Alle Fragen zum Tag Case Interview - Consulting Q&A - PrepLounge.com

Hi there,

Great question with all the detail!

I can confidently say that the reason she didn't point out the error is that overall you did very well and a little mistake here or there doesn't change the overall impression. Everybody makes mistakes, especially mistakes of ommission, so why correct you? If everything else is as you describe, you did well enough.

If you had other problems, she might correct you and see if you are able to fix your mistake.

It's not like studying with a junior case practice partner. You don't have to get everything on the page to do well.

Bottom line, you're not screwed!

Best of luck,

Allen

Hi there,

You can structure a cover in 4 parts:

1. Introduction, mentioning the position you are interested in and a specific element you find attractive for that company
2. Why you are qualified for the job, where you can report 3 skills/stories from your CV, ideally related to leadership, impact, drive and or teamwork depending on the company
3. Why you are interested in that particular firm, with additional 1-2 specific reasons
4. Final remarks, mentioning again your interest and contacts

In part 2 you can write about experiences that show skills useful in consulting such as drive, problem-solving, leadership, teamwork and convincing others