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Why APT?
When I was making my decision as to where I wanted to work, I knew I wanted to be working on solving business problems. Traditional consulting roles readily offer such opportunities. However, as I made my move into the business world, I knew I didn't want to be far from technology. It was very important to me to be a part of a company that was using technology to innovate and change the world. This is where APT is unique.
As a consultant at APT, you also get to be a part of developing an innovative product that is changing the way traditional strategy consulting is approached. Your role in developing our product can be as involved or as removed as you wish it to be. It works the other way as well. As a software engineer, it is easy to gain exposure to the business problems we help our clients solve. It truly is the best of both worlds. Moreover, both the consultants and engineers at APT are equally involved in creating value for our company, and thus have an equal voice when we address important decisions regarding the direction of our company.
It was also important for me to be working with smart people and to know I would learn from the management team I was working with. The management team at APT comes from a wealth of impressive experience in industry. Because APT is so small, you get to work directly with the Senior Management. Additional, APT is committed to hiring bright and passionate candidates. You can be sure that your peers from your class will constantly inspire and challenge you on a daily basis.
Not only are the people at APT smart, they're also friendly, approachable, and a lot of fun to work with. If I ever have a question, I can pick up the phone or walk over to anyone's office, and get an answer right away. People are always ready to stop what they're doing and help you. In fact, we encourage everyone to collaborate as much as possible to make the best use of our resources.
Working at small company like APT has a lot of advantages. You know you're directly involved in creating bottom line value for the company, which is an exciting feeling. Bureaucracy and overhead is minimal. If you have a good idea or you want to make a change, you can make waves right away. Teams are small and efficient, and we have the agility to move fast.
All in all, APT is a great place to be.
Daily responsibilities:
As an Engagement Manager, my role is to help our clients solve their business problems. At any point, a consultant may be involved in project work for several clients. At the beginning of any project, I'm involved in collecting data for the company I'm working with. This involves receiving a company's financials and clearly understanding how the client measures and evaluates its business. It may also involve interviewing members of the client's senior executive team and understanding their problems. After gathering the data, we then move to performing our analysis in order to create value for the client. Because we have and use our own analytical tool, the analysis is less about “grunge” calculations and more about thinking creatively and analytically about the problem and the data. A project will typically end with providing our product to the client, so that the client can use our product to continue to solve their problems, optimize its business, and make more data driven decisions on its own.
Business consultants will work directly with our clients. It's not uncommon to have several meetings throughout the course of the project at the client site, and get direct contact to the senior executives. Because of the nature of how we approach consulting, you will generally not have to be on site 4 days a week. It's a nice a mix of getting experience with working with clients and not having to constantly live out of a hotel room!
I started working with clients directly my second week on the job. At APT, you will get a lot of responsibility fairly quickly. Working directly with client helps you realize that while helping fortune 500 companies optimize their businesses, you are also impacting the thousands of lives employed by the client. The combination of the size of APT and responsibility you're given, means that not only are you in a powerful position to affect change, but also in a meaningful one as well.
Outside of work:
I enjoy taking classes in a variety of arts and I like to run. As I explore DC, I'm hoping the Potomac will be as runner-friendly as the Charles River back in Boston. I like traveling when I get time off. I'm also interested in the intersection between technology and education and would like to get involved with a related volunteer project I can pursue on the side.