I live and study Economics in Germany, unfortunately all career prospects evitably have to interact with transactions that involve some kind of interest-related element.
Is it permissible to work as a management consultant for a consultancy firm like McKinsey, BCG or Bain?
As a consultant, one provides an advisory service to clients. However, consulting can sometimes explore a company’s funding styles which may explore how a company would use interest to fund their operations.
I’ve placed links to give you an idea about Mckinsey’s operations as well as particularly about what a management consultancy firm generally does.
One Sheikh answered that it is permissible as long as one does not offer expertise to certain clients (gambling firms/brewery firms). Is this right or can I offer expertise to this clients as well?
And is it permissible to work in a mixed environment with woman due to the fact that I live in a western non-muslim country?
im on a very similar journey as you and IMO, i think it should be okay.
only because top strat firms like MBB have so many projects in different industries/functions so that you dont always have to work on projects where the company partakes in haraam activities. so it is possible to avoid working for a pornographic company etc.
And its okay because you’re only providing a recommendation and therefore are legally separate from the client who makes the final decision. (on many occasions they don’t even follow the recommendation). like if your team had to provide a recommendation on the capital structure for the funding of a m&a transaction, you’d say X equity and Y debt for XYZ reasons, then let them pursue that if they want. whereas in ibd (m&a/capital markets), i would deem that to be totally haraam because they directly create debt for the client so have a direct contribution to the haraam. Although try to minimise your interaction on such projects. And dont specialise in a sector which is haraam when you do become more senior.
If you want to be totally safe I would work for consulting firms who work on the implementation side over strategy. MBB are starting to offer such projects but not so much, try to target in-house big 4 consulting & places like accenture.
Unfortunately, by living in the West, there is no way around working in a mixed environment. All I can say is be as conservative as possible, don’t shake hands and just talk about work with the other gender. Or move offices to Saudi/Dubai where I assume the culture is much better.
May Allah bless you.
As a consultant, you must avoid advising companies from haram industries such as gambling, alcohol, conventional finance etc.
You must also refrain from advising on haram transaction such as: how to profit from interest revenues, or how to generate an income from haram sources.
If you can avoid doing these then, there is scope for such role to be lawful (halal).
Jazak Allahu Kheiran for your answer. But on the implementation side, you participate actively in whatever is in front of you. Isn’t that more critical?
So a recommendation as @Mohamed1 mentioned is also totally impermissible although the client would be the one making the final decision?
Mr Khan mentioned in his video that it is permissible to provide Professional services to the end customer, even in practice it is a client that is engaged in impermissible activity such as investment banks. @Mohsin_from_IFG and @ibrahimkhan, can you kindly answer this? As far as I can see it is different than the view of @Mufti_Billal, I can not unterstand your point of view.
Salam Amiri,
Did you figure it out?
I’m in the same position as you, interested in consulting at the big 4 but again not sure if consulting investment banks is halal.
JazakhAllah Khair