Teaching to learn and learning to teach: notes toward building a university in a management consulting firm

The shape and makeup of a corporate university in a management consulting firm remains a vexed question: what should it look like, and what should it do, to develop its professionals most effectively? There is not a great deal of literature on this topic ‐ or on management, human resources, and professional development in professional services firms in general ‐ as these firms tend to hold their cards close to the vest. This article offers some initial thinking about education and development in a management consulting firm, with the aim of laying out a framework for understanding what a university in such a context might be. The hope is that this consideration of the particular dynamics of management consulting firms and the challenges for education and development therein, coupled with a case study of the curriculum at the management and strategy consulting firm of Booz·Allen & Hamilton, will open up a discussion of the most important factors for success in this arena.