So, what do consultants have the knowledge in? What do you have to know or be good at to get a job at consultancy?

I want to answer this generically, without going into specific areas of expertise etc. So:Be presentable.Be articulate.Be able to get up to speed on specific issues very quickly, and hold an intelligent conversation around them.Be able to offer sound/reasonable advice based on imperfect knowledge, past experience, and a wider knowledge base.Pretty vague, I know, but these skills also serve people well in senior industry positions - hence why many top businesspeople have been consultants at some point in their lives.A lot of people will answer 'do powerpoint', 'kiss ass', 'work 5,000 hours every weekend' etc., but the best consultants are the same as the best people in any industry/profession - practical and sharp - this is what clients value.Feel free to disagree!

Thanks, Dan. I was hoping for a more specific answer as those qualities are relevant for many jobs. For instance, legal consultants/solicitors should know or be aware of legal provisions, regulations, case law and etc. IT consultants should be good at programing and other specific IT know-how (I think), engineers have the know-how of their particular engineering field and etc., so what do management consultants have the knowledge in or, what is necessary to have the knowledge in to be management consultant?

If consultancies had to keep an army of people with very specific skills/experience and only deploy them on projects that they were ideally suited to then they would not be able to manage their capacity/utilisation in a profitable way. Dan is right in outlining some seemingly general skills... but not everybody has them and not everybody works as hard in delivering for their client/customer/boss. Admittedly it's a fine dividing line, but as a consulting colleague of mine often says, 'just use your native wit and intelligence'. It really comes down to confidence, common sense and occasionally the ability to knock out a good spreadsheet/business case/presentation.... sounds simple and trivial but it's not - there's a reason why consultancies employ 'raw intellect' above experience - their people will have to deal with complexity and ambiguity all the time - not only deal with it but make some sense of it and help their clients.

Sounds like a whole bunch of gibberish talk to me. Clarify, there is not specific specialty knowledge, that's why we do it. :)

Generalist explains it well.To Clarify: you seem to be looking for very specific answers to an incredibly vague question and you are not going to get them. Being a consultant is not comparable to being a doctor or a lawyer.Consulting companies employ a diverse range of people because there is not one skill set that they want/need - they need a range. If that sits uncomfortably with you, then you will be far happier as a client because, as is the case here, the person asking the question (the client) often doesn't know what the question is and needs the consulting firm to first define it before answering it

Alex,It's not meant to be gibberish and although I've called myself 'Generalist', I'm far from it. It's always hard to say what value consultants add without sounding vague and cliched (doing it already!) - I'll give a specific example..I worked on a transport optimisation project for a multi-national client that resulted in significant savings and a billing mechanism that was adopted in the company. I worked side-by-side with someone from the client who had the same, if not better, 'specialist skills' as me (operational and financial modelling and logistics management experience) - we spent long hours pouring over data, building and calibrating models and identifying savings. A good example because on face value the client could have done this without us (me). So what did I add? (IMHO)..1. An intensity/energy/paranoia to get the job done on time and to spec no matter what.2. The ability to stand back from the detail each day and think about the 'so what?'3. project management and communucation with the project sponsor.4. Suggestions of ways to get our methods/findings across to a wide audience.5. Structured presentation of the project results/recommendations.Nothing remotely vague/clever/gibberish about it and in full acknowledgement that the project wouldn't have been a success without the client's day-to-day involvement.... BUT, it wasn't my 'specialist skills' that were particularly valued, more the things I did as listed above. Pretty typical of other projects I've done / been aware of. Bottom line is that the client wanted us involved and was happy with the result.

Ah, but were your recommendations any good? ;-)