L.E.K. Consulting Salary 2026: Pay by Level and Office
By case-prep.comPublished August 21, 2026Updated August 21, 202610 min read
L.E.K. is the closest Tier 2 firm to MBB on the work and one of the furthest from it on transparency. Undergraduates enter as Associates near $117,000; MBA hires enter three rungs up as Consultants near $226,000. The most useful thing to understand here is not the level figures but where the jumps sit: Associate to Associate Consultant is worth about $40,000 and Consultant to Manager about $100,000, so promotion timing moves your earnings far more than any signing bonus negotiation.
Undergraduate entry
$117K
Associate, year one
Post-MBA entry
$226K
Consultant, year one
Manager
$275K
Levels.fyi reported average
Partner
$750K
Reported $510K to $1.1M
Pick a level, pick an office
L.E.K. was founded in London in 1983 and runs a genuinely international network, with unusually strong Asia-Pacific and Australian practices for a firm of its size. US figures are anchored to New York.
Office
Associate
Undergraduate entry, years 1 to 2
Reported
$117,000USD total, year one
Typical range $105,000 to $130,000 in United States
If you stay: total compensation by year
Seven levels to Senior Partner. Associate to Partner takes 10 to 14 years on a competitive up-or-out track, with roughly 60 to 70 percent advancing at each cycle. Tap any point for the detail.
What actually moves your number
L.E.K. is a Tier 2 generalist strategy firm that does MBB-adjacent work and is, by some distance, the least transparent Tier 2 firm about what it pays. Four things decide what an offer here is actually worth, and the first is a structural feature of the ladder rather than a number.
Promotion timing beats negotiation, and it is not close
L.E.K. runs an extra rung at the junior end that most peers do not: Associate, then Associate Consultant, then Consultant. Two of those transitions carry almost all the money. Associate to Associate Consultant is worth about $40,000 in package terms, and Consultant to Manager about $100,000. Everything between them is incremental. Base pay is banded by class year and close to fixed, so the negotiable elements are the signing bonus, which genuinely moves, and the level you enter at, which matters more. A year saved at any rung is worth more than any signing bonus you could argue for, which makes promotion pace the single most valuable thing to ask about in an offer conversation.
Three different kinds of number get quoted, and they are not interchangeable
Because L.E.K. publishes nothing, the public picture is assembled from three sources that measure genuinely different things. Certified H-1B filings are exact, dated, tied to a named office and legally attested, but they cover base only, exclude bonus and signing entirely, and only describe visa-sponsored hires. Crowdsourced platforms report what people say they received, which pulls down in weak bonus years. Offer trackers report headline figures from signed letters, which never do. This page uses all three and labels which is which, because a Manager base of $241,500 from a filing and a Manager total of $275,000 from Levels.fyi are not in conflict; they are answering different questions.
The local staffing model is a real, uncosted part of the package
L.E.K. staffs largely locally rather than flying teams to client sites Monday to Thursday, which is the default at MBB and at most of the Big 4 strategy arms. That does not show up anywhere in a salary table and it is one of the most commonly cited reasons people choose the firm. If you are weighing a roughly 10 to 15 percent pay gap against four nights a week in a hotel, the honest comparison includes that, and for a lot of people it dominates the cash difference. The counterpoint is that a smaller travel radius can mean narrower client exposure early on.
The sector concentration shapes both the work and the exit
L.E.K. is heavily weighted toward life sciences, healthcare and private equity commercial due diligence, more so than a generalist label suggests. That concentration is why its alumni land disproportionately in private equity, life sciences and healthcare roles rather than across the full spread a McKinsey exit opens. If those sectors interest you, the firm gives you deeper reps in them earlier than a generalist MBB seat would. If they do not, you will spend a lot of time in them anyway.
L.E.K. pay across nine offices
Total compensation at both entry points and at Manager, in local currency. Confidence reflects how directly each figure is evidenced.
Office
Associate
Consultant
Manager
Evidence
United States
$117,000
$226,000
$275,000
Reported
Australia
A$105,000
A$203,500
A$247,500
Partly reported
Singapore
S$105,000
S$203,500
S$247,500
Indexed
UAE
$93,500
$181,000
$220,000
Indexed
Germany
€68,000
€131,000
€159,500
Indexed
United Kingdom
£58,500
£113,000
£137,500
Partly reported
France
€58,500
€113,000
€137,500
Indexed
China
¥819,000
¥1,582,000
¥1,925,000
Indexed
India
₹1,521,000
₹2,938,000
₹3,575,000
Indexed
Only the US row rests on substantial submission volume, and it is anchored to New York rather than averaged across US offices. The UK and Australia rows are marked partly reported because London is the founding office and the Australian practice is unusually large for a firm of this size, but neither has a direct sample we would defend. Everything else is indexed from the US ladder and should be used for relative comparison only.
L.E.K. against MBB and Tier 2
US total compensation at three points. The undergraduate column is the one most candidates look at and the least informative, because L.E.K.'s extra junior rung changes what year two looks like.
