5+ great years at BTS San Francisco post-MBA before leaving for an entrepreneurial opportunity
Pros
The people and culture are outstanding. I commend Henrik and the leadership team for building a firm that really does feel like a special place to work. The clients are awesome. In five years I was able to work at many leading high-tech, retail, professional services, and biotechnology firms. The talent (and the market credibility you get from working here is) getting better. During my time there, BTS grew from an $80M firm with an spotty record of placing alums, just figuring out how to best leverage talent from top undergrads and top MBA programs... to a $130M firm that had undergrad alums do great work, then go to HBS, UCLA Anderson, MIT Sloan, and Michigan Ross... and one that had MBA's come, grow, contribute and be able to move into great internal leadership positions and external roles at companies like SF.com and Google. The firm continues to evolve. Look, professional services is tough. All firms will struggle with the balance between revenue growth and "sexy", innovative work. Firms will always struggle to provide interesting work for young, ambitious consultants to get growth, variety, and ownership. Firms will always struggle with "rainmakers" who struggle to develop talent. But not all firms care as much as BTS does to experiment/evolve, grow its talent, and delight its clients. You learn how to sell and drive revenues. Trust me, you'll appreciate and value this. I highly recommend BTS as a place for talented people looking for an entrepreneurial role in a scrappy company with big aspirations.
Cons
The quality of coaching/mentoring/people development varies widely across the top leadership team. The firm must (in a transparent way) hold their leaders to the highest standard not just on revenue delivery, but also on culture and people development.