Do consultants use AI for PowerPoint or excel or anywhere in the Process??

Hi there - agree with everything that has been said earlier. Adding my two cents. All consulting firms have developed or are in the process of developing their own Gen AI tools (either independently or through partnerships). Take McKinsey for example - they recently launched "Lilli". 

From a McKinsey article "We have now launched Lilli our own generative AI solution for colleagues. It’s a platform that provides a streamlined, impartial search and synthesis of the firm’s vast stores of knowledge to bring our best insights, quickly and efficiently, to clients.

“Lilli aggregates our knowledge and capabilities in one place for the first time and will allow us to spend more time with clients activating those insights and recommendations and maximizing the value we can create,” says Erik Roth, a senior partner with McKinsey".

Majority of consultants are using these and other Gen AI platforms such as Chatgpt for creating content that goes into the slides (e.g., bullets, synthesis) and also for doing broad research on various topics (e.g., industry analysis, macro trends). They also potentially use it for help on excel formulas, setting up models etc. However the technology is not yet mature enough that they can directly get slides and excel models out of it. Having said that, that is a near future given the pace at which things are evolving.

Hope this helps.

Cheers

Nilay

Hi! Most consultants do not use AI for PowerPoint (making slides, excluding the content in the slides) or Excel. This of course may change in the next months/ years.

As a consultant you may use AI more in the drafting process of content (e.g., translation, creating summaries) or as a tool to navigate internal knowledge.

I hope this helps!

They do, but these tools are still in the process of being rolled out and Consultants still have to do a lot of “manual” work.

All consulting firms are incorporating AI tools from 3rd parties or developing their own solutions to improve their knowledge management and their efficiency at work.

Taking Power Point as an example, even if you have an AI that can generate a slide after giving it information on the desired layout and content, a consultant will sill need to do some rework to have the right data, plots, visuals, and wording. 

No, they don't. 

But it's likely to happen soon. 

For now, the big firms like McKinsey use the actual consultants to draft the pages, then they have support services that visually improve those pages so that the consultants get to spend most of the time on the conceptual (not the esthetic) aspects of presentations. 

Best,
Cristian

Hi there,

AI is not going to be relevant for you day-to-day PPT and Excel work as a consultant for a while. These tasks are often not complex or standardized enough to warrant such tools at current development levels. However, it may change in the future. 

Chat GPT as a content creation aid sure, but not AI to create slides or spreadsheets. 

Best

No they don't. Simple reason: there are no good tools right now. I've seen one that seemed to be quite interesting for Powerpoint, and gave it a try. Although I decided not to use it afterwards, it was pretty close to being useful. My guess is that in ~2 years a good tool will be out there for consultants to use.

Hi Guneet,

I would be happy to share my thoughts on your question:

• This does not (yet) apply to MS PowerPoint and MS Excel, but in general it does. At the moment, AI is still full of bugs, which consulting firms cannot reconcile with their need for high quality. However, AI is already being used by consulting firms for high-level brainstorming or research questions.

If you would like a more detailed discussion on how to best prepare for your upcoming interviews, please don't hesitate to contact me directly.

Best,

Hagen