We are witnessing the slow death of the prestige career | Alice Lassman
TL;DR
Alice Lassman frames consulting as an old prestige bargain: survive two intense years at firms such as McKinsey, and the brand becomes a signal for leadership, elite access and future top jobs. AI hits the junior work that trained people in consulting, law, finance and other white-collar fields: research, analysis, synthesis, slide decks, memos and crisp communication.
Nauti's Take
The Guardian piece works well as a cultural diagnosis, but it is inevitably heavy on prestige logic: McKinsey stands in for an entire class of jobs. The hard question is not whether AI replaces consultants, but whether companies are still willing to pay beginners to learn.
Cut the entry ladder too aggressively, and you save costs now while creating a shortage of real decision-makers later.
Briefingshow
The important point is not whether McKinsey hires fewer graduates tomorrow. It is the operating system of status careers: young talent used to do expensive, repetitive work to build judgment, networks and credibility. If AI performs that work faster, firms need a new answer for how people become senior in the first place.
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