Kearney prides itself on providing a path for experienced hires to join the firm – that is what this week’s episode is all about!
Joining us is Mark Missirlian, a Manager in the firm’s New York office. The fast-paced conversation explores:
- Opportunities for experienced hires at Kearney
- How to know what role to apply for as a working professional
- How to network your way into consulting as an experienced hire
- Does Kearney have a referral system?
- Turnaround time between invite and interview (spoiler: <1 week)
- Do’s and don’t for your consulting resume
Kearney does offer sponsorship for consultants at the Senior Business Analyst level and above. Learn more.
Relevant Links
- Explore openings at Kearney
- Read up on Kearney
- Mark’s matcha business
Partner Links
Transcription:
MC
In this fantastic conversation with Mark from Kearney, we talk about becoming a manager at Kearney but not through traditional path. This episode is really focused on the experienced hire process at Kearney. We’d go through everything from the order of operations for each of the different positions, the expectations for the resume, the secrets of the referral process, and the expectations for the interview. In addition, we share about some fun things around Mark, including how he became the maestro of a monster company. It’s a really exciting episode and we’re excited to dive in.
Mark, we’re so excited to have you today on Strategy Simplified, I’m Jenny Rae LaRue, the managing director of Management Consulted and we have a lot of questions for you. But the first one is just tell us a little bit about your background. Tell us how you got to where you are today. We’d love to know a little bit about you before we dive into some specific questions.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Great, yeah, thank you, Jenny for having me. I’m really grateful to be here and I’m excited to have our conversation. So a little bit about myself. My name is Mark Missirlian. I am a manager here at Kearney. I joined Kearney back in August of last year. So a little over six months I’ve been here now. I am part of their ATI practice, which is a longer acronym. It’s the aerospace and defense automotive, travel, transportation, industrials and infrastructure practice. And within that, I focus more on the aerospace and defense side. And that is what I’ve been focusing on for the past six months, I joined as a manager, so I came from industry and consulting before so immediately before Kearney, I was in consulting at another firm, focusing on strategy and business transformation.
I was there for nearly four years, I joined as a senior consultant there, worked my way up to manager before coming to Kearney. Prior to that, I was in industry in aerospace and defense, I did a leadership development program in supply chain. And then I worked for one of their subsidiaries as a supplier quality specialist, which is sort of an internal consulting, which helped set me up and prepare me for consulting as well. Prior to that, I went to grad school at Hult International Business School up in Boston, which was a one year International Business program, where I got to travel the world, really focused my studies on supply chain management. And then prior to that I did my undergrad at George Washington University with a focus in international business.
MC
So basically, you’re an expert in acronyms. That’s what you say. Yes, that’s right. You had acronyms in school, you had acronyms in aerospace and defense and now, acronyms in consulting. Its acronyms upon acronyms.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
That’s right. We’re all about acronyms in both in this specific industry as well as consulting.
MC
That’s amazing. Well, what a tremendous background. And honestly, for so many people, I’m sure that our listening is such an encouragement, because I think there is this historical view that the only way into consulting is to go to the right school and do the right things and have the right internship and, and you and I know having worked there that there are mythbusters, so that all over the place.
So that’s really our goal today is to try to explain, you know, how somebody does do something similar to what you did, or what you’re seeing, from your view, now, inside the firm. You talk a little bit about your early background about your education, and then your kind of work experience in industry. What was it that made you jump the shark, right, like, how did you kind of focus on getting into consulting? And what drew you to it? What made you kind of decide to make that leap?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, great. So I knew that I wanted to go into consulting, probably since the beginning of college. And I knew that I didn’t want to immediately go into consulting. I don’t know what it was about my mindset. Because now I know that a majority of folks come into consulting, right out of undergrad. But to me personally, I wanted to really have that on the ground experience in you know, supply chain or manufacturing or whatever that industry I was going to be consulting in.
I wanted to be actually doing that, to see a full end to end process of how a business operates, how it grows and how the people internally operate on a daily basis. And to me that experience on the ground was very important. And I learned a ton more than I possibly could, you know, really an undergrad when you they tell you these case studies. It really comes to life when you’re practicing it on a shop floor in a manufacturing facility or in an office space.
