This one is going to be a long one, but I am typing slowly and thinking each one through:
1) Capco is very high on form and weak on substance. This leads over time to a culture where the bar steadily drops and one thinks "Why am I bothering with getting better at my work? Let me learn to either talk BS confidently, or even better, get pally with one of the big shots in the firm".
2) Alas, the management of the firm, especially a couple of the newer partners do not have the foresight to discourage this kind of behaviour and the resultant signalling is - you might as well join in the sycophantic fray, as long as you are here. Case study 1: A girl who spent 3 years at Capco as Consultant drastically changed her strategy while we worked together at a Tier 1 bank in Canary Wharf. Flirted with the principal consultant, made vague but intelligent sounding contributions in weekly meetings. Voila - promotion to Senior Consultant in 6 months.
3) Capco actively encourages training - but conducts most of it in-house, presumably to avoid paying high priced training firms. Fair enough so far - but most of the training sessions are delivered by other consultants in the firm. With the key focus being to notch these up and stake claim for promotion, the focus really isn't on imparting usable skills. Case Study 2: A senior trainer on one of the modules told me that he actually billed his client for the day even though he was in the Capco office training.
4) Capco doesn't care 2 hoots about your interests especially if you have spent time on the bench. Personal Case Study: I once spent 3 weeks on bench while waiting for a role that spoke to my skills in Capital Markets. I am an ex finance professional who at this point had been working for 9 years. As "bench work" I was asked to go man their retail banking stall in a client branch - when I protested saying that there were better ways I could add valye, I was called by he who shall be unnamed, saying that since I was an Associate, and was on the bench, I should comply or get off the bench. Yeah, as you've probably guessed, I really needed the job at that point.
5) Capco is cliquey - The saddest part about this is that the young people who join Capco get moulded for life in this vein. To some extent, this is not unique to Capco, but the brazenness with which this flourishes was enough to make most people shake their head. This culture begins with HR - I've discussed with many of my friends from Capco (the kind of good friendships that can only be forged through common misery, and this was my biggest saving grace during this dark period of my life) how dealing with HR was probably the most unpleasant experience we had to endure.
6) At a fundamental level, I developed a healthy mistrust of the authority figures at Capco, barring a few decent blokes, who found themselves in the midst of the nuthouse. The firm has a very ambitious program called Be Yourself at Work - as part of this they profess to be alongside you supporting you. This support, sadly, extends to the good times in the bar, or celebrating a big win. I had the misfortune of discovering this during trying personal times after which I returned to work to find out I had been awarded a 2/5 rating for work that had been widely appreciated by some of the biggest stakeholders on the client site
Anyway, all in all, I look back on my time there as some kind of penance or hard wake up call that I had to go through. I don't harbour ill-will, but I certainly
