Questions to be asked at the 'initial interactions' stage

Question

In this case, background information about the product, production, cost, etc seem to be important to determine the structure of the analysis, it is then necessary to ask some background questions? But this kind of overlap with the 'initial interactions' before taking a minute and drawing down the framework.

1. How much time shall be spent on the 'initial interactions' before the 'minute-break'?

Besides, my 3-must questions for each case at the 'initial interactions' stage are:

Which industry is the client in?
What products/ services do they offer?
What is the problem and why?

Are there any recommended must-ask questions at this stage?

Answer 1

Hello Ronnie,

In order to address this point I usually tell my candidates to ask themselves:
Is this information important to better design my framework? Can the answer significantly change the focus of the framework?
If the answer is yes, you have to ask those questions before the one-minute break. It's better to spend a couple of minutes more to fully understand the case instead of having a framework that is not effective and that will affect the whole resolution.

Hope it helps,
Luca

Answer 2

Hi Ronnie,
these are 3 good questions. You can spend up to 4/5 minutes on initial clarifying questions before write down your structure, depending on how complete is the problem statement. I usually recommend leveraging this time in order to develop the best structure possible.

Best,
Antonello