So I knew I wanted to go into consulting. I knew I wanted some experience prior to that. I did a leadership development program with Textron, which was an incredible experience, because you across two years, you work in four different organizations for different subsidiaries of the company, all different industries, all different functions, focusing on supply chain. So I worked for an automotive tier two supplier, I worked for a helicopter company, and you do different things within those firms to really understand the different functions of corporate entities both large and small.
MC
Well, you’d have about having this focus from the very beginning. You’re odd, you know, just to be totally honest, that’s, that’s unusual. Some people call it special. But I think that really, the thing that strikes me is that you were so focused on it. What about somebody who just had this epiphany, right? They’re an experienced hire, they’re working in industry, they all of a sudden found consulting, met somebody who’s in consulting.
Right, you know, it kind of wasn’t on their radar before, but now they’re thinking about it, what do you advise them? And we’re not yet talking about coming specifically to your firm, but just in general, right? What should they be thinking about? What should they be doing? What kind of opportunities should they be pursuing? How should they be building their resume?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Absolutely. And I have had this conversation with friends. And, you know, interested people in consulting, who have never thought about the career never really thought it would be for them, they go do an industry role. They like it. But maybe they feel like they want to try something new, or want to really learn and achieve more in a shorter period of time. And that’s really important to have that mindset for consulting because you are shifting quite a significant gear when you come into consulting.
And one of the things about being an experienced hire, is that is your biggest asset. When you come into consulting, it is that diverse background that you have. It’s that experience working in industry, that is an asset to so many of these consulting firms. And it’s why consulting firms hire industry experienced professionals. And it’s a strong experience to have that in the recruiting process as well.
MC
Well, you talked a little bit about coming in as a manager, obviously, you came in from another consulting firm. So you you’d kind of made the transition once and then made it twice again. Right? You You did the to-consulting transition then to-another firm transition. But one of the questions we get all the time is, when people are thinking about what role they’re trying to apply to, now we try to disavow them of the notion that they should apply down.
Because usually, it’s just a sense of like a lack of understanding of what they’re capable of, or an oddity, if they’re 10 years out of school, they want to apply for a junior analyst position. But what should they apply to? And now we can kind of talk about your firm’s specifically right, you know, what should they be applying to? And how do they figure that out? If they’re not sure where their experience maps.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Of course, so it’s important to go and do research on the firm that you’re interested in joining, you’re applying to looking at the types of roles they offer, what are the typical experiences that are required for that role. A lot of consulting firms have specific job types and descriptions for industry experienced hires. So it’s important to really do the research, look at those different types of roles and understand what best fits you, I don’t recommend applying down either. For me, it was a little simpler, because I was a manager in consulting, it made the most sense for me to apply for a manager consulting role. And I found that through a referral.
So you know, I was reaching out, I spoke to a few folks at Kearney, and I went through the interview process. And there was a discussion that, you know, we they weren’t sure whether or not to maybe bring me in as a manager, or maybe a senior Associate along those lines. And it came down to the interview process and how it went. And ultimately, we landed in the manager position, which I’m grateful for. But again, I wouldn’t recommend applying down and do the research for the roles that you’re looking into for the firm’s you’re looking into, and it doesn’t hurt to reach out to either recruiters or other consulting in that firm. And just ask them what their experiences with experience hires as well
MC
Now, we have information about this on our website, but just for the sake of people who are listeners not readers, can you just tell us what the order of the roles is at Kearney in particular, so that you can get it right, because sometimes people don’t know how to translate that because every it’s not like banking, where every firm has the same thing. But in consulting, everybody just went rogue and called their positions, whatever they wanted to call them.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yes. Yeah, so Kearney, to me it’s pretty straightforward for Kearney, there at the earliest entry level is a business analyst and I’m talking about consulting roles specifically. So at the earliest level, you have a business analyst, which typically someone fresh out of undergrad will, will enter into that role. And then there’s a senior business analyst position, which is the intermediary between a BA and an Associate. Once you are past the senior business analyst role, you enter the Associate position.
