With a PhD into management consulting: Two professionals share their experiences

While it is common for masters graduates to head into consulting, the path into advisory from a PhD is a route far less travelled. Magnus Energy experts Iacopo Bertelli and Fei Wu explain the benefits that the sector holds for academics – from impactful projects to diverse and challenging work.

One of the things which many PhD students worry about during their studies is becoming isolated on the dreaded ‘ivory tower’, and of accruing knowhow that isn’t actually put to use to actually impact the world. So, while it might seem quite a big change to join a management consultancy straight after an intense period of academic study, both Iacopo Bertelli and Fei Wu believe it has provided the perfect bridge between research, and putting their knowledge to practice.

According to Fei, “consulting brings in real-life projects and direct interaction with stakeholders”, which there were simply “not enough of” during her own eight-year research journey. In particular, life at Magnus Energy has provided her a “perfect middle ground” to utilise her modelling and technical expertise on impactful initiatives amid Europe’s drive to decarbonisation.

Meanwhile, Iacopo found an opportunity to diversify his working patterns. “My PhD was in quantum physics, so it’s a pretty big change of field,” he admits. “But I wanted to focus on the broader picture rather than the extreme detail, and to have the possibility to frequently change project or topic, colleagues within the project team, and clients. All things that I found at Magnus Energy.”

Magnus Energy is a management consultancy specialised in the energy landscape – and is placed at a vital intersection in Europe’s energy transition. From its offices across Europe, Magnus Energy works on energy projects all over the continent, drawing on a team of international consultants and experts.

This has seen both Fei and Iacopo work on a variety of important engagements in the energy sector, during their first 15 months at the firm.

Iacopo explains, “I had the possibility to try a bit of everything. I’ve worked on project management for a big consortium. I’ve helped with Technical Advisory on questions such as ‘Can hybrid interconnectors work with explicit allocation?’ and currently I’m helping a European Transmission System Operator (TSO) integrate further with capacity calculation and market coupling.”

Working as a senior consultant, Iacopo focuses primarily on the electricity market. Drawn by his background is in physics, he wanted to work on the energy transition from a technical point of view – and the electric grid and market seemed like the perfect starting point on that basis.

According to him, Magnus Energy works with many European actors, that help build the diversity in his work that he craved – from TSOs and Distribution System Operators (DSOs), to regulators (NRAs), Regional Coordination Centers (RCCs) and more.

Meanwhile, Fei works as an expert in energy system modelling within the Technical Advisory team. This team acts like an R&D team at Magnus Energy, mainly focused on two main areas.

The first is energy system, market modelling and analysis, which includes services like modelling to identify long-term strategies for policymakers (e.g. flexibility needs and potential), potential impacts on TSOs when implementing different policies, the design of subsidy regimes, and investment decision support.

Second, the Technical Advisory arm focuses on grid analysis support, which includes things like flow-based capacity calculation and adequacy studies, to ensure new energy production is efficient enough to meet with demand.

“Working on such important topics for the sector makes me feel tremendously motivated every morning when I wake up. It is just so much fun when you can be directly involved in the energy transition – something that I couldn’t do during my PhD time,” says Fei.

Settling in

Both professionals have also found Magnus Energy’s working culture very helpful, when transitioning from academia to consulting. Describing her colleagues as “diverse, young and energetic,” Fei says that the firm has made her feel “right at home from the very beginning.”

“Growing up in Shanghai and spending my last four years in Zurich has spoiled me with a highly international social life, yet Magnus Energy keeps catching up with the diversity – colleagues from all over the world who speak over a dozen of different languages. It is always a lot of fun catching up with my colleagues and seeing how different cultures blend together.”

“The firm offers a really great mix of backgrounds. This mix really is quite unique.”

Similarly, Iacopo – who re-located from Italy to the Netherlands for his PhD – notes that during his studies, the share of Dutch and international colleagues had been balanced – and that he had looked for that in an employer as a strict requirement.

However, he actually found more than that with Magnus Energy. “The firm offers a really great mix of backgrounds: from engineering and hard sciences to law, economics, political sciences. This mix really is quite unique in my perspective. Despite all our difference and cultures, relationship between colleagues are very close-knit.”

Learning together

Having been on board for around 15 months now, Fei and Iacopo also said they were impressed with the firm’s continuous support in career development. “We have a personal and professional development programs that helps us further improve. And of course, most of all we learn on-the-job.”

Fei points at the firm’s mentoring system, which coupled her with a senior consultant, and buddy system, which actually paired her with Iacopo. “I still remember my first day going to the office with my buddy Iacopo, who briefed me on all the major projects, jargon, tips and hacks while giving me a ride on his car. We also talked about how different academia and consulting can be. So I felt right at home!”