Odyssey: The Life and Career of a Senior Consultant

Case background:

When elected a partner at McKinsey and Company (a well-known consulting firm), a senior consultant
starts questioning the purpose of his life. He worked industriously to achieve this target only to realize
that it was not the position that he aimed for, but to able to his competency. The realization comes
from his awareness of being disconnected from his family, health issues, and Alexander’s book he
read. Walt Shill had completed his MBA eight years earlier from the Darden Graduate School of
Business Administration at the University of Virginia and had worked his way up at McKinsey
Consulting to become the first American partner in the Japanese office. As his family grows, he along
with his family moves back to the US where he starts to question his goals and targets. He decides to
go on a solo bicycle ride to take a break from his work, reflect on his life, and gain some perspective.

This case tells Shill's story and his learnings along the journey. His story while he is riding across the
US provides provocative thoughts and insights into modern, global consultants and the struggle they
and their families generally go through. The case ends with Shill's understanding that people and
businesses can’t be judged in a similar fashion and a promise to himself to be less judgmental and his
realization of how he needs to hold onto his values in life.

My key takeaways from the case are –

1. Although we can achieve a successful career by setting our goals and dedicating ourselves
towards it, but it is equally important to reflect on personal life for inner peace.
2. Personal values and changes hold a very important part in one’s life along with the career
management and planning.
3. As we keep progressing in professional life, we sometimes get so indulged in it that we kind
of drift far away from our value systems and too much practicality makes us indifferent
towards the importance of small things in life.
4. In a race of success and higher executive positions, our minds become so business-oriented
that we tend to judge individual behaviours too quickly and compare them with businesses.
We need to realize that decisions about individuals cannot be taken in the same way as those
businesses.
5. We should create a balance between our personal and professional lives. We should try to
keep our priorities straight because a successful career can give a feeling of achievement, but
not a sense of accomplishment in life.

I really like the way the case has put forward the dilemmas of consultants worldwide and the message
that it has provided. It showcases how Shill sets on a journey to find a purpose in life after he realizes
the need for it even when he is excelling in his professional career. Throughout his journey, meeting
different people and their individual behaviours make him realize at multiple instances how
wrongfully judgemental he had become, how much he had changed from what he used to be, how
distorted his value system had become, and how he needs to assess himself. He realizes his mistakes
from each of the incidences, self-assesses himself and his emotions, and imbibes the learnings and
memories from each of his ride along the way. This helps him gain new insights and perspective in life,
makes him realize importance of things which he would not have even noticed earlier, brings positive
changes in him at the personal level and gives him a sense of accomplishment. He is able to decide
what he wants in life, and with what intensity, thus gaining back his lost motive.