Vault’s Verdict

The Bridgespan Group offers consultants a unique experience, consulting on some of the world’s greatest challenges alongside some of its most renowned philanthropists. This game-changing organization presents a great opportunity for anyone who wants their work to result in not just profits, but a fairer and more just society.

Insiders at Bridgespan point to it as an excellent place to work overall, even after a rough 2023 in which the firm underwent an internal unionization effort. They point to compensation that, while lower than the for-profit sector, is exceptional for the nonprofit space. They also say that working at the firm, while still more demanding than a traditional nine-to-five job, offers a much better work-life balance than other consultancies.

As the most prestigious consultancy in its niche, Bridgespan’s name will burnish any resume. However, that position does bring some business challenges. While the firm remains one of the world’s go-to mission-driven consultancies, its prestige means that its prices are often higher than smaller, competing firms. While this can present growing pains at times, most insiders see a bright future ahead.

Employee Reviews

Firm Culture

• “It’s very rewarding to work with most of our clients, who in their own right are inspirational leaders trying to make the world a better place.”
• “Though work can pile up, the firm as a whole very much respects personal hours after 5 p.m.”
• “The firm offers many formal wellness programs, but what stands out is its cultural expectation that supervisors truly listen and make space for employees’ personal needs.”

Quality of Life

• “In my experience of moving from for-profit consulting to Bridgespan, the quality of life is excellent. And compared to nonprofit sector, many of our consultants make more and work shorter hours than executive directors at our clients.”
• “Your work-life balance will vary greatly throughout your time at Bridgespan. It will depend on your manager, your workstream, where you are in the case, your ability to workplan, and your ability to set boundaries. Travel is negligible to minimal, although there are certain repeat clients who require frequent travel (but they're rare).”
• “The continuation of our hybrid model has made it easy to flex my work life balance and ensure I can be present at important moments in my personal life.”
• “PTO is generous and because we work in teams, it’s fairly simple to take time off for a week. Two-week vacations are harder to plan for.”

Career Development

• “The firm has a wide breadth of opportunities in the social sector and provides a great introduction to the sector. Once you ‘get’ it, the way Bridgespan teaches you how to think about the social sector and your approach to work more broadly will set you up for success.”
• “It’s relatively easy to get connected to management in different practice areas, though this does not always translate to case opportunities.”
• “Bridgespan offers very clear and transparent performance criteria with frequent data (every six months) on how you are doing. It offers formal training every one to two years, plus opportunities to go to world-class Bain trainings.”
• “The firm offers clear progression and promotion pathways. There are also options for international transfers.”

Compensation

• “Obviously, the salary is much lower than for-profit firms, but it's part of the tradeoff. And compared to the nonprofit sector overall, salaries are very high.”
• “Salary progression is transparent, and salary is dependent on your level and tenure. For example, everyone who has two years of tenure as Partner is paid the same base salary, and this level is transparent to everyone.”
• “We have many useful benefits, such as a fitness stipend and vision insurance. However, I wish that the health insurance deductibles and retirement vesting schedules were more flexible.”

Community Engagement

• “Bridgespan has a very strong DEI leader with meaningful responsibility, status in the org chart, and access to key decision makers on the leadership team. We also have lots of individual leaders who care and are trying to improve our work here.”
• “The company prioritizes DEI efforts as core to the business model. While it has faced some challenges, it is much more focused on DEI than other consulting firms and is much more diverse than other firms.”
• “Leadership frequently cites that over half of advisory management staff and above are people of color, and a greater percentage of junior advisory staff are. While Bridgespan has improved tremendously on diversity with respect to hiring of people of color, senior leadership still could improve on supporting and retaining staff of color.”
• “Bridgespan offers a peloton subscription, an employee assistance program for access to mental health services, and opportunities to engage in intramural sports teams.”

Business Outlook

• “We are one of the higher-priced alternatives in the market so there is always competitive pressure to manage our costs. Yet, demand for our services remains high and we have grown a bit fast in the last few years to accommodate this. I have confidence in leadership's plan to lower our growth to more sustainable levels and manage costs so that we can compete in the market.”
• “In the last year, we lost a large source of revenue. Since losing that revenue, we have made up about half of it and are positioned well in the future.”
• “Employee morale this year has been lower than usual given that we’ve had restructuring and changes to our client base, but our new work is interesting and will push the firm in a different direction.”
• “Employee morale is currently lower than usual, but the economic outlook appears to be on an upward trend for 2025.”

Hiring Process

• ”The people who thrive at Bridgespan are smart, emotionally intelligent people who care about social impact and have a nose for what truly matters. If you can sell yourself as hitting on all those boxes, you stand a good chance of getting a callback. A reference doesn't hurt either.”
• “We’re looking for someone with a demonstrated interest in the social sector and a broader personal north star or guiding mission.”
• “Our ideal candidate is a thoughtful and creative person with a ‘can-do’ attitude."
• “I want to hire people with a track record of facing ambiguous problems, then solving those problems by adding structure to them and using data and other analyses to get to a good decision.”

Interview Questions

• “Bridgespan does a standard case interview, but it’s geared towards social sector. The math will include market sizing and potentially some cost and revenue analysis. The case interview will have a racial equity component.”
• “See Bridgespan's website for example cases and questions -- that was representative of my experience interviewing.”
• “Break down how you would approach a problem synthesizing something you learned from an interview or data analysis into an update for your manager and a recommendation for your client.”