Context: Currently Senior Manager at a mid-sized reasonably specialist Consultancy in an account management / business management role. Have experience of business consulting and technology delivery before current Sales / Management focused role. Currently working in TMT but with extensive previous work in Gov. Sector too.Question: Having got a bit bored working hard to carry a few average teams through what should've been more straight-forward projects I'm looking for a move into something where I can channel the hard work into something that'll be more financially rewarding and maybe working with some more capable folks.Looking at a move over into FS - conscious that I'm probably not looking to be a trader or a quant - wondering what other roles could make the best of my previous experience, work ethic and good judgement under pressure. Any views from anyone with experience of stepping over from Consultancy into FS or working directly in FS much appreciated.

There are at least two areas that you could look at:1) Account Management positions in FS are numerous. Examples would include selling credit card acquiring services to large retailers, providing asset finance products to manufacturers, relationship manager in Corporate Banking (cash management, trade finance, etc). The challenge is that there have been lots of cuts in many of these areas, so you'll be competing for jobs against people who have the done the job before while you will be selling parallel experience. Always easier to do that in an upward market.2) Change Management. Many non-IT consultants that join banks do so by becoming internal consultants and the home for many of them is the bank's change management team. At your level you would need to target a programme manager position. This may sound more delivery focussed than account management, but often includes lots of pre-project work such as developing business cases, gaining budget approval, managing stakeholders, running monthly steerign committees, etc. Often project managers do the actual delivery management working for the Prog Mgr. You coudl take a step backwards into a PM role to make the change, hoping to progress quickly.I would warn that while I would recomend a move to FS from consulting for many reasons - work/life balance, control over travel, etc, - I' m not sure I'd say bank teams are any stronger and financially it depends VERY much on the individual bank. A good MC can make the move with minimal or no loss of income, but not many make the jump in order to make a lot more money.

I am also thinking about a move from Consulting into FS so I hope you don't mind me hijacking the thread.Is 2 years too early to be thinking about a move into industry? This time has been spent exclusively in change management functions at retail banks.What's the scope for progression in the FS industry? Looking at the client colleagues I've interacted with, I am concerned about being stuck at the same level for a long time.

Thanks Mr Cool - that's pretty sound advice.Change might be as good as a rest as they say.

A move after two years is perfectly viable. Any less and you look like someone who couldn't hack it in MC. As long as you have good annual reviews (and the salary increases to back them up) then you can pitch yourself as someone who could hack it, but came to the conclusion that it was not for you.Beware that two year experience will probably put you in at the junior manager end in a bank. They'll see you as having been trained up and the rough edges knocked off you, but not much else.Progression can be slower at banks than at consultancies, but then again many consultancies are struggling with bottlenecks at the moment, so perhaps not. Certainly in a bank most promotions are based on a specific post coming available in a fairly fixed org chart. It's not like MC where promotions are grade based not post based.