Consultants Are Paid to Fix Businesses. Why Can’t They Fix Their Own?


裁减合伙人，放慢员工晋升速度，减少办公室零食……大型咨询公司正努力应对业务低迷的局面。新员工甚至要等待几个月才能入职。



在波士顿咨询公司（Boston Consulting Group, 简称：BCG），初级员工总是不断向高级顾问提出一个现在已经司空见惯的问题：你有工作需要我做吗？ 6park.com
At Boston Consulting Group, junior staffers have been peppering more senior consultants with a now-familiar query: Do you have work for me? 6park.com
   
答案往往是否定的。 6park.com
The answer has often been no. 
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像麦肯锡(McKinsey)、BCG和德勤(Deloitte)这类老牌大型咨询公司都是有偿为全球最大的企业预测未来，但它们却未能准确预测自己的命运。随之而来的后果是一片混乱。 6park.com
Big and established consulting firms such as McKinsey, BCG and Deloitte, which are paid to predict the future for the world’s biggest corporations, have gotten their own destiny wrong. The fallout is messy.  6park.com
  
一些新员工在苦苦寻找可以干的工作。咨询公司正在失去客户的合同，一次性客户在大范围削减成本的情势下，也缩减了战略评估预算。一些手里有项目的员工在连轴转地工作，而另一些员工则无所事事。许多公司以业绩为由裁减员工，它们或者公开大规模裁员，或者悄悄让员工走人。 6park.com
Some new recruits are struggling to find work. Firms are losing contracts as one-time clients slash budgets for strategic reviews amid broad cost-cutting efforts. Some employees are working long hours for the assignments they do have, while others are twiddling their thumbs. A number of firms are cutting staff by imposing large-scale layoffs or by quietly showing staff the door, citing performance reasons.  6park.com
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疫情期间，企业们为了应对全球经济放缓、居家办公模式和供应链延误等问题而向咨询公司寻求专业意见，咨询行业在新业务的推动下蓬勃发展，于是招聘了与之相匹配的员工。但现在，麻烦出现了。当一切恢复相对正常的状态时，企业开始认真审视成本，从那以后，许多公司一直处于紧缩模式。 6park.com
The troubles are arising after the industry boomed with new business—and hired staff to match—during the Covid-19 pandemic when companies sought expertise on how to handle the global slowdown, the work-from-home paradigm and supply-chain delays. When relative normalcy returned, companies looked hard at their costs and many have been in contraction mode ever since. 6park.com
  
对贝恩、安永(EY)和麦肯锡等公司的60多名现任及前任顾问和合伙人的采访显示，各家公司都处在一种新的节俭环境下，从办公室零食到优步(Uber)车费的一切开支都会受到审视，为参加客户会议而进行的商务旅行也减少了。 6park.com
Interviews with more than 60 current and former consultants and partners from Bain, EY, McKinsey, and beyond reveal a new frugal environment where everything from office snacks to Uber rides are under scrutiny and travel for client meetings has scaled back.  6park.com
   
咨询业高管表示，这些问题只是暂时的。许多公司表示，它们的业务已经出现小幅增长，还有些公司说，它们不会将过去18个月的低迷视为行业的大规模衰退。 6park.com
Consulting executives say the problems are temporary. A number of firms say they are already seeing an uptick in business, and some add that they would not categorize the past 18 months as a massive downturn for the industry. 



