Boston Consulting Group
Boston Consulting Group (BCG) is an American global management consulting firm founded in 1963, headquartered in Boston, Massachusetts. It is one of the Big Three — the world’s three largest and most prestigious management consulting firms — along with Bain & Company and McKinsey & Company. History. The firm was founded in 1963 by Bruce Henderson as part of The Boston Safe Deposit, and Trust Company. Henderson had been recruited from Arthur D. Little to establish the consulting arm operating as a subsidiary under the name Management and Consulting Division of the Boston Safe Deposit and Trust Company. Initially the  division only advised clients of the bank, with billings for the first month at just US$500. Henderson hired his second consultant, Arthur P. Contas, in December 1963. In 1966, BCG opened its second office in Tokyo, Japan. In 1967, Henderson met Bill Bain and offered him a role at the firm. Bain agreed and joined in 1967 at a starting salary of $17,000 per year. In the early 1970s, Bain was considered internally to be Henderson's eventual successor. However, in 1973 Bain resigned from BCG to start his own strategy consulting firm, Bain & Company, hiring away six  of BCG's employees. In 1974, Henderson arranged an employee stock ownership plan so that the employees could make the company independent from The Boston Safe Deposit and Trust Company. The buyout of all shares was completed in 1979. Recruiting. BCG typically hires for an associate or a consultant position, recruiting from top undergraduate colleges, advanced degree programs and business schools. The firm also offers summer internships. Insiders estimate that BCG North American offices receive around 10,000 resumes every year for the associate position. Consulting interviews typically include up to four behavioral and case interviews. Final round interviews usually consist  of two interviews with the firm’s partners. Senior associates have the opportunity to work abroad through BCG's exchange program. Many associates are also sponsored by the firm to attend business school. As is typical for the top strategy consultancies, BCG practices an "up or out," or forced attrition, system, in which employees must leave the company if they fail to achieve a promotion within a fixed time frame. Interview process. BCG uses the case method to conduct interviews. This technique is designed to simulate the types of problems inherent in management consulting and to test the qualitative and  quantitative skills deemed important for abstract thinking in a business setting. Generally, the interview process consists of an online assessment and two consecutive rounds of interviews. The Boston Consulting Group’s hiring process is commonly regarded as one of the most difficult and selective in the world. BCG growth-share matrix. In the 1970s, BCG created and popularized the "growth–share matrix," a chart to help large corporations decide how to allocate cash among their business units. The corporation would categorize its business units as "Stars," "Cash Cows," "Question Marks," or "Dogs," and then allocate cash accordingly, moving money from  Cash Cows toward Stars and Question Marks, which have higher market growth rates and hence greater upside potential. BCG extended business units. BCG Digital Ventures. BCG Digital Ventures partners with companies to research, design, and launch new products and services. Ware2Go (a logistics platform developed with United Parcel Service), Tracr (a blockchain-based supply chain tracker developed with De Beers) and OpenSC (a supply chain tracker developed with the World Wide Fund for Nature) are projects backed by BCGDV. BCG GAMMA. BCG GAMMA builds and applies data science, analytics, and artificial intelligence to identify competitive advantages in market. BCG Platinion . BCG Platinion covers the tech, architecture, implementation, and human-centered design side of digital transformations. BCG Omnia. BCG Omnia translates strategy expertise into software and data solutions. BCG BrightHouse. BrightHouse was founded in 1995, and acquired by BCG in 2015. BrightHouse is a creative consultancy specializing in corporate purpose. Expand, a BCG Company. Expand, founded in 2001, offers advice for executives, as well as research and syndicated benchmarking for financial institutions. INVERTO, a BCG Company. INVERTO is an international management consultancy and one of the specialists for strategic purchasing and supply chain management in Europe. Controversy. Angola. An article published  by "The New York Times" on January 19, 2020 identified the Boston Consulting Group as having worked with Isabel dos Santos, who exploited Angola's natural resources while the country suffers from poverty, illiteracy, and infant mortality. According to the article, BCG was contracted by the Angolan state-owned petroleum company Sonangol, as well as the jewelry company De Grisogono, owned by her husband through shell companies in Luxembourg, Malta and the Netherlands; the firm was reportedly paid through offshore companies in tax havens such as Malta. Saudi Arabia. "The New York Times" also reported that Boston Consulting Group is  one of the consulting firms, along with McKinsey and Booz Allen, helping Prince Mohammed bin Salman consolidate power in Saudi Arabia. While a BCG spokesperson said the firm turns down projects involving military and intelligence strategy, BCG is involved in designing the economic blueprint for the country, a plan called Vision 2030. In June 2021, BCG was hired to examine the feasibility for the country to host the 2030 FIFA World Cup. The bid was assessed to be a great deal, as FIFA’s policy of continental rotation blocked all the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) nations from hosting the World  Cup until 2034, after Qatar was set to become the first Middle Eastern nation to host the tournament in 2022. Sweden. Boston Consulting Group has received substantial criticism for their involvement in the construction of the New Karolinska Solna University Hospital after an investigation by Dagens Nyheter. Specifically the potential conflict of interest where a former BCG employee and then hospital executive approved numerous expenses without proper receipts and the high cost paid for external consultants including BCG. In the investigative journalism book "Konsulterna - Kampen om Karolinska" (roughly "The Consultants - The Struggle for the Karolinska University Hospital"), the authors and  Dagens Nyheter journalists Anna Gustavsson and Lisa Röstlund argue that the value-based health care model as recommended by BCG had not been properly investigated and have resulted in an exponential growth in administration and lack of responsibility for patients.