And this is typically what we see. Graduates from grad school, they’ll come into an Associate position, after the Associate position, it goes straight into a manager. And then from a manager, it goes into a principal. And then after principal, you enter the Associate partner and partner ranks.
MC
Fantastic, okay, that is super helpful, because I think again, right and associated one firm is different than an associated other. So and and for those of you that are kind of paying attention to that, like you said, right, if you don’t have an MBA, but if you’re a PhD, or if you’re an experienced hire with X number of years of experience, you’ll have to work at least the number of years that somebody at Kearney would work in that role, probably more inside industry before you would transition over it. I think again, sometimes it’s just a little confusing for folks to know what’s happening on that side.
Okay, well, let’s talk a little bit about the networking process. You mentioned that you came in through the referral process. Can you just shine some light on to how you made the connection? Why they were interested in you, right? What were some of the steps in the networking process? Again, I think a lot of times the conception is that is a very, very long process that you talked to 60 people over 24 months, you know, I would just love to know some of the metrics for you so that we can use it as an example for people to know what to expect.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, absolutely. So believe it or not, I started my recruiting and referral process through Fishbowl. So through Fishbowl there was a thread about aerospace and defense practices and Kearney was mentioned quite a bit. And of course, I’ve always seen Kearney mentioned throughout fishbowl about having a great culture. So I started talking to someone, ended up being a partner at Kearney, who was able to refer me to recruiting. And I worked with my recruiter, had a conversation with him, sent my resume and he set up interviews with the folks in my practice. And it was a pretty straightforward process from there. It was a handful of interviews but start to finish it was a few weeks at most.
MC
Incredible. So from Fishbowl, the great place where people wander into to, you know, whine about their firms. Right? Not always but that’s definitely like, an incredible thing. That’s amazing that you connected with somebody, and it was a very straightforward process, right? Not 16 referral steps in order to get it and it was just one person, one interview, and then straight through. Okay, amazing. Would you say that that’s fair to expect and who should people be trying to talk to you know, I would say that it’s amazing if you get to talk to a partner, but you know how partners are, right, sometimes they don’t want to be talking to you.
And so you were in the field already, were looking for that, maybe some other people might be trying to make a bigger transition from a different space over in, you know, who should they be talking to? Who should they be reaching out to? How do you want people to reach out to someone like you inside the firm? What works for you?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Sure, of course. So I’ll say that. I was very lucky. It was a great time. They were actively recruiting and Kearney recruits on an as needed basis per year and throughout the year, so there isn’t any set times. But it’s really consistently looking at the utilization levels and needs of projects to identify when we need to hire new individuals, especially experienced hires, and it does happen pretty often. So the experienced hire is more targeted based on functional capabilities and needs of the practice. Whereas the typical campus recruiting is a mass recruit and targeted on overall profiles.
But if you’re really looking to join as an experienced hire in terms of who you should speak to, you can always reach out to anyone on Fishbowl, I know that there are always people who are happy to talk to you. There’s always people happy to reply and respond from Kearney specifically, I still see it all the time. And you’re always welcome to reach out to recruiters, whether it’s LinkedIn, or even other Kearney consultants on LinkedIn. I know there several people who reach out to me on LinkedIn, I’m happy to respond and start that conversation as well.
MC
So you said one thing that was also really interesting, and I just want to shine some light on this, you said that you’re recruiting on an as needed basis, kind of all around the year. And I would see that being definitely true for a senior Associate or a manager position. What about people that would be applying for roles that would compete with those school in balance? Classes? Right? Is it the same thing? Or should they really be applying kind of close to or even a little before maybe those school recruiting periods are happening?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
So that’s a great question, Jenny. And I don’t want to give you the wrong answer so I’ll tread lightly here. But my understanding is that for new hires, who are coming in at the BA level, you know, whether it’s fresh out of undergrad or a couple of years of experience, not really applying for that Associate or manager position, it would fall in line with our typical recruiting periods. And our typical recruiting and onboarding waves for those coming from undergrad.