BCG北美地区负责人莎伦·马西尔(Sharon Marcil)表示：“2024年已经是强劲的一年，我对这个市场的势头充满了信心。”她补充说，最近几个月，该公司在北美地区的业务出现了“非常强劲的”两位数增长。 6park.com
“2024 is already a strong year, and I am confident in the momentum of the market,” said Sharon Marcil, North America head for BCG, adding that the firm’s operations in the region saw “very strong” double-digit growth in recent months. 6park.com
   
然而，包括阿迪达斯(Adidas)和花旗集团(Citigroup)在内的一些公司都表示，它们正在减少顾问支出。据Source Global Research估计，美国咨询市场2024年预计将增长6%，低于疫情期间两位数的增幅。该公司发现美国客户中有86%计划今年削减咨询开支。 6park.com
Yet companies from Adidas to Citigroup have said they are ratcheting back on consultants. In the U.S., the consulting market is expected to grow by 6% in 2024, down from double-digit growth in the pandemic, according to Source Global Research estimates. That group found that 86% of U.S. clients said they plan to cut spending on consulting this year. 6park.com
   
比约恩·古尔登(Bjorn Gulden)在2023年重返阿迪达斯担任CEO后做的头几件事之一就是和这家体育用品巨头的顾问解约，责怪他们提供的策略阻碍了公司发展。顾问们的报告通常有几十页那么长，里面充满了图表和模型。古尔登对《华尔街日报》(Wall Street Journal)表示：“我根本不看这些。” 6park.com
One of the first things Bjørn Gulden did when he returned to Adidas as chief executive in 2023 was to ax the sports giant’s consultants, blaming their strategies for hobbling the company. Consultants’ reports typically run dozens of pages filled with charts and models. Gulden told The Wall Street Journal, “I don’t even see them.” 6park.com
   
麦肯锡去年曾要求合伙人推迟领取部分报酬，以帮助公司应对客户兴趣低迷的状况，不过到了年底，业务表现情况还是让他们拿到了全额报酬。去年，该公司还裁减了1,400名员工（基本都是后台人员），并且放慢了晋升速度，同时减少了一些现场培训和务虚会。 6park.com
McKinsey asked partners last year to defer some of their pay to weather the downturn in client interest, though by year’s end business was good enough that they got their full pay. The company also cut 1,400 largely back-office employees last year, and slowed down the pace of promotions and trimmed some in-person training and retreats.  


麦肯锡最近告知大约3,000名员工其绩效评级不理想。

麦肯锡全球管理合伙人鲍勃·斯特恩费尔斯(Bob Sternfels)险些被赶下台，暴露出这家全球最赚钱的合伙企业之一的内部人士对其运营方式的不满。一些合伙人对麦肯锡去年的重组以及该公司应对增长放缓的方式感到不满；其他人则抱怨变化无常的企业文化以及自上而下的领导风格。 6park.com
McKinsey global managing partner Bob Sternfels narrowly survived an effort to unseat him, laying bare the dissatisfaction with how one of the world’s most lucrative partnerships is operating. Some partners felt frustrated over the firm’s restructuring last year and how McKinsey responded to slowing growth; others complained about a changing firm culture and a top-down leadership style.  6park.com
   
安永最近采取了一系列削减成本的广泛措施，其中包括裁减100多名美国咨询合伙人，这样的举措几乎闻所未闻。裁减合伙人的行为在整个行业内掀起波澜，因为公司很少淘汰能够带来新业务的群体。成为一家大公司的合伙人曾经意味着终生的职业生涯，每年可能有数百万美元收入。 6park.com
In an almost unheard-of move, EY recently laid off more than 100 U.S. consulting partners amid broader cuts. The partner layoffs ricocheted across the industry, as firms rarely eliminate a cohort that can bring in new business. Making partner at a large firm once meant a career for life, with potentially millions in earnings each year. 6park.com
   
“这个乡村俱乐部不再是高枕无忧的地方了，”总部位于芝加哥的咨询公司West Monroe的董事长兼首席执行官凯文·麦卡蒂(Kevin McCarty)表示。 6park.com
“The country club isn’t safe any more,” said Kevin McCarty, chairman and CEO of Chicago-based consulting firm West Monroe.

