Partners that have experience at MBB and B4+ACN - if you were to choose a firm, excluding the one you are at now, which one would you pick if the only criteria were: thought leadership, reputation with clients, and intellectual horsepower of colleagues.

BCG workout a shadow of doubt. And that it’s not sketchy like Mac with dubious clients

Not BCG anymore, given the fluff they’ve been putting out. Brilliant people but the product has been really awful. None of the big firms are doing cutting edge work from an intellectual perspective. It’s the big firm curse.

There’s a lot going on in this question, but isn’t it essentially just asking about informed-but-external reputation? I mean, I guess the relatively small subset of partners who have experience at MBB and Big 4/ACN could have a significantly different POV than their peers who have only been at one firm or who have been at smaller firms and one of your targets, but it’s not clear why they would. Especially since you’re essentially saying “what’s the best firm that you chose to leave and for some reason not return to or not to go to when you had the chance?”

Most are equal in terms of TL. Nothing overly differentiated from what I’ve seen. Means you have to look at 2 and 3. I’d say McK wins.

McKinsey, based on the criteria you outlined.

Thank you folks for your helpful perspectives.

It may sound a bit odd, I think you should change your firm: I guess that’s what we are here for. You should have enough resources to do it, and usually less strong brands give you more flexibility to do that