Overview / CareersAI Careers in Consulting
Many companies across an array of industries benefit from consultants. These topic experts provide advice to organizations ranging from finance and healthcare to technology and public services. Consultants help solve complex business problems, improve efficiency, and drive growth through strategic recommendations, operational improvements, and digital transformation initiatives.
Much of how consultants work — and the solutions they provide — is being enhanced by AI. AI in consulting is used for data science and analytics, automating repetitive tasks, problem solving, risk modeling, and scenario planning, among other tasks. For example, natural language processing tools help extract insights from documents, while machine learning enables predictive analytics for client strategy. AI also assists with customer segmentation, optimizing operations across departments, and return of investment (ROI) analysis.
What would an AI professional contribute to the consulting industry?
An AI professional would, among other prominent responsibilities, build tools for automating workflows, calculate and track analytics, assist in client problem-solving using AI-driven data insights, and design dashboards that enable real-time business intelligence. They might also be involved in developing custom models for client-specific use cases or integrating AI platforms with enterprise systems.
What are the biggest opportunities and challenges for AI in the industry?
There are immense opportunities to leverage AI for competitive differentiation, faster delivery, and transformative AI-based solutions and services. AI could automate large portions of research and benchmarking, as well as provide real-time strategic forecasting. It may also democratize access to strategic insights through AI-powered platforms, transforming the consulting model from expert-driven to tech-augmented decision-making.
The challenges that exist include integrating AI within traditional consulting frameworks, client resistance to change, data availability and privacy, and ensuring accurate interpretability of models.
How does MSAI prepare students to lead in the consulting space?
For their Capstone project, MSAI students have worked with industry leaders like Accenture, Deloitte, and EY. Through these projects, the students gain first-hand experience with the types of problems that the companies envision addressing with AI.
Where have MSAI students and alumni interned or worked?
- Accenture
- Affinity Solutions
- BCG
- Cognizant
- Creospan Inc.
- Deloitte
- EY
- Jade Business Services
- Ryuk Labs
- TerraStrat
Neelanshi Varia
MSAI '20, Senior AI consultant at DeloitteAs a consultant, Varia has found that no two days are the same — and she loves that unpredictability.
Her work with Deloitte has allowed her to demonstrate her AI expertise while contributing to a range of client challenges and opportunities. She's helped with data engineering, project management, and machine learning for a top grocery store chain and an ethical AI organization. She's also served as a subject matter expert for Deloitte's Trustworthy AI projects.
“I really like that I can talk with stakeholders and suggest ways in which AI can help the clients get better results,” she said. “Conceptualizing an idea that has never been implemented before to developing it to deploying it at scale and seeing it being used by thousands of users is great.”