MC
Perfect. So again, I think we just have to separate than those two, right? If you’re thinking about if you’re a couple years out of the MBA, you think about it a little differently, versus if you’ve worked maybe for five years in industry, you might be kind of competing with one of those MBA folks. So would you say that though, even though you can’t give me a definitive answer, right, because it’s always it depends in consulting. Would you say that it’s fair that in the networking process, people could kind of suss that out a little bit if they if they reach out to somebody to figure out when the right time when you do apply?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, absolutely. And I say that’s your biggest success indicator, or your biggest rate for success is reaching out to others on LinkedIn, or Fishbowl having those conversations, ask them for advice. And I know that people are always willing to look into it for you and get an answer for you. So whether it’s applying immediately, or waiting a couple of weeks or months, I always first suggest reaching out to someone getting an answer before just blindly throwing your resume in there.
MC
Love it. Another question for you on this? Would you say that there is a defined referral process? Like if somebody talks to you, and you decide to refer them? Is that is that an email to a recruiter? Is that a like, hey, I’ll flag your application? Can you just talk a little bit about what’s happening in the background? Because again, there’s a lot of mystery around that and whatever you can share would be great.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah. So there is a referral process. Typically, I would reach out to a recruiter after I’ve spoken to someone and they’re really interested in applying, I’ll talk to the recruiter about, hey, I have this candidate, seems like they’d be a really great fit for Kearney, can I send you their resume, they’ll take a look. And then we can submit the application from there. I will say if you want to go the referral route, hold off on submitting your application until you hear from someone that they’ve spoken to a recruiter and they’ve started that process.
MC
That’s really good insight, actually. Okay, that’s super helpful. So it’s better for you to take the lead, rather than the candidate taking the lead.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yes.
MC
Okay. That’s perfect. Well, then I think the next thing that’s just really helpful to talk about is what happens after the the application process, right, what happens in the interview? Is there a digital assessment? And are there differences to the on-campus hiring? So if you try to go in at those two kind of main intake levels versus if you’re coming in at a different place? Are there different processes?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, so I will say, there are no digital assessments typically. Typically, it’s a phone call with a recruiter first. And they’ll walk you through the process of how interviews will go, and then they will set up some case interviews and behavioral interviews. So to begin with, you’ll have one case interview and one behavioral conversation, and that will then determine that we consider that the first round interview, and then we’ll have a conversation. The key is succeeding and passing that case round interview. And then we can move on to a second round. And that second round is when you typically meet with a partner, you’ll have another case study, you’ll have a behavioral interview, and then a final decision is made, and you’ll get the offer then.
So it’s a pretty quick turnaround time. There aren’t five rounds of interviews, there’s not, you know, 10 case studies, it’s pretty straightforward. The cases aren’t tricky. They’re not meant to fool you. They the cases are based off of real-life consulting experiences. I just went through the Kearney interview training a few weeks ago, I’ve done interviewing at my last firm I just started doing interviewing at Kearney, and they really encourage you to create cases based on the work that you have done in the past at Kearney. So we’re not asking how many golf balls fit into an airplane, we’re asking straight questions.
MC
Wait, you guys don’t do that? That’s an aerospace question isn’t?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
I guess you could call it an aerospace question.
MC
I love that. And so then I think it’s also important for folks to know, right, because in a McKinsey model, where McKinsey has a core, internal bank of cases where you learn the case and give it you’re going to have out of case experiences, right, you’re going to have things that you didn’t write down on your paper, but that you knew from the things that you did inside the case. So it’s going to lead to a more conversational case, would you say?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yes, absolutely. There is no bank of cases, we don’t have a repository, you come up with the cases on your own. There are numbers involved. So there is basic math involved, and there will be numbers, but we’re not looking for an exact answer out of anyone. Primarily, we want to see the logic and thinking and how you structure your thoughts and approach to solving a problem.