业务枯竭

由于高利率环境下交易数量下降，私募股权工作（顶级公司咨询合同的一个重大来源）已经枯竭。管理顾问经常为并购的尽职调查提供建议，然后获得合同，负责将一家公司与另一家公司整合。根据贝恩公司的一项分析，去年全球并购市场的总价值下降了15%，至3.2万亿美元。 6park.com
Private-equity work—a big wellspring of consulting contracts for top firms—has dried up, due to a drop in dealmaking amid high interest rates. Management consultants often advise on due diligence for mergers and acquisitions and then get contracts to integrate one firm with another. The overall M&A market, globally, dropped 15% last year to a total value of $3.2 trillion, according to a Bain analysis. 


花期集团CEO简·弗雷泽此前是麦肯锡合伙人。花旗最近削减了在聘请咨询顾问方面的开支。

近年来，花期集团聘请了外部顾问帮助其全面改革公司运营。在首席执行官、前麦肯锡合伙人简·弗雷泽(Jane Fraser)的领导下，这家银行启动了一项雄心勃勃的计划，旨在重塑公司，卖掉一些国际消费者业务，裁员数千人，扩大财富管理部门并提高技术水平。 6park.com
Citi hired outside consultants in recent years to help it overhaul its operations. The bank embarked on an ambitious plan under CEO Jane Fraser, a former McKinsey partner, to reshape the company, selling off some international consumer businesses, cutting thousands of jobs, growing its wealth-management division and improving its technology.  6park.com
    
1月份，首席财务官马克·梅森(Mark Mason)表示，该公司已经调整了支出，“随着我们更深入执行”一项转型计划，“将咨询费用转为投入到技术和薪酬”。弗雷泽仍然面临来自投资者的压力，要求提高公司利润。 6park.com
In January, Chief Financial Officer Mark Mason said the company had shifted its spending, moving “from consulting expenses to technology and compensation as we have gotten deeper into the execution” of a transformation. Fraser remains under pressure from investors to boost profits.  6park.com
    
Block的首席运营官兼首席财务官阿姆丽塔·阿胡贾(Amrita Ahuja)去年秋天表示，该公司已经确定了一些预计将削减管理费用的领域，包括顾问和承包商方面的费用。Block是支付平台Square的母公司。 6park.com
Block’s chief operating officer and chief financial officer, Amrita Ahuja, said this fall that the company had identified a number of areas where it expected to cut corporate overhead costs, including on consultants and contractors. Block is the parent company of payments-platform Square. 6park.com
   
一些公司将曾经用于咨询的费用转作技术开支，尤其是人工智能领域。咨询公司本身也在为人工智能花钱。有些公司表示，它将成为一个救世主，既可以作为改善它们自身流程的工具，又可以作为一个实现增长的专业知识领域，公司可以销售针对这个领域的服务。麦肯锡公布去年的收入约为160亿美元，达到创纪录水平，这在一定程度上要归功于生成式人工智能带来的新一波工作。 6park.com
Some of the spending companies once allocated for consulting has shifted to spending on tech, in particular artificial intelligence. Consulting firms themselves are also spending on AI. Some say it will be a savior as a tool to improve their own processes as well as an area of expertise to grow and sell services against. McKinsey reported record revenue of approximately $16 billion last year thanks, in part, to a new wave of work relating to generative AI.  6park.com
   
麦肯锡高级合伙人斯文·斯米特(Sven Smit)是业内资深人士，于1990年代初期加入该公司，并与他人合着了一些关于提高公司业绩的书籍，比如《精细化增长》(The Granularity of Growth)。斯米特说，这个行业是周期性的。他向同事强调，人生不是一条直线；就在几年前，该公司还存在需求积压的情况。他说，现在高管们也面临比以往更严峻的难题，需要顾问提供专业建议，以应对不断变化的消费者行为和地缘政治动荡。他说：“我从未见过如此复杂的情况，也从未见过CEO们要考虑这么多重大问题。” 6park.com
McKinsey senior partner Sven Smit, a veteran who joined the firm in the early ‘90s and co-wrote books such as, “The Granularity of Growth,” on improving company performance, said the industry is cyclical. Smit has emphasized to colleagues that life isn’t a straight line; just a few years ago, the company had a backlog of demand. Executives are also facing tougher conundrums than ever, he said, and need the expert advice a consultant can offer to navigate changing consumer behavior and geopolitical unrest. “I have not seen more complexity—and more big issues on the minds of CEOs—ever,” he said.



