Transitioning from consulting to PM: why, how, and the aftermath

Switching from consulting to PM has been a journey of self-exploration, experience-building, and blood/sweat/tears…oh and fun.

Alternative story titles (in jest):

• Moving from one job where you know nothing, to another job where you know nothing
• Do you like meetings?
• **brainstorm furiously about how to convince PM recruiters you have actual experience operating**

Why the change?

Having worked in consulting for 3 years, there were a few things that drew me to PM:

• Execute: I wanted to work “in the stuff” not “around the stuff” as my old Wharton professor Doug would say. Consulting was exactly that: consulting companies but not being able to make decisions. As a PM you are in the weeds and getting messy.
• Lifestyle: While the travel and consulting life can be glamorous, I couldn’t sustain it. The grind it out, work-life sacrifice of consulting was starting to wear on me, even though the people and projects of consulting were interesting. The PM role requires much less travel, and working on one product continuously ensures you some level of work-life balance.

How to change?

It’s not the easiest transition. As a consultant, I’d never actually “done anything”, at least anything easily explainable to the tech world. A few things that helped me:

• Having an industry focus. Management consulting is all about taking smart young people and assuming they’ll figure it out. However, the tech industry loves prior experience. If you were not previously a PM, you don’t have PM experience. However, tech is becoming increasingly cognizant of the fact that they can’t just airdrop into new industries and expect to succeed. Thus, having built up an industry specialty in consulting will help you make a case of why you’re valuable without any tech background.
• Getting lots of little, but real adjacent experiences. Ok, so maybe you’re finding it difficult to transition to PM right away. But you can still get experiences or internships in BizOps, PMM, or Customer Success that can help you understand what a PM does and build your network. Often, it’s easier to transition within a company from a non-PM role to a PM role. If you’re finding it difficult to land a full-time role, or don’t want to commit to a full time role, consider doing a few internships.
• Going to business school. Business school is a great way to gain all these little experiences. Before school I interned in Marketing / PMM at a startup. During school I did product strategy consulting projects with 2 startups and 1 VC. Then over the summer I interned as a PM. Over the course of 1–2 years I gained 5 new product-relevant experiences that definitely helped me with full time recruiting. If you need help deciding, feel free to read my post Should you go to b school? Recap of 1st yr at Wharton!
• Building my technical skills. The emphasis on technical background is usually overstated for PMs. You definitely don’t need an engineering degree to be a great PM, but you do need to be tech smart. I recommend taking an introductory programming class in Python / Java, watching “How the Internet Works” on Khan Academy, watching system design lectures on Youtube, taking a databases / systems storage / SQL type class, and maybe Andrew Ng’s Machine Learning intro class and you will probably get you most of the info you need to know. I ended up pursuing a dual degree during my MBA and got a Master in Computer and Information Technology, but I can definitely say the knowledge is overkill. Oh also definitely read Ben Thompson’s Stratechery to understand the business side of tech.
• Studying like crazy for interviews. There is no shortage of interview prep material for PM interviews. Cracking the PM Interview and Decode and Conquer are both worth their weight in gold. Lewis Lin’s website also has additional resources like a slack channel to find others to interview prep with. I found practicing with partners that were already PMs to be most helpful. Having your “favorite products and how you would improve them” spiel ready is a must.

How’s the change?

Having only done a 3-month internship and being 6 months into my full time job in PM, I cautiously have these takeaways:

• Working with a x-functional team to build something is awesome. It’s so refreshing to not only work on strategy but also see that that strategy is used and contributes towards something real being built. The diversity of work being a PM and working with design, eng, legal, BD, etc. is incredibly exciting. You get to learn a broad skill set like in consulting and have to know when to let go and let the experts (aka basically everyone you work with) take the reins.
• Executing is hard for a strategist, you are really in the weeds and need to prioritize. I don’t have any problem creating a presentation on what needs to get done. It took some getting use to to get to demystifying the steps required to get the team started on an initiative. Maybe it’s a meeting cadence, appointing owners, etc. Sometimes I feel like the most important job of a PM is taking notes and declaring next steps at the end of every meeting. There are so many things you could be working on at any one time, you have to ruthlessly prioritize. I think this is the most different thing from consulting where the entire team was focused on a set of deliverables for an entire project.
• Managing clients in consulting has prepared me well. Getting teams working together and cohesive was a staple in consulting when your teammates and clients changed constantly. Communication skills I developed in consulting definitely help me work with cross functional teams on hairy problems as a PM.

Any other consultants transitioning to PM have thoughts to add? Would love to hear in the comments.

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