McKinsey YLP Final Round Prep?

Hello, and congrats!

In a nutshell, the structure should be the same one as the one you have seen so far in the 1st round. However, this is the theory, and in practice some things may change:

• 2nd round is much more "unstructured", driven by the fact that is conducted by much more senior people than the 1st round. Given their wide experience, they can go off the normal "script", which translates into creative FIT and Business cases. 
• FIT is very important, and sometimes it´s given even more time than in the 1st round. In line with my 1st point, FIT can be a bit more "improvised" and with questions that are not the classical ones. However, it should go in line with the 3 main leadership principals tested: 
  • Personal impact: Developing and implementing sound recommendations requires the involvement and support of many individuals. Skills interacting with people, sometimes in tough situations, are critical to driving distinctive client impact.
  • Entrepreneurial drive: We look for people with an entrepreneurial spirit: innovative by nature, always creating new approaches, products, services, and technologies.
  •  Leadership Abilities: We seek people who strive to lead themselves, their teams, and their communities, and who can foster effective teamwork to drive results.

To prep for it, I would recommend you to work with experienced candidates -who have been at least once in a Round 2 interview- or with a coach, to tackle the off-the-guidelines questions. 

Hope it helps!

Cheers, 

Clara

Hi Jahanzeb,

First of all congratulations to reach final round interviews!

While first round interviews are highly standardized especially at McKinsey, in second-round interviewers bascially everything can happen.

The main idea of second/final round interviews is to ensure your performance in those areas in which you did not convince McKinsey in the first round interviews. This can be either the case interview or the McKinsey PEI, or both. Whatever it is, your weak points from first round interviews are where you can expect a strong focus in the second/final round interviews.

So yes, you should have also some additional PEI examples prepared for that. I wrote a full blog post about PEI in final rounds here in more detail: https://pei.consulting-case-interviews.com/blog/can-i-use-the-same-pei-example-in-different-interviews/

Hope that helps - if so, please give it a thumbs-up with the upvote button!

Robert

Hi Jahanzeb, congratulation for having reached the final round! The structure of the interview will be the same and the difficulty of cases comparable. You do not need to change personal stories and PEI answers.

Best,
Antonello

Hello Jahanzeb,

First of all congratulations!! There is nothing really different but the fit part will be much more important than in other rounds. Regarding the business case, they are usually less structured and complex (generally market sizing).
Try to focus on your PEI and on your communication, it's fundamental to have a good personal fit with them. Sometimes the partner could even try to put you under pressure, heavily challenging your answer (stress interview, I had one), so be prepared for it.

Best,
Luca

Dear A,

In general I would say that the case difficulty increases from round to round. 

At the first round you're mostly have you personal fit and individual behavior questions, taking most of the time, but cases is rather shorter. 

In the third round the cases are longer, and personal fit part is very short one. 

So the case difficulty increases from round to round. But I cann't confirm that the cases differ between generalist and specialist track. They should be more or less the same. 

Hope it helps,

For any further questions, feel free to reach out. 

Best,

André

Hi Jahanzeb,

the structure of the final is the same (fit + case+ your questions); however there is more emphasis on communication and fit.

Specifically, the main difference you will find in a final round with partners is that at that stage they:

1. spend more time on fit questions and your alignment with the company
2. check more closely your communication (eg how you react to challenging questions)
3. may not have a “proper” structured case to present – during one of my MBB finals I had one interview which was made by two market sizing questions and a brainteaser, without any business case. That's because during the final they know you can structure and crack a case (you passed 1 or 2 rounds already) and are more interested in your logic, personality and fit with the company

So in order to prepare I would concentrate on:

• Review in detail your PEI stories – they will matter more than in the first round. In some finals I had almost exclusively behavioral questions
• Work on your communication (reaction under pressure, how to gain time when you do not have a structure ready, connect with the interviewer, etc). This is something you can do almost exclusively in interviews with peers.
• Prepare cases as you did for the first round. More market sizing practice may be useful to think outside the box if you get unusual questions.

I would suggest to have at least two stories for each PEI dimension.

In case you need help with unusual cases please feel free to PM me, I do a specific session on them (eg How would you estimate the effect of the Coronavirus on the economy in China)?

Best,

Francesco

Hi Jahanzeb,

Final round typically put more emphasis on PEI, which revolves around 3 key themes:

• Leadership experiences
• Conflict management
• Motivation

Do prepare at least 2 stories for each and formualte it in a structured manner.
Also, refine your case interview skills, as while the portion would be less, you would be expected to go through the process smoothly and quickly with much less difficulties.

Hope it helps.

Kind regards,
Nathan