斯米特说，人们对于如何利用生成式人工智能来提高生产力和重组劳动力这方面有需求。他说，国际上还有很多公司在打电话咨询，尤其是来自中国的公司，其中有些公司是第一次面临不得不裁员的局面。 6park.com
There is demand for how to use generative AI to boost productivity and restructure workforces, he said. Internationally, many companies are still calling, Smit said, especially from China where some companies are having to conduct layoffs for the first time.   6park.com
   
“客户对我们服务的需求实际上在增加，而不是下降，”麦肯锡的高级合伙人兼首席客户官莉兹·希尔顿·西格尔(Liz Hilton Segel)表示。 6park.com
“Demand for our services is actually accelerating, not declining,” said Liz Hilton Segel, a senior partner and McKinsey’s chief client officer. 6park.com
  
自由职业顾问市场Catalant的首席执行官帕特·佩蒂蒂(Pat Petitti)表示，客户已经要求咨询公司降低收费。有些公司正试图通过聘请经验丰富的自由职业者来节省开支，这些自由职业者单打独斗，通常专注于某一个行业。他说，这不仅比聘请知名公司便宜，而且客户不用花那么多时间让20多岁的顾问团队熟悉情况。 6park.com
Clients have demanded that consultancies charge less. Some are trying to save by hiring experienced freelancers who work solo, often specializing in a single industry, said Pat Petitti, CEO of Catalant, a freelance marketplace for consultants. Not only is it cheaper than engaging a big-name firm, he said, but clients don’t have to spend as much time bringing teams of consultants in their 20s up to speed. 6park.com
   
咨询公司正试图通过减少项目人员数量、把薪酬更低的员工放到项目上来留住客户。他们可以依靠级别较低的员工或印度等地的员工，这些人员对客户的收费要低于中层顾问。 6park.com
Consulting firms are trying to keep clients engaged by staffing projects with fewer, cheaper staff. They can lean on lower-ranked staff or employees in places like India who cost less for clients than a midlevel consultant would. 

工作不安全感

长期以来，在大型咨询公司工作的经历一直是通往辉煌的企业职业生涯的门票。麦肯锡在内部自称为“头号‘CEO工厂’”，它有数百名前员工成为大型组织的领导者。即将毕业的大学生会花很多时间练习面试，分析商业策略，有些人会随身携带西装，为随时可能出现的社交机会做好准备。获得这份工作后，每天的工作时长和适应“不进则退”的文化让他们引以为傲。他们和来自政府、金融、科技等各领域的客户见面，将之称为“MBA下半场”——通过这个机会可以和高管会面，了解企业实际是怎样运作的，每次出差都要从周日持续到周四。 6park.com
Working at a big consulting firm has long been a ticket to a highflying corporate career. McKinsey internally has referred to itself as “the #1 ‘CEO Factory,’” with hundreds of its former employees leading large organizations. Soon-to-be graduates spend hours practicing for interviews where they analyze business strategy, and some keep suits nearby in case there is a chance to network. On the job, they take pride in working long hours and navigating the up-or-out culture. They meet clients from government to finance to tech, calling the field an “M.B.A. part two”—the chance to meet executives and see how business really works, one Sunday-to-Thursday trip at a time.  6park.com
   
现在，有几家咨询公司正在考虑裁员，一些公司已经裁减了大量员工。然而，很多公司也在尽可能留住员工，期待新业务会更快反弹。咨询公司是紧密型合伙企业，因此和上市公司相比，它们快速裁员的动力较小。 6park.com
Now, job cuts are on the table at several consulting companies and some firms have already made significant reductions. Many, however, hung on to staff as long as they could, expecting that new business would rebound quicker than it has. Consulting firms are closely held partnerships so they have less incentives than public companies to cut staff quickly. 