Firm
Undergraduate entry
Post-MBA entry
First leadership level
BCG
$146,000
$267,000
$306,000
McKinsey
$135,000
$262,000
$309,000
L.E.K. Consulting
$117,000
$226,000
$275,000
Kearney
$111,000
$233,000
$278,000
OC&C
£64,000 London
London-anchored
£140,000 London
L.E.K. and Kearney land in almost exactly the same place, which is the honest headline. L.E.K. is ahead at undergraduate entry and marginally behind at both post-MBA entry and the first leadership level, and every one of those differences is inside what a single performance rating would move. Against MBB, L.E.K. trails by roughly 13 percent at undergraduate entry and 14 percent post-MBA, and the gap narrows to about 10 percent by Manager. Two things the table cannot show: the local staffing model, which many people value at more than the cash gap, and the extra Associate Consultant rung, which means an L.E.K. undergraduate hire reaches a higher figure in year three than the entry column suggests. See the McKinsey, Kearney and OC&C pages for those ladders.
Prep for the L.E.K. process
L.E.K. runs a traditional interviewer-led case with a strong quantitative bias and a noticeable weighting toward life sciences, healthcare and commercial due diligence scenarios. There is no assessment game.
L.E.K. publishes no salary bands and is the least transparent Tier 2 firm about compensation, which is why the public ranges on it are unusually wide. The compensating advantage is that certified visa filings give us exact base figures at two levels, which most firms on this site do not offer.
Sources, most to least direct
Certified H-1B filings. Labor Condition Applications that L.E.K. must submit for sponsored hires, giving exact and legally attested base salaries: $241,500 at Manager and $280,000 at Managing Director. These exclude bonus and signing entirely and cover only visa-sponsored employees.
Levels.fyi. Management consultant data reporting $113,000 at Associate, $163,000 at Associate Consultant, $214,000 at Consultant and $275,000 at Manager, with a $140,000 median across the track as of March 2026.
Glassdoor. 2,152 US submissions as of August 2026, spanning $67,467 for a Case Team Assistant to $283,772 for an Engagement Manager, with a Consultant band of $142,000 to $225,000 across 432 submissions.
Offer trackers. Source of the MBA package detail: $160,000 to $185,000 base, $22,000 to $48,000 performance bonus and $18,000 to $32,000 signing, plus the Partner band of $510,000 to $1,100,000 and the 10 to 14 year path to Partner.
Indexed estimates. Every non-US row is modelled from the US ladder against local market rates. These rows are labelled Indicative and should not be used to evaluate a live offer.
One figure to treat carefully. Comparably reports a $120,640 average including a $107,000 average base, and Glassdoor's headline range tops out at $283,772 for Engagement Manager. Both are firm-wide figures that pool case team assistants and support staff with consultants, and the Glassdoor ceiling in particular is a base figure at a mid-ladder title rather than the top of the firm. Neither describes what a Principal or Partner earns.
Common questions
A US undergraduate Associate earns roughly $95,000 base plus a bonus near $17,000 and a small signing bonus, for total first-year compensation near $117,000. Levels.fyi reports $113,000 total at this level. MBA hires enter three rungs higher as Consultants, on a $160,000 to $185,000 base with signing bonuses of $18,000 to $32,000, reaching $210,000 to $255,000 in year one.
Associate, Associate Consultant, Consultant, Manager, Principal, Partner, then Senior Partner. Undergraduates enter as Associates and MBA graduates as Consultants. The extra Associate Consultant rung at the junior end is what distinguishes the L.E.K. ladder from most peers, and Associate to Partner takes 10 to 14 years with roughly 60 to 70 percent advancing at each cycle.
Two of them, by a wide margin. Associate to Associate Consultant is worth about $40,000 in package terms, and Consultant to Manager roughly $100,000. Everything between those two rungs is incremental. Because base pay is banded by class year and close to fixed, promotion timing is a far more powerful lever on your earnings than anything you can negotiate at offer stage.
Yes, by roughly 13 percent at undergraduate entry and 14 percent at post-MBA entry, narrowing to about 10 percent by Manager. L.E.K. also lands within a few percent of Kearney at every level, which is the more useful comparison. The offsetting factor most people cite is the local staffing model, which means substantially less travel than an MBB seat and does not appear in any salary table.
The signing bonus genuinely moves, within a reported $18,000 to $32,000 band for MBA hires. Base does not, because it is banded by class year across the cohort. The most valuable thing to negotiate is not a number at all but the level you enter at, given that two promotions on this ladder are worth $40,000 and $100,000 respectively.
Reported total compensation runs $510,000 to $1,100,000, built on a base of $315,000 to $520,000 plus performance bonuses of $195,000 to $580,000. Profit sharing accounts for 50 to 70 percent of total pay at this level, which is why the band is so wide. L.E.K. is a private partnership and discloses nothing, so treat these as informed estimates rather than data.
Because three different kinds of number get quoted interchangeably. Certified H-1B filings give exact base salaries but exclude bonus and cover only sponsored hires. Crowdsourced platforms report what people actually received, which pulls down in weak bonus years. Offer trackers report headline figures from signed letters, which never do. A $241,500 Manager base from a filing and a $275,000 Manager total from Levels.fyi are both correct.
