Sorry, I should have been more clear. The acronym is MBB (McKinsey, Bain, and BCG) that I'm familiar with when referring to the top consulting companies. MBBD (McKinsey, Bain, BCG, and Deloitte) is a reddit joke that I've seen a bunch. The original commenter was using McKinsey, Bain, BCG, and Accenture to refer to the "big 4" consulting firms. I've worked with Accenture before, but I've never heard anyone group Accenture with those other consulting firms.
The Big 3 distinction isn't based on firm size (McKinsey, Bain, and BCG only have 38k, 25k, and 15k employees respectively) but rather on prestige and type of work done.
Dell is not lumped in with MAGMA even though they’re everywhere and everyone knows who they are because they have completely different business models, employee pools and compensation. They’re barely in the same industry, if you squint. Similarly with Accenture and prestige consultancies. If you were going to have a Big 4 the fourth would be AT Kearney, not Accenture.
If you redefine common terms as you go, you should at least give the reader a heads up. Nobody uses “big 4” for MBB and Accenture. Those are not the same type of companies.
The whole thread is debating who’s sitting in the BIG4 and all I see is companies trying to belong on musical chairs. What’s strangest to me is we’re not in an early-Schumpeter cycle, seats should be well-established by now, it’s been half a century.
Accenture aren't even in the Vault Consulting Top 50 rankings. I don't know how this list is calculated but people in consulting tend to refer to this (I used to work at MBB).
lol. McK isn't a body shop. McK = ivy league grads, olympic medalists, top PhD's from flagship state schools. I mean Chelsea Clinton worked at McKinsey. You think she's going to be managing some Indians on setting up SAP?
Top tier consulting firms are: McKinsey, BCG, Bain