Graduating senior. Have choices between MBB and SWE at FAANG. Not sure what to do. Long term I’d love to be in a small startup or a leader in a tech company. Not sure which path is better for that. Any thoughts?

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MBB. Pessimistically speaking, if you're not good at either you'll be better off having MBB on your resume.

I also make the assumption if you were really passionate about coding this wouldn't be a question. They're quite different jobs.

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100% agree

SWE

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I think this group is going to overweight consulting skills, because ya know, consultants.

I’ll split it into the following, if you want to have a tech career and actually get tons of credibility, go be a SWE and actually build something. It’ll teach you the foundations of tech, and product at a ground zero level, engineers will respect you and listen to you, and you can downshift towards more businessy things like product or other stuff over time.

If you want a business focus and career, mbb wins, it is the best generalist business education you can get and a phenomenal credential to land a bunch of jobs. It is nowhere close to being a SWE and it is much much more high level.

The real real question I’d ask you is do you enjoy coding and building things, and if the answer is yes that it makes you happy, go be a dev. Mbb is all business and you won’t build anything other than models full of assumptions and slides.

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Thanks! This is helpful. I think it boils down to the fact that while I have eventual business goals, I don’t think I would be happy somewhere where I didn’t code.

SWE

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MBB

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Mbb. You can always make the switch back to swe at faang but not the other way around

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As someone switching back and forth between consulting/MBB and tech a few times I would disagree (will be joining your fine firm in a few weeks) of course as an Associate though while the people who joined after school and stayed on are now EMs/Associate Partners, so maybe not a fast track in your career, but changing into MBB not that hard if you have/are willing to get 1) right educational/professional profile 2) referrals 3) good labor market 4) plenty of case prep.

I would do SWE. The role you ultimately want requires technically skills and MBB consulting roles are not technical roles (in the sense you’re thinking of with SWE). If you feel like you need to you can always go to business school later. Successful SWE—>PM—> director or SWE—>PM—>B school feels more realistic than MBB business consultant trying to get onto as many tech cases as possible to build credibility.

This is not to say people at MBB don’t go become tech directors, they do. I’m just saying this having seen some of my colleagues try to get tech jobs and not being considered bc they don’t have technical backgrounds. Of course, this is anecdotal evidence :)

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Unrelated, but could I DM you about how you got the roles?

Sure

Not aware enough to give you an educated answer but are you trying to be both a consultant and a SWE in your career? Or just one or the other before being a leader at a tech company?

Gotcha, I think both routes are good. Probably from my limited experience (2 years out of school) that going the SWE route is more lucrative with better WLB and an easier transition to product manager. I think product managers can easily be a director of product if they’re good and work hard. Again, not an expert but just my thoughts.

I would also say that you should know if you’re willing to put in the hours for MBB. 60 hour weeks are more of the norm and also working more than that is common. I don’t work at an MBB firm but have a friend that does. Also, I think SWEs probably get paid more but check levels.fyi

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What is SWE?

Software engineer

Could you get an internship in either place under your belt? I think the best move is choosing the role you enjoy more and where you will be able to perform. If you get an internship in one and then switch to the other, transitioning back to the first will be easier. Plus you get to try out both.

Sadly it’s too late, although I did have a swe internship at a smaller company.

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