去年夏天，West Monroe裁减了10%的员工，也就是大约200人，此前高管们意识到他们之前的假设是错误的，即业务低迷将持续六到九个月，然后客户就会回来。实际上，这轮低迷持续了更长时间。不过，首席执行官麦卡蒂表示，需求正在开始恢复。 6park.com
West Monroe laid off 10% of staff, or about 200 people, last summer after executives realized their assumption was incorrect that the downturn would last six or nine months before clients came back. Instead, it dragged on longer, though, the CEO, McCarty, said demand is starting to return. 6park.com
    
麦卡蒂说，“你必须做些什么”，然后做出艰难的决定。“你不能依赖太多人。”2002年，麦卡蒂和同事一起创办了West Monroe。他们此前就职于会计和咨询巨头安达信公司(Arthur Andersen)，该公司受安然(Enron)丑闻影响而倒闭。 6park.com
“You have to do something,” and make tough decisions, said McCarty, who started the firm in 2002 with colleagues from Arthur Andersen, the accounting and consulting giant felled by the Enron scandal. “You can’t just hang on to too many people.” 6park.com
   
咨询公司裁员的原因之一是，企业雇主——包括客户公司的管理团队——已经放慢了白领员工的招聘速度并继续宣布裁员计划。这就意味着想要离开这一领域的顾问很难做到自愿离开，因此公司必须依靠裁员来精简队伍。 6park.com
One reason firms have cut staff is that corporate employers—including client companies’ executive teams—have slowed white-collar hiring and continue to announce plans to trim jobs. That means consultants hoping to leave the field have struggled to do so voluntarily, and so firms must lean on cuts to thin the ranks.  6park.com
   
贝恩公司鼓励一些顾问以领取25%左右薪水的方式休假，以减轻公司的工资负担。一些手头没有项目的年轻管理顾问描述道，他们上班时间都在打瞌睡或者在Netflix上疯狂追剧。 6park.com
Bain encouraged some consultants to take sabbaticals at roughly 25% of their salary to lighten the payroll load. Some young management consultants without projects describe spending their time napping or binge-watching Netflix.  6park.com
    
在BCG，多位团队负责人表示，已感受到压力要对初级员工进行更严格的绩效评级。他们表示，糟糕的评级会让更多顾问因为绩效原因而被悄然抛弃，而不会像正式裁员那样引起负面关注。 6park.com
At BCG, multiple team leaders said they felt pressure to score junior staffers more harshly in performance ratings. Worse scores allow more consultants to be quietly jettisoned for performance reasons, they said, without the bad publicity that comes with official layoffs. 6park.com
   
在业务放缓时期，“他们展示自己能力的机会较少，”BCG的人力资源主管阿莉西亚·皮特曼(Alicia Pittman)表示。 6park.com
In slower times, “there’s less opportunity for them to show their stuff,” said Alicia Pittman, BCG’s people chair.
  6park.com
她补充说，这可能会带来焦虑，但仍然有实现成长的方法，比如从事业务拓展方面的工作。“我们期待的这个标准本身实际上没有太大变化，”她说。 6park.com
That can breed anxiety, but there are still ways to grow, like work on business development, she added. “The standard itself on what we expect actually doesn’t change very much,” she said.  6park.com
   
裁员是对疫情期间咨询公司策略的彻底转变，当时，麦肯锡和其他公司都加大了招聘力度以避免落后，同时还不断提高薪水，到了2022年，一些顶尖商学院新近毕业生的基本工资中位数攀升至17.5万美元。根据追踪行业薪酬和趋势的网站Management Consulted的数据，今年的薪资总体上基本与这持平。 6park.com
Doing layoffs is an about-face from consultants’ strategies during the pandemic when McKinsey and others put hiring on overdrive to avoid falling behind, paying ever higher salaries, with median base salaries for recent graduates of some top M.B.A. programs climbing to $175,000 by 2022. Salaries broadly this year flatlined, according to Management Consulted, a website that tracks industry pay and trends.  6park.com
   
