Company: Deloitte
Date: 2013-08-15
Overall rating: 3/5
Employment status: former
Experience level: Junior

Bring your A-game
Pros: You will always be working with intelligent high-effort people here.  The firm has very good domain knowledge of its client's businesses, and an excellent R&D infrastructure.  This is the type of consulting company that will aggressively tell a client what is wrong with their business and try to fix it instead of simply looking for an easy money-making project.  Deloitte Consultants know what they are talking about.
Cons: The up-tempo nature of the work here means there is little work/life balance if you want to move up.  And you *do* have to move up, or you are moved out unless you have a very specialized skillset.  Hence it is more of a competitive environment rather than a collaborative one (which isn't always good for clients).  That kind of model obviously works well here, but isn't for everyone.  The stovepiped partner structure and review methodology means that you are best served by latching onto a partner and riding their coattails.  The large R&D infrastructure means that billable rates are very high, and thus the value proposition for clients is not as good as it should be...which then means that client staffing is done with too much of a bottom-heavy approach towards younger cheaper consultants.  Sometimes the aggressive problem-solving approach means there is too much talking done at clients by the consultants and not enough listening.