MC
Now, tell us a little bit about your prep process. I don’t know if you did case interviewing with either your rotational program or your other firm. But was there anything incremental that you did with with Kearney, and then also just give us a little bit of your case interview in background? We want to set fair expectations, right? If you did one practice interview that’s a little different than if you did 40. Right, even if it was cumulative for your career?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, so I’ve done a few case practices, case interviews, nothing too wild, really just a lot of research online about how to structure a case interview, how to handle the approach, breaking it down into different frameworks, and being able to just speak your thoughts. I think that’s one of the most important challenges that we see is candidates will come in, and they’ll just you’ll ask them the question, you’ll set it up, and then they’ll just look down at their piece of paper and start writing. And that’s not what we want to see. Right, we want to see, you ask clarifying questions, we want to see you ask for assumptions. And really sound out your thoughts of which ways you’re going to approach the case, because there may be four different ways to approach the case, if you give us all four that your thinking will tell you, hey, we don’t want to focus on those three, let’s focus on this one, as opposed to you just going down a rabbit hole in something that we may we may not be looking for.
MC
Super helpful. And so if you’re advising somebody who wants to prep, how long do you want to see them? You know, basically, they get the interview? Do you want them to be ready at that point? Or do you want them to, you know, take two weeks between them and the interview to prep? What would you advise for somebody who is going through the process? Because sometimes people don’t even know when to reach out? They’re not sure when they’re ready?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Sure? That’s a great question. So I will say the interview process, once you begin it, it can happen very quickly. You can have interviews scheduled within the next 48 to 72 hours, you do want to be prepared, right. And you’ll have time before your first phone call with the recruiter to refresh on case studies. But I will say definitely take a look at sample case studies and understand how to approach a case study with a framework before looking into that process and really pushing the pedal and moving forward with the recruitment process.
MC
Now going backward, just a little bit into the recruitment process. We talked about, you know, doing the referral, we talked about having that initial reach out, we talked about making those connections. Fantastic. But I think one of the keys that a lot of people don’t know is—they’ve done a lot of stuff, right? What goes on the resume, what doesn’t? What are you looking for when you say, Hey, we think this candidate will be a great fit. Can you give us a couple of examples of things that would make you say that on a candidate’s resume?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Sure and I’ll speak specifically to the experienced hire that we’re joining right, not the one fresh out of undergrad.
MC
Sure.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
But it’s really key to showcase your experience that you’ve had. And because when you come into consulting as an experienced hire, this is your key selling point, it is your experience that you’ve had in industry. So it’s really being able to demonstrate your skills that you’ve learned in industry, whether it’s being able to demonstrate working in teams, working in times of ambiguity and adversity, or working in times where there’s tight schedules, and you’re not really sure what needs to be done, or working and convincing leadership and executives, how did you do any of that in your previous role, that is going to help the types of clients that we serve in the types of functions that we look at, I think that’s really important to showcase. It doesn’t really matter what projects you had in undergrad, we really want to see what skills you’ve learned in industry that are going to help and line up to the skills that we need in consulting.
MC
That’s great. So this isn’t a rule, but maybe as a guide, somewhere around 50% of Your resume should be your work experience, maybe even up to 60%. And then like a nod to your leadership and a nod to your academics, right? But like a real heavy focus on your experience. Is that what you’re saying?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yes, I agree.
MC
Okay, great. Last question. Just about the kind of hiring and, and referrals, etc. process, like, give us three big mistakes, right? Could be resume, interview, or networking? What are some no-no’s? What are things that you’ve seen people do that you would just recommend that they don’t do?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah. So I will say, it’s good to be persistent. When networking, right, it’s good to reach out to others, ask for conversations, asked to have phone calls, or quick chats or coffee chats. Make sure you’re not being too heavy handed, and you’re reaching out every you know, day to the same person. Right? Because that could be happen. I have seen this happen, where someone will reach out every single day. And there’s a fine line between persistence and pushing it too far. So just keep that in mind.
MC
But you can’t say it, but I can. It’s like dating. Right? You just you don’t want to do like that, you know? Daily, day-to-day outreach is not not going to work out for you. But yeah, okay, go ahead.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
That’s great. Yeah, you definitely don’t want to end up being ghosted. So that’s important. And I will say, you know, making sure your resume is crisp and clean. You know, there are dozens, hundreds of templates out there, which show what a typical consulting format resume looks like, make sure you’re using that don’t try to add some whimsical flair, or all these graphics to it.
