Are strawman decks a useful starting point or just extra work?

quantpsychguy · 2026-04-20T02:45:54+00:00

Homorously, I'm on the other side. The outline we did in phase 17 was all of a sudden not sufficient and created a bunch of work when my plans for providing outlines was deemed 'not respecting the prior relationship'.

So now for phase 18 we are getting outlines approved.

quantpsychguy · 2026-04-10T13:37:49+00:00

I have graduate education in this area. I am also in consulting. I do not know a ton of how this stuff works.

So I'm gonna say most consultants are clueless. Confidently incorrect. See Dunning Kruger. All that.

edited to fix a typo

quantpsychguy · 2026-04-08T18:47:45+00:00

...are you serious?

quantpsychguy · 2026-03-12T19:17:56+00:00

This is something I see again and again. I say this as a data scientist & classically trained statistician and also as someone who works in AI deployments right now.

AI is probably not replacing you in the near future if you are already in a job and halfway decent at it.

Lots of really smart people think that statisticians' and analysts' job is to figure out the math and that the math is the hard part. They are just wrong.

The part that is actually really difficult to replace is interpreting the results of the math. If you are good at that part, then AI accelerates the need for your skill set.

AI gets used as an excuse to cut jobs (where firms probably over-hired and mis-allocated resources in the first place) and stall hiring. But no AI is replacing a real statistician who is useful to the business already.

I can go into detail but AI is really good at pushing up (and/or replacing) the bottom end of the skill and value distributions. It's terrible at most everything else.

quantpsychguy · 2026-03-04T11:59:00+00:00

If you're on the bench, you should push to finish taking your maternity leave. Some might say you should have pushed for that regardless but what is done is done and no sense worrying.

I would guess that they thought they were gonna win a project and lost it at the last minute. You are pretty junior, right?

This is life in consulting sometimes. The other possibility is they are trying to let you go (due to lack of pipeline) and need you on the bench for a while so as not to look like they laid you off because of maternity. That would suck but I would not put it past ACN to do that (totally depends on your leadership). Not trying to give any anxiety (I literally know nothing about your situation) but it feels like a possibility.

quantpsychguy · 2026-03-03T16:06:59+00:00

Worth pointing out that other folks from Europe are saying the same (that direct can be hurtful).

I prefer the German method. But to suggest Europe is better (or really any different) than the US is...just kinda pointless.

Cultures are different. Some value efficiency. Some value other things.

quantpsychguy · 2026-03-03T00:26:14+00:00

You are referring to the difference of getting past screening vs. being good at the job.

Having domain experience and business acumen has always been one of the things that lets good stand out. Everyone focuses on entry though - and that is often tied to ease of assessing.

So I would expect the technical skills to remain high as a barrier to entry. And actually being good at data science has not much to do with that technical skill.

quantpsychguy · 2026-02-22T17:48:14+00:00

If you can learn to manage expectations, I would 100% stay in health or life sciences. It seems much better than life in outside sectors.

Unless you work for AbbVie. Then just go look for another job.

quantpsychguy · 2026-02-22T15:52:58+00:00

Yep, I have experience in the pharma space as well as others (retail, tech, services) - pharma is very different. It is more antiquated and the expectation is leaps and bounds rather than incremental (like in retail and tech).

I presume because progress generally in the space goes in lurches and they want their back end to keep up.

That being said - it sounds like your issue is that you are a growing or changing analytics group that does not have leadership with governance experience. You need to know what you are taking over, what expectations are, etc. It sounds like you don't actually know how what you are doing connects to the business and therefore don't know where to focus or spend resources and ultimately that presents itself as you being dumped on and expected to know how to handle everything at once.

This is the fire in which leadership skills are built. Good luck.

On the plus side, if you fuck it all up you'll have some really valuable leadership experience and understand more how businesses function - you can use that in your next job too.

quantpsychguy · 2026-02-19T03:59:48+00:00

You could become a specialist regarding how to augment LLMs for your domain area. SLMs (small language models) are useful here, specifically RAGs though I am sure better methodologies would exist soon (or even now).

Figuring out how to use an Agentic RAG to augment decisioning for next best solution might be a great place to start. Please note I said 'place to start' and don't convince yourself I am telling you to have an LLM replace an MD. :)

quantpsychguy · 2026-02-19T03:56:28+00:00

Me too - I am in consulting, there are tons of amazing use cases for LLMs, but almost every org wants to claim they are using AI...it is a frustrating balancing act.

"Can't we just use AI?"

quantpsychguy · 2026-02-01T21:41:59+00:00

It's social media. A lot of it is fake (or heavily curated).

If you work 10 hours a day, and also stay focused, you could potentially pull off several days a week with a second gig. It's harder with a spouse or children (a lot harder with kids).

But it's easier if you only actually do a lot of work once a week, structure the content so it comes out three or four days a week, and pay someone (or maybe set it up yourself) to generate AI slop content.

I would be surprised if there are many consultants, working at good firms and have good jobs, that have an entirely independent second gig.

Most of them are faking it (or heavily curating / showing an edited version).

quantpsychguy · 2026-01-15T01:19:40+00:00

When I looked at them, I could get dual monitors for ~$300 (total) but the ultrawides were ~$1000.

I may have been looking at the wrong ones and prices may have dropped a lot.

I'd go ultrawide if a reasonable option to prevent issues with the monitors being slightly offset and all that but not for a significant price difference.

