Andrey Donov graduated AUBG in 2001 and then completed his M.Sc. in management at the London School of Economics. The 2002 financial crisis brought him back to Bulgaria to work as a consultant. Three years later he did an MBA at the Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth, MA. He is currently working as a consultant for McKinsey & Company in Sofia.

What did you major in at AUBG? 

I completed the typical double major degree in business administration and economics. I have to say that I very much enjoyed the liberal arts curriculum because it allowed me to explore areas outside of business. Studying business can sometimes be boring and repetitive, so the fact that one could study history and astronomy at the same time is terrific.

Besides the Thursday nights in Underground, I learnt one major lesson at AUBG that impacted who I am. Coming from the English Language High School in Sofia, I obviously could speak English, but I could not think critically and I could not put my brain power to work to its full potential. The Bulgarian educational system was not meant to produce critical thinkers but passive listeners. The main lesson AUBG taught me is that independent, fact-based, critical thinking is valued and required if one wants to grow. Looking back now, this lesson could seem a bit trivial and obvious, but 10 years ago it was a major development for me.

Don't even get me started on this one. How about the afternoon naps? The fact that you don't have a boss? The four-month summer vacation? Having all your friends within a radius of 100 meters? The opportunity to get drunk on any random day of the week? You do take all these for granted, but this changes at a certain point...

I was drawn to consulting for two reasons. First of all, I wanted to travel around the world and get to know it better. Life is short and when you have spent your first 20 years basically sealed from the rest of the world in communist Bulgaria, you develop the desire to go out there and see it for yourself. Consulting allows you to travel to different countries, work with different people, and try different projects. Secondly, I did not have a big passion for one specific business area, but I had a little bit of passion and interest in many business areas. This naturally fits with consulting, where you can try different industries before you figure out what industry you like and in what industry you have some sort of advantage over the others.

That is one of those questions where the answer is: "it depends." Let me summarize what happened yesterday. I went to the client's office at 9.00 a.m and had a quick meeting with the marketing department on data collection. Then I produced several data collection forms to be sent to the people in the field. I then spent several hours refining an Excel model I have developed over the last one month and had another brief discussion with the client on that. In the meantime, the owner of the desk on which I was working showed up very surprised and asked me in Romanian why I am sitting at his desk. So I had to move to some other person's desk, who fortunately did not show up. At 6.00 p.m., I left the client's office and went to the McKinsey office where I had a discussion on the model and the data requests with my manager. We grabbed dinner at 9.00. Finally, I drew a couple of slides on a piece of paper and faxed them to our center in India. The completed PowerPoint slides were waiting for me in my mailbox in the morning.

I always make plans, so that I can sleep well. But over the course of the years, I have realized that life happens in the present tense and not in the future tense. So the plans are there, but I will go with flow.

I was in Blagoevgrad last month and talked to students. I realize that the number of students at the university has doubled, but I could still feel the spirit of the small place where everyone knows each other. I could still feel the intellectual intensity and the energy of the students. So, in a way AUBG has probably changed on paper, but the spirit and the energy remain the same.

Please login to post comments or replies.