You know, what we’re really looking at the content of what that is, and make sure you highlight your actions. So, in a resume, it’s really important that you show what the challenges were, that you were when you got into that role, what you did to address them and what the outcome was. And I think that’s a classic format for a well-structured bullet on a resume, right? Don’t just say, I did this, this and this, we want to know what the problem was, what you did and what the outcome was.
MC
Love it. I always say that about 2006 was the end of the Roman Empire again, right? Because you could tell that people were like putting flowers and timelines on their resume. And you know, it was it was so far beyond like, subsistence farming and everything else that you just knew, like, it just couldn’t go anywhere from here. So I’m so glad that we’re past that moment. But you’re exactly right. What about number three? What’s number three? For your advice?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Great question. So third piece of advice. When coming into the recruitment process, I would say, be yourself and showcase your talents and your skills, right. And and just a couple of things that we typically look for. And it’s a piece of advice that I always give consultants, whether they’re applying or interviewing, and they ask, what makes a good consultant, right? What, what is the type of consultant that you want to see on your team? And I always give the same answers. One, it’s having that that drive and ambition and that entrepreneurial spirit, right, you need to be able to take charge.
If you have a task that’s given to you, I want to be able to see you manage that and succeed even if you’re a new BA, right. If you have no experience in consulting, you need to be able to have that drive to even if you don’t know how to accomplish something, ask questions, take the lead, reach out to people who will be able to help you and set up that structure. That is one of the biggest things that we look for. And again, just following up on that. I’d much rather someone ask 100 questions and me be locked in a room with them for two hours to make sure they understand something as opposed to them going off trying to complete a task for a week, they come back and it’s nothing along the lines of what we’re looking for. So those types of things are what you want to think of, especially in the interview process along that that line of thinking.
MC
Love it. So the last and final question, I think about the interview process and the networking process that is looming, I’m sure in a lot of people’s minds is, do you sponsor? Do you hire internationals? A lot of our folks are, you know, either in the US for education or working on a certain type of visa, it would be super helpful for them to know if not a yes or no straight answer just where they could find that information.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, so we absolutely do sponsor, there are specific requirements for that. And we have someone at Kearney, who handles those sponsorships. And I could find some more information offline. And we could discuss that and find some resources that we could have you put out there for everyone
MC
Okay, love it. Well, the last thing that I want to talk about before we go to the rapid fire personal questions, which we can’t wait to get to, are just, you know, the the why Kearney questions, right, you made a big life transition to move over to the firm. You talked a little bit about how people in Fishbowl had talked about the fact that they have a great culture. But what does that mean? Why is it great? Why or what, you know, what are two or three reasons why people should take a serious look at making, you know, a pass at applying to Kearney and getting excited about working there?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, great question. And I’m asked this all the time. And it is the culture, right, it is what you say it is the culture 100% The people at the firm really make Kearney who we are. Everyone here is so supportive of each other, it is very uplifting to be in that kind of environment where it’s not a cutthroat, competitive place where one person is going to drag down someone else so they can get the promotion. Doesn’t work like that here, everyone wants each other to succeed in their role. And they will do whatever they can in their power to help you succeed.
Everyone is looking out for each other. And it really is just a great group of people to be around. And that is something that I think you’ll see, in any interview that you go in, if you can ask, you know, every interviewer that you have when you’re applying to Kearney, and you ask them what they love about Kearney, and I bet you one of those answers will be the people and the culture. But not just the culture and the people. I won’t only give you that generic answer, as some may see, oh, you know, the culture. But it’s also the work we do. Right?
Not only do we do, you know, high level strategy work, but we are also on the ground helping these giant companies implement the work that they want to see. So we’re on the ground, we’re helping them implement, we are realizing results. And we see while we are there, the improvement come through these businesses, which is really just a great thing to be able to see as opposed to coming in looking at the situation, offering advice and then leaving.