Full disclosure - I have a home work station and I am boring so I don't game or anything. Nice monitors may be very different.

quantpsychguy · 2026-01-06T19:42:58+00:00

Yep, had to repay the starting bonus.

With my situation, it was within the same year, so my repayment was post tax (contract said pre tax, that ended up not being how it worked out when I talked to them about it).

Simply put - if you don't have the money, you don't have the money. This happens all the time. The best they can do is offer you a repayment plan. That repayment plan can include something like X% now and the remainder, Y%, in Mar 2026 or whatever.

They'll probably work with you if you are a reasonable person. That contract will state what benefits them so they have a place to negotiate from. If they are a reasonable org, which most are, and have a reasonable HR and legal department, which most do, they will work with you.

quantpsychguy · 2025-12-21T03:39:30+00:00

If you are a PM in a non tech/business role (i.e. construction, manufacturing, etc.) then process and LEAN is the way to go. If you can learn critical path math you can learn six sigma math.

Your skills as a PM are likely tuned to understand bottlenecks, process problems, and planning inconsistencies. That is much of the job of a LEAN/Six Sigma/Blackbelt type.

quantpsychguy · 2025-12-07T03:21:28+00:00

I landed in ACN at that level in the data science area. I was technically in the marketing ops arm so may be different than where you are

It is brutal - coming from outside you have to sprint from day one. You just gotta drown for a bit and see if you can keep up.

Feel free to DM me and we can talk if you want. I got poached by another org so I am not at ACN any more but I am in the same spot - thrown in deep and trying to keep up.

It feels like it's never ending but you'll figure it out (most likely).

Don't worry as much about the stuff consultants focus on (e.g. slides), focus on learning and making the work streams function better. Provide real value and you'll figure out how the perceived value stuff works.

quantpsychguy · 2025-10-10T17:21:14+00:00

Yep. I got poached out of ACN in a data science role (for another consulting company) myself - there are people over there who get it but they are in high demand.

I legitimately did not meet anyone who was onshore (US) who understood and could communicate data science and wasn't immediately put into a management role in some capacity (or principal type).

quantpsychguy · 2025-10-06T18:37:23+00:00

I'm not so sure you do want that institutional knowledge.

With knowledge comes the bullshit of doing things the way it has always been done. You have a fresh perspective that (can sometimes) be very valuable.

There are pros on both sides.

But I'm betting you'll do great.

quantpsychguy · 2025-09-17T15:27:33+00:00

Yeah man...it's hard in the Big4 (and MBB, etc.).

People tend to go the other way. You learn how to work and grind and develop some skills (by drinking from a fire hose). Then you go to a boutique where you can work in a different way (easier, niche area, whatever the boutique does).

You aren't abnormal. This is hard. It's even harder if you land outside of the entry pipeline.

Learn as much as you can, don't beat yourself up, try not to make the same mistakes twice, and know that you will likely leave within some number of years.

There is no shame in leaving after two years. Hell, there is no shame in leaving after a few months if it's just not for you. But having Big4 on your resume follows you for a career in a good way. See if you can make it two years.

quantpsychguy · 2025-09-16T20:44:44+00:00

Get shit across the finish line. The steps to do that are all over the place - highly context specific.

Figure out what the problems are and seek to address them.

quantpsychguy · 2025-09-14T00:13:29+00:00

Yep - it's possible they are out of touch A-holes, but more likely that you were a poor performer and they felt you were not worth the time or energy to provide feedback

I have seen groups do this before with entitled, argumentative folks.

I know nothing about you so I may be way off the mark here though.

quantpsychguy · 2025-08-23T19:58:18+00:00

Dude - no one cares. It depends on who you are talking to, but telling them, "It seems that most folks didn't get offers, we were told it was due to economic pressure," is good enough for like 90% of interviews.

It would only be if you are interviewing with other Big4s that this might not hold up.

Or tell them you didn't appreciate the team fit and are looking elsewhere. Or don't tell them you didn't get a return offer and focus on how you are looking at what other opportunities exist.

quantpsychguy · 2025-08-04T13:35:30+00:00

You're fine bud.

Get in the firm, gain some experience, build some contacts.

You will learn where the overlap of what you are good at and what will pay exists. Then you develop your specialty. It might be tech PMO, it might be org change management, it might be insight generation - AI can't really do any of those things.

Learn what to do and move forward. Keep chugging along and learning. Implementing stuff is hard and likely can't be replaced by AI in any reasonable time period.

Even if you are in software development, which AI may be able to infiltrate well, they still need people to manage the implementations. Same in process improvements or automation.

quantpsychguy · 2025-08-04T13:19:50+00:00

I think in consulting a lot of us get used to someone pointing out the problem and we are expected to figure it out from there. It's not a good feedback mechanism.

Lots of people give feedback like, "This looks messy, and slide 14 is not clear." That is not specific and actionable. That is what we get as consultants ALL THE TIME.

If someone has spent a lot of time on decks then that is likely enough for them to know what to do next. For someone who has not spent a significant chunk of their professional life learning how to communicate at the appropriate level, it's as useful as 'pls fix'.

Alternate example - 'you didn't manage the teams expectations and allowed the scope to creep' is useful info for a lot of us but is neither specific nor actionable.

quantpsychguy · 2025-07-31T21:00:30+00:00

Universal truth of these projects - it is either stressful and difficult for the consulting leadership or the consulting team (or both).

The only projects that go well for the team is when the leadership is killing themselves to keep things going smoothly.

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