A consultant knows better than anyone what a figure adds to an argument. Yet when writing their own CV, they face a dilemma: confidentiality clauses forbid them from naming their clients and disclosing their data, but a consultant CV without measurable results does poorly at first screening. Many come down on the wrong side: either they stay vague (“supported a large group in its transformation”), or they say too much. There is a middle way, well known to recruiters: anonymise the client, but keep precise results. This article explains what confidentiality really forbids, how to describe a client without naming them, and shows an engagement rewritten.
Why figures matter at screening
For a recruiter at a firm, a fund or a company, a figure on a consultant’s CV plays three roles.
It gives the scale. “Cost reduction plan” can mean a one-week workshop or an eighteen-month programme across an entire group. A quantified scope (number of sites, of employees affected, size of the cost base) makes it possible to place your experience immediately.
It proves impact. A consultant is hired for what they change at the client. A measured result (savings committed, time reduced, adoption rate reached) is the most direct proof.
It shows a results culture. A candidate who thinks of quantifying their engagements shows that they reason like a consultant, which is a signal in itself.
The figures must nevertheless remain accurate. McKinsey points this out on its interviewing page 🔗, regarding the use of artificial intelligence: polishing the presentation of a CV is encouraged, but exaggerating or claiming achievements that are not yours is not. BCG, for its part, stresses on its interview process page 🔗 the interview as an opportunity to go beyond the CV: every figure will be discussed.
What confidentiality really forbids
Consultants’ employment contracts and the engagement contracts signed with clients almost always contain confidentiality clauses. Their exact content varies, but they generally cover:
- the client’s identity, especially when the engagement has not been made public;
- non-public information about the client: internal figures, projects, strategy, organisation;
- the deliverables produced for the client, which cannot be shown to a third party;
- the very existence of some engagements, particularly in mergers and acquisitions or restructurings.
On the other hand, these clauses generally do not forbid describing, anonymously, the type of engagement, the industry and the size of the client, or giving orders of magnitude that do not make it possible to identify the client or its data. A good consultant CV rests on this distinction.
When in doubt, the rule is simple: reread your contract and, if necessary, ask your firm what it allows. A former employer who discovers confidential information on your CV does not forget it, and a recruiter who sees it wonders what you will say about their own clients.
Lawyers face the same problem with professional secrecy, under even stricter rules; the page on what professional secrecy allows on a lawyer’s CV 🔗 shows how that profession presents its cases, an approach a consultant can draw on.
Describing a client without naming them
An anonymised client remains perfectly readable for a recruiter if it is described by three elements: its industry, its size and its scope.
The industry, with a reasonable level of precision: “food group”, “mutual insurer”, “telecoms operator”, “specialist retailer”. Avoid details that designate a single player (“world leader in tyres”).
The size, by a range or a public indicator: “mid-sized company with 1,500 employees”, “group listed on the SBF 120”, “family-owned mid-sized company”. A stock market index is public information, useful and broad enough.
The scope of the engagement: the department, business or area concerned. “The procurement department”, “three French plants”, “a region’s branch network”.
A few useful wordings:
| Too precise | Too vague | Right | |---|---|---| | France’s leading food retailer | A large group | A national food retailer (over 100 hypermarkets) | | Bank X, risk department | A bank | A regional retail bank, risk department | | Fund Y, on the acquisition of Z | A fund | An investment fund, on a B2B services target |
Orders of magnitude rather than amounts
The second tool is the order of magnitude. An exact amount can make it possible to identify a client; a range or a proportion rarely can.
- Prefer proportions to amounts: “8–10% reduction of the indirect cost base” rather than “12.4 million euros of savings” when the amount is revealing.
- Use ranges: “programme affecting 1,000 to 1,500 employees”.
- Round: “about 40 quantified levers” rather than “43 levers”.
- Distinguish identified from committed: identified savings are not realised savings. Saying so shows your honesty and your understanding of the job.
- Link the figure to your contribution: if the team identified 40 levers, say how many you investigated yourself, or which workstream you owned.
These precautions also apply to volumes of work (interviews conducted, workshops facilitated, data processed), which generally raise no confidentiality issue and show your real workload.
Before and after on one engagement
Take a typical engagement of a management consultant with three years’ experience, on a performance plan in industry.
Before, the vague version:
“Supported a large industrial group in optimising its costs. Took part in workshops and in building the business case.”
The recruiter knows neither the size of the group, nor what you did, nor what came out of it.
Before, the overly precise version:
“23.7 million euro cost reduction plan for [group name], [city] plant, approved by [title and name of the director].”
Everything is there, including what should not be.
After, the anonymised and quantified version:
“Performance plan for the support functions of a mid-sized food company (about 2,000 employees, four sites): 28 quantified levers, savings identified of around 8% of the costs concerned, over half of them committed in the following budget; facilitated 22 workshops with frontline managers.”
This version gives the industry, the size, the scope, the method, the result and the consultant’s personal share (the workshops), without making it possible to identify the client. The management and organisation consultant CV template applies this logic to several engagements. For a corporate role, the corporate development manager template shows how to quantify acquisitions with a total and a range.
What to keep for the interview
The CV is not meant to say everything. Some information is kept for the interview, where it can be mentioned orally, with care.
- The detailed context of the engagement: why the client brought you in, what the internal stakes were.
- Your reasoning: the hypotheses tested, the difficulties, the trade-offs.
- The exact figures you are allowed to cite, if the recruiter asks and if your contract permits.
- Names, never, except for a public engagement and with explicit agreement.
For each engagement on the CV, prepare a two-minute oral version, built like a fit interview story. The interviewer will dig into your figures: you must know where they come from and exactly what they measure.
Once your results are quantified, the question of how to present them arises: by engagement, by industry or by skill. Our article on presenting engagements on a CV compares these three options, and the article on the one-page CV helps you choose which engagements to detail. For formatting, the ConseilCV editor neatly aligns figures, dates and titles, and produces a PDF that screening software reads without difficulty.
Frequently asked questions
Can you name a client whose engagement has been made public?
Only with care. Even if the engagement was announced, your contract may limit what you can say about it. Check with your firm, and stick to what has been published.
Should you give figures for every engagement?
Ideally, at least one order of magnitude per significant engagement: scope, volume of work or result. An engagement without any figure often looks less important than it was.
What if the engagement’s results are not yet known?
State what was decided or committed at the end of your work: a plan approved, a budget voted, a rollout launched. That is already a result.
Are your former employer’s figures confidential too?
Often, yes, for unpublished internal data. For a listed company, figures published in its reports can be used, but your own contributions are better described in proportions.
Sources
- McKinsey & Company, Interviewing at McKinsey 🔗
- Boston Consulting Group, Interview process 🔗