MC
Amazing. Well, I thank you so much for sharing about the pathway into Kearney, about why working there is obviously something that is written all over your face that you enjoy it. And you can just tell by your enthusiasm that you’re happy that you’ve made the transition. So that speaks volumes. Thank you for sharing that. Now on to my favorite part of the interview, which is the the final piece of rapid fire questions. I’ve got three questions for you. You can think about them, you’ve just got to go for it and dive in. So the first one is you started an authentic macha company during the pandemic, if I’m wrong, correct me. But like, what the heck, right? Why did you do it? Tell me a little bit about that experience. It’s wild. Would love to know more about it?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, so great question. And I’ll try to be quick about this because I could go on for a while on this one. But
MC
You’re a macha person that’s like, a macha thing.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Yeah, I’m wearing a green sweater just for it. But pre-COVID I you know, drink matcha quite a lot. I’d go to Starbucks. When you’re traveling for clients. Every morning we get I’d get a Starbucks matcha latte during COVID, you know, pandemic happened. I started making matcha on my own at home. I bought the powder from the store. I had the fancy whisk I was making it, it was delicious. And I was like why is it so different from what I get at Starbucks? And I started looking into it and I found out that the matcha powder that Starbucks uses is a really low quality matcha and half of the powder is sugar. So it’s terrible for you
MC
No wonder it tastes so great!
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Exactly. So I was making it at my home for a while I was really enjoying it. I tried to find something similar like that on the market so that when I do travel again for consulting projects, maybe there’s something that I could have on the go in the can. Nothing existed. Everything that was out there just didn’t taste good or just had like weird ingredients. And I just wasn’t into it. So I started playing around and decided to launch my own macha brand.
MC
Amazing. Is it still going? Yeah, it’s still going. We are in about 50 stores in Southern California. And we sell online as well. See, California is the coolest. We’ll have to put the link in the show notes so people can find it. Yeah, I spend a lot of time in Southern California, so I can’t wait to try it. Okay, great. Second thing when that thing that you’re listening to or reading that’s inspired you recently?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
So listening to.. can I say something I’m watching?
MC
Oo. Sure.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
All right. So and this might be a curveball, but there’s a reason to it. I’m gonna say Ted Lasso.
MC
Oh, okay. Explain.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
And there’s a reason for this is because one, it is just a in general feel good, happy comedy. And I love that, too. It really is a remarkable educational show on leadership and it shows the big difference between being a leader and being a boss, right. It really does. And that’s what I like to think is my leadership style is very similar to what I see in Ted Lasso. I’m not as funny in real life, though as Ted Lasso.
MC
Wait are you Ted Lasso? Or?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
You do not want to see me try to grow a mustache. But it really is a great visual onto what a great leader is and how they can properly lead a team, whether it’s consulting, or software, football, wherever you are in the world, what to call it and lead them to success.
MC
Last question, tell us one person from history that you would love to have dinner with and why?
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
One person? I don’t know if I could say this, because it’s technically two, but it would be the Wright brothers.
MC
Oh, okay. Great answer.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
I’m a big aviation nerd, right. I work in aerospace and defense; I have my pilot’s license personally.
MC
You know the number of golf balls that could fit in an airplane. One of the core pieces of expertise in the space.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
That is how you need to be successful. But I think that would just be an incredible conversation to understand what they were going through and what they were thinking and their process and pushing through all of that adversity and all of the unknown in order to really develop the first functional aircraft of their time.
MC
Amazing. Well, thank you, Mark, so much today for the really exciting conversation. I learned a lot. I’m sure that everybody who listens will really enjoy this. Really appreciate you just sharing your journey, why you love working at Kearney and more. So thanks again for joining us. Really appreciate your time.
Kearney: Mark Missirlian
Thank you so much, Jenny, happy to help.
MC
Thank you so much for listening to this podcast episode with Mark Missirlian. From Kearney, we had an amazing conversation, and we hope that you enjoyed it. If you did enjoy it, please rate or comment on your favorite podcast platform, that’s the best way for other people to find the Strategy Simplified podcast. In addition, we put a lot of free resources on Kearney in the show notes and we would love to have a number of you apply. But it’s important for you to know whether you’re qualified and what they expect, because we want that to be a great experience all around. If you’re from a firm that’s looking for great talent or if you’re interested in entering the consulting field, we have resources for you and we’d love to connect. You can reach out at [email protected] Thanks so much for listening.