can we answers "What could be the major issues for each business unit" with more specific answers?

Question

I read the recommended answers are "Quality of service\Speed of service\Price of service". my questions is can we just point out the most important part for each business units??

for example, for "Restoration of old movies for preservation", the restoration technology and skill is extremely important, we need to train and maintain skilled person and invest into new technology. for "Production for cinemas", we need secure influencial actor/actress with good performance skill. meanwhile, director and good storyline need to be considered as well.

can these sorts of answers acceptable??

Answer 1

Hello Linnan!

Your points make completely sense, but I have 2 comments on that:

Make sure that your answers are significant considering the goal of your client (in this case profitability), pointing out clearly why your suggestions can help them
Try to make your recommendations a little bit more "professional" translating them into business next step (e.g. restoration technology and skill is extremely important -> we need to invest in people, R&D and Legal department if any patent is possible)

Best,
Luca

Answer 2

Hi Linnan,

I quickly browsed the case and saw that this is the 1st question. In McK-style case, the 1st question is usually the prompt for your framework/structure. Your answers are good but they dive into the details too fast so the high-level view is missing.

To answer this question, I suggest you:

- Clarify the client's goal

- Propose your structure/framework

- For each branch of your structure, pick up one or two points as your hypothesis and state them to the interviewer

For Mck style interview, even prompts can come out in very creative ways, the general case flow is not that much different. Happy to discuss more if this is unclear in any way!

Answer 3

Hi Linnan,

The most important thing here is that you have a sound structure. After that, the specific ideas are less importnat (though they have to be revelant).

How to Structure In General

I'm going to take a step back and answer the most important question: How do I use frameworks in a case?

If there's anything to remember in this process, is that cases don't exist just because. They have come about because of a real need to simulate the world you will be in when you are hopefully hired. As such, remember that they are a simplified version of what we do, and they test you in those areas.

As such, remember that a framework is a guide, not a mandate. In the real-world, we do not go into a client and say "right, we have a framework that says we need to look at x, y, and z and that's exactly what we're going to do". Rather, we come in with a view, a hypothesis, a plan of attack. The moment this view is created, it's wrong! Same with your framework. The point is that it gives us and you a starting point. We can say "right, part 1 of framework is around this. Let's dig around and see if it helps us get to the answer". If it does, great, we go further (but specific elements of it will certainly be wrong). If it doesn't, we move on.

So, in summary, learn your frameworks, use the ones you like, add/remove to them if the specific case calls for it, and always be prepared to be wrong. Focus rather on having a view, refering back to the initial view to see what is still there and where you need to dive into next to solve the problem.