麦肯锡在全球范围内的员工数量已经从2021年的3万人增加至4万人。用麦肯锡内部的话来说，如果顾问没有被分配到某个项目或者他们绩效表现不佳，他们仍然担心自己会被“CTL’d”，也就是被建议离开。据知情人士透露，麦肯锡最近告知大约3,000名员工其绩效评级不理想。 6park.com
McKinsey has grown to 40,000 worldwide, up from 30,000 in 2021. In McKinsey-speak, consultants still worry about getting “CTL’d,” or counseled to leave, if they don’t get assigned to a project or if their performance is lacking. McKinsey recently put about 3,000 staffers on notice with unsatisfactory performance ratings, according to people familiar with the matter. 6park.com
   
去年，一名德勤的顾问被分配到一个项目，正常情况下，该项目需要配备四名顾问，但为了节省资金，只配备了两名顾问。有时候，她从早上7点一直工作到第二天凌晨2点。在项目最紧张的日子，她需要每天服用阿德拉(Adderall)来保持活力，洗头的时候会大把大把地掉头发。 6park.com
One Deloitte consultant was assigned to a project last year that would normally require four consultants, but to save money was staffed with two. Some days she worked from 7 a.m. to 2 a.m. At the project’s peak, she took Adderall daily to stay motivated, and when she washed her hair, clumps of it fell out. 


德勤在去年春天裁减了大约1,200名员工。

当德勤在去年春天裁减大约1,200名员工并继续裁员时，同事之间的短信往来活跃了起来，彼此交换着关于谁还安全、谁被解雇的信息。 6park.com
When Deloitte cut about 1,200 staffers last spring and then kept cutting, text chains with colleagues would light up, comparing notes about who was safe and who was out. 6park.com
    
当她的项目结束后，她也被裁掉了。 6park.com
When her project ended, she was laid off, too.  6park.com
   
德勤表示，该公司已为员工的学习和发展投资出力，包括一些帮助顾问规划职业生涯的项目。 6park.com
Deloitte said it has invested in workers’ learning and development, including programs to help consultants navigate their careers.  6park.com
    
“从客户的角度看，他们完全有权审视这些咨询公司并问一句‘你们的自我管理能力又如何呢？’这是咨询公司必须面对的问题，”毕马威(KPMG)前首席顾问迈克尔·米舍(Michael Mische)表示。他目前在南加州大学(University of Southern California)教授咨询方面的课程。 6park.com
“From a client perspective, they have every right to look at the firms and say. ‘How well are you managing yourself?’ That’s something the firms have to contend with,” said Michael Mische, a former principal at KPMG who now teaches classes on consulting at the University of Southern California.

招聘，招聘，招聘

尽管如此，咨询公司仍处在招聘模式中。去年秋天，当又一位德勤顾问正飞往一所大学为公司招揽学生时，他收到了一封电子邮件，邀请他参加人才情况更新会议。翻译过来就是：他工作没了。 6park.com
Firms stay in recruiting mode regardless. Last fall, as another Deloitte consultant was flying to a college campus to woo students to his firm, he received an email inviting him to a talent update meeting. Translation: He was out of a job.  6park.com
   
他来到校园，向学生们宣讲他们可以在这家公司展开的美好职业生涯，心里明明知道下周一他就会失业。 6park.com
He went to the campus and pitched the students on a great career they could have at the firm, knowing that by Monday he would be unemployed.  6park.com
   
很多人仍然想在这个行业谋得一席之地。在去年年底的一份备忘录中，麦肯锡的斯特恩费尔斯告诉员工和校友，该公司一直在收到大量入职申请。 6park.com
Plenty of people still want a spot in the industry. In a note at the end of last year, McKinsey’s Sternfels told employees and alumni that the firm continues to receive a flurry of applications. 6park.com
  
