as a very risky proposition to join - why take the gamble with your career ?

Tony that was great advice. I'm in a similar situation to Paul. I'm a second year analyst at PA and have been mulling over EY BAS. My only gripe is that to join, I would 1) Have to take a pay cut of approx 1k (not including bonus)2) Have to start as a grad on their BAS scheme which lasts 18 monthsWith these circumstances, in your opinion, would you still recommend the proposition? It means I would have spent a total of 3 years as an analyst/grad/level 1?Also im currently doing change managemnt work, but interested in doing some strategy, my understanding is that EY BAS is mainly financial advisory e.g. tax etc?

Its good to see that other Paers are openly disclosing their intentions of leaving. I am most interested in BAS aswell. For ppl at PA atleast including myself, atleast the place has a brand ! Pa is unknown, undergoes menial work and lacks top tier talent. I am surprised how our name actually makes when established consultancies are discussed !

With re to what adam wrote... is it really true that having up to 2yrs experience is 'grey' area for leading strategy houses?If so then I got a bit puzzled... I'm too old/experienced for grad scheme, but without MBA. And, because industry firms don't sponsor MBA usually, I have less prospects...Would it be a solution to apply for entry-level position and ask for possibility of faster progress if performing well?

my friend. "progressing faster" in a tier 1 strat house doesnt exist. its like saying to an olympic 100 meter specialist to just 'run it faster for once'. you must be kidding me. in the few cases that someone at mckinsey gets promoted a whole grade faster than his peers he usually becomes CEO of Vodaphone (just happened) or partner at KKR. Get real.Im sorry to be blunt but you need a serious reality check. How old are you?Strat firms do NOT hire people with a few year experience. Unless your two years of experience are in investment banking, PE, VC or at Google / amazon type places - i think there is a 99% chance youre all out of luck. for example, where i work its like thisconsultants = grads from uni - just internship experiencesenior consultants = the consultants we promoted last year associates = mba'sprincipals = mbas +3-5 experience in strat consulting associate partners / partners If you dont have consulting experience you either enter as a consultant or as an associate. Bar none.I would strongly suggest you look at big 6, capgem etc - or get yourself into a top mba school. Its a silly argument regarding the fees of the mba - get into HBS / LBS / Chicago etc and it will pay itself in less than 2 years. good luck

Blunt but fair. Thanks for this!I guess I was mislead by websites (or just didn't understand them ;-)... they say there that candidates with 1-3yrs (or 2-5; depends on the firm) experience can apply for +1 position.roy

thats true roy, and sorry for being blunt. What they really mean is that they look for candidates with 'relevant' experience - something that interests them. 1/2 years industry experience is not enough to make you a specialist. however 1/2 years experience at being an economics, a teacher, an engineer, a fluid dynamics applicationist - to name but a few wierd things that people did before coming here - can perhaps show that you have good qualitites that they are after. this is turning into meaningless advice. if you can post what kind of grades, uni, and specific experience you have - including your rough age - im sure we all can give you better feedback.

Various points to respond to here.I'm reluctant to provide guidance on specific circumstances; for the most part you will know more about the firm you're leaving and the firm + practice area you're considering joining than I do. So it would be misleading for me to try to provide all the answers. Sorry to cop out on this, but I don't want to be the cause of anyone taking a career decision that ends up being the wrong one for you...... however I would add that in a fluid organisation (ie. one that is growing fast and experiencing rapid organisational change) it is usually the case that the cream rises to the top. So losing a couple of £k at the early stages of your career is relatively trivial compared with the difference to your life if you make it to Partner a few years earlier.As regards consulting firms recruiting from outside consulting and the comment that "Strat firms do NOT hire people with a few years' experience", I'd have to say this is not entirely true. I remember a very prominent recruitment campaign by McKinsey in recent years that went out in all the mainstream print press. Their adverts were specifically encouraging people who were ex-lawyers, doctors, corporate execs, etc. to consider applying for careers at McKinsey. And I can think of numerous people I know who've transitioned to consulting from the likes of Shell, British Airways, etc. Some were just a few years into their careers; others made the move at a much later stage. So there's no closed door mentality in consulting - you just have to demonstrate that you're good enough for clients to pay the prevailing fee rates.What it would be fair to say is that this transition is less straightforward than a consultant moving from one consulting firm to another. Coming from outside consulting you'll have to convince that your industry / functional expertise will be a valuable commodity for clients and that the other skills you've learnt are transferable to consulting. But then that shouldn't come as a surprise to any readers...Hope this helps. TonyTony Restell (Top-Consultant.com)