If I could go back to graduate school now, there are a million things I would do differently! From focusing on the most important issues in my dissertation, asking lab mates for more help, and taking greater advantage of my free time, working as a management consultant has taught me many valuable skills. However, had I known all along I would join the fast-paced consulting world after graduate school, I would have beefed up my knowledge in a few key areas. First, completing coursework in accounting, finance, and organizational behavior. Second, joining consulting or entrepreneurship clubs in the business school. Although apprenticeship-based learning, or on the job learning, defines the essence of management consulting, having a solid foundation in the tools of business would have given me a faster, more confident start.

Taking courses helps you learn the principles, increase your vocabulary, and learn a new way of thinking about a problem. It is not hard to pick up the accounting terminology needed to read a balance sheet on the job, but knowing it before a real world project starts would free up time and mental capacity to focus on other issues.

Next, corporate finance is at the heart of every company's operations, and being able to sniff out a problem through the numbers is a talent I'm trying to cultivate. In my experience, the CFO is one of the quietest executives at client meetings because strategic consulting work frequently focuses on strategy and execution, not just ledger sheets. However, being able to understand a company from multiple perspectives wins you points from all sides of the client table.

Finally, organizational structure and behavior is not a strong point for many academic scientists or physicians. Businesses are organized radically differently from academic institutions, and PhDs and MDs often struggle to make sense of company hierarchy. Studying a few examples of organizational structure by looking at "org charts" will give you a graphical explanation of client relationships. It also provides a hint of your client's responsibilities in addition to your project. For example, a client (project manager) with 5 people reporting into him (direct reports) who also reports to a head of finance (functional manager) and the EU division manager (geographic manager) may not have much time for you. As a result, you will need to structure your meetings effectively to maximize your time together.

A seminar or workshop in project management is a lower priority suggestion. Unless you have had to track detailed progress on a grant or extra-curricular project, you might not have much experience creating, organizing, and leading a team of co-workers and clients. For example, as a pressure-driven person who thrives well in the absence of structure, I had a minor heart attack upon seeing my first Gantt chart. Fortunately, I have adopted basic project management skills from attending in-house training sessions and observing good managers, but it helps to be exposed to the formal tools of project management.

The logistics of actually taking a class, however, may be more challenging given your lab/rotation schedule and the course instructor's willingness to take you on as a student or auditor. One added benefit of taking a class is determining if you really want to switch careers to do what you're learning. Auditing a patent law class quickly shuttered any thought of my becoming a lawyer!

Joining a consulting or entrepreneurship club at the business school would help to meet like-minded people and provide an opportunity to discuss what you are learning. In the club, recommended reading could come from the popular business press (Wall Street Journal, Economist, NYTimes Business section), the b-school press (Harvard Business Review and HBR case studies, MIT Sloan's Management Review), and popular business books ("Profit from the Core," "Porter's Five Forces," "Good to Great"). The specific details of each case study or book are less important than getting comfortable discussing the strengths and weaknesses of companies.

Even joining an informal debating club would help to cultivate a keen sense of argumentation. Journal Club, though similar in principle, is not the best venue to practice the mental gymnastics commonly used in consulting because your arguments there are backed up with loads of significant evidence. In more informal debating societies – as well as in consulting - you rely more on general logic and reasoning to draw conclusions. Consulting, however, goes the next step to identify the analysis required to prove that what you've proposed is, indeed, the right answer.

In addition, joining a club provides the opportunity to demonstrate leadership as an officer in the organization. And if the club doesn't exist, you could always start your own: Initiative is highly valued by consulting firms!

Also instructive is listing the skills I developed in graduate school that I have honed as a consultant. The ability to conduct independent research seems obvious, but I use this skill almost every day. Beyond general literature or news searches, I continue to search PubMed for review articles and the latest research on topics such as heat shock protein inhibitors and trends in conjugated antibodies. Though I no longer use EndNote, the ability to track and document sources is a highly appreciated – but underutilized - skill in consulting. Finally, my solid foundation in Excel and PowerPoint has come in handy for modeling and slide-making, the lifeblood of consultants. (And if I had only used SPSS in graduate school, like my psych colleagues, I would be one of the most sought after people in my firm!)

But above all, if consulting firms wanted another MBA, they could hire one. PhDs and MDs are valued not only for their ability to logically structure a problem and solution but also for their unique knowledge, skills, and abilities. Extra coursework and activities are tools that will help you enjoy a faster ramp up to a challenging career as a consultant, but sacrificing all your free time to get the leg up may not be worth the effort. For me, consulting was a natural extension of my intellectual interests in science and business along with my extracurricular interests including high school debate, college model congresses, and grad school career seminars. Adjusting to the demands of the job in first few months will be difficult, but you can be successful in spite of, and as a result of, your unique background.