在《华尔街日报》见到的这份备忘录中，斯特恩费尔斯写道：“每次与负责招募人才的同事交谈时，我都会想到有那么多人愿意和我们站在同一片阵地——每年有超过一百万人申请加入我们。” 6park.com
“I’m reminded each time I speak with our Talent Attraction colleagues that so many would love to be in our shoes—more than one million people apply to work here each year,” Sternfels wrote in the memo, which was viewed by the Journal. 6park.com
   
普华永道(PricewaterhouseCoopers)负责美国和墨西哥地区招聘的罗德·亚当斯(Rod Adams)说，为了获得大学校园里的顶尖人才，该公司开始在大学二年级学生中招募潜在的顾问。他说，这么做意味着公司必须预测未来的客户需求。该公司在1月份录用了575名应届毕业生，此前，由于业务低迷，公司推迟了其中许多人本应从2023年夏天开始的入职时间。 6park.com
To secure top talent from college campuses, Rod Adams, who leads recruiting for the U.S. and Mexico for PricewaterhouseCoopers, said firms start recruiting would-be consultants as college sophomores. Doing so means the firm has to speculate about future client demand, he said. The firm onboarded 575 new grad hires in January, after delaying many of their start dates from summer 2023 because of the downturn in business. 6park.com
   
霍夫斯特拉大学(Hofstra University)商学院就业指导中心执行主任帕特里克·霍尔顿(Patrick Holton)表示，其他的2023届毕业生要等到今年夏天才能开始工作，有些人的入职时间要推迟到今年10月。 6park.com
Other 2023 graduates won’t start until this summer, and some had their start dates delayed to as late as October 2024, said Patrick Holton, executive director of Hofstra University’s business school career center. 
    6park.com
德勤向一些延迟入职的员工每月支付2,000美元作为等待的补偿，而毕马威则向新员工提供10,000美元，目的是不让他们接受其他工作。据Management Consulted称，留用津贴无法与他们的咨询薪酬相提并论，拥有本科学历的从业人员最高可获得11万美元的年薪，而工商管理硕士的薪酬最高可达19万美元。霍尔顿说，咨询公司在吊着应届毕业生，希望他们会厌倦等待并找到其他工作。 6park.com
Deloitte has paid some with delayed start dates $2,000 a month to wait around, and KPMG offered a payment of $10,000 to stop recruits from taking other jobs. The retention stipends don’t compare to their consulting pay, which can top $110,000 for those with undergraduate degrees and $190,000 for M.B.A.s, according to Management Consulted. Consultancies are stringing along new grads with the hope that they’ll tire of waiting and find other work, Holton said. 6park.com
   
更重要的是，许多来自哈佛商学院(Harvard Business School)和耶鲁大学管理学院(Yale’s School of Management)等顶级名校的MBA新晋毕业生当初在获得工作机会的同时还获得了大约3万美元的签约奖金。四大咨询公司的几名新员工表示，现在不要这份咨询工作可能需要偿还那些奖金。 6park.com
What’s more, many newly minted M.B.A.s from top-ranked universities like Harvard Business School and Yale’s School of Management received signing bonuses of about $30,000 with their job offers. Backing out now from a consulting job could require repaying those bonuses, several recruits to Big Four firms said.  6park.com
   
“这种金手铐现在变得更紧了，”一位刚获得MBA学位几个月、去年10月开始在普华永道工作的新顾问说。他当初等待入职的时候，不得不通过打零工来维持生计，包括送外卖和辅导高中生。“我从顶级名校MBA毕业，被招进这里——现在却送着外卖。”他心想。 6park.com
“The golden handcuffs are now tighter,” said one new consultant who started at PwC in October, several months after earning an M.B.A. As he waited, he patched together odd jobs to make ends meet, including delivering takeout and tutoring high-school students. “Here I am,” he thought, “graduating from this top M.B.A. program—and doing UberEats.”