Consulting Becoming Popular Career Path : Jobs: In the slow-growth ‘90s, people are drawn to enticements of a high salary, prestige and a fast track to the top.

It’s not the kind of career people dream about when they’re growing up, like becoming an astronaut, or a baseball player or even President of the United States. Being a consultant doesn’t rate quite that high.

Few people probably even know what consultants do for a living.

But in the slow-growth, nose-to-the-grindstone 1990s, where “hot” careers like law and investment banking have cooled, young people are searching for new directions in their work. In growing numbers, they’re turning to consulting.

Beth Bradmon, 28, who recently received an MBA from Columbia University’s business school, ranks among them. She has just been hired by the accounting firm Coopers & Lybrand as a real estate consultant.

“I liked the idea of consulting,” Bradmon said recently. “Especially the way the market is now.”

The term consultant covers a lot of ground. Consultants analyze management practices, the very way companies are run. They suggest methods to organize operations and staff, devise ways to improve the quality of products and services offered and come up with ideas for companies to win market share from competitors.

Consultants also sell expertise in technology, compensation, personnel practices and more. When companies go through reorganizations, repositioning or other major changes, consultants thrive.

That accounts for some of the industry’s recent popularity.

“Part of my choosing to go into consulting was that I knew that you have your hands on everything, and that’s good in terms of personal growth and personal development,” Bradmon said during a recent interview.

“There are people out there who love to come in and push the same papers day in and day out in the same order and that’s great. . . . That would make me insane!”

Consultants can be found everywhere, working for firms of all sizes. They can be self-employed experts, university professors who consult part time or retirees looking for extra money.

David Lord, editor of Consultants News, an industry newsletter, said about one in five MBAs from top schools today go into consulting. Most are hired by large consulting firms or other companies offering consulting services, such as accounting firms and computer maker International Business Machines Corp.

The enticements of a high salary, prestige and a fast track to the top are powerful, particularly in a weak economy.

Worldwide consulting in 1992 generated $28.3 billion in revenue, up 12 percent from a year ago, according to Consultants News. Revenue generated in the United States totaled $15.2 billion and the world’s 10 largest consultants were U.S. firms.

There are about 80,000 consultants in North America who specialize in management issues such as reorganization and restructuring. “But the world of consulting is so broad that it would include hundreds of thousands of other people” who advise companies in areas such as technology, health care and personnel, Lord explains.

Adding one more to that number is Marie Tyvoll, 32, another recent Columbia MBA graduate.

Starting recently as a manager in operational consulting at the accounting firm Arthur Andersen & Co., Tyvoll said she couldn’t wait to go into the field and begin working with clients.

“I see consulting as a way to learn a tremendous amount,” she said.

Tyvoll’s work involves the re-engineering of business processes, the implementation of quality management practices and other areas in which the way companies operate is examined.

“I knew I wanted to go into consulting, because I wanted to duplicate the entrepreneurial environment,” Tyvoll said.

Like other consultants, Tyvoll will examine companies’ ongoing operations, recommend improvements and help carry out her suggestions. It’s not unusual for consultants to stay with clients for extended periods, a kind of high-priced temporary help.

The job carries strategic responsibilities similar to those of a business owner. Consulting work brings other advantages, too.

“People figure if they do well in the consulting firm, that’s great. If not, they’ve met a lot of other people in the business world and made a lot of contacts,” said James J. Beirne, director of career development and placement at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Roughly one-quarter of each Wharton class is hired by consulting firms, more than any other single industry, Beirne said. The median starting pay for Wharton MBAs in consulting was $72,000 a year in 1992, often with the addition of signing bonuses of about $10,000.

But while the money certainly is good, consulting is a tough job. The pressure is intense for those at the largest firms, and many don’t make it to the partner level, where consultants gain an ownership stake and a measure of security.

The big firms “pay combat pay, because they put you on the road a lot and work you unreasonable hours,” said Maury Hanigan, president of Hanigan Consulting Group, a consulting firm specializing in strategic staffing and campus recruiting.

But Hanigan points out that consulting does offer “a bird’s-eye view of a number of different industries,” allowing some students who enter the field to effectively postpone their career choices.

Many eventually enter industries for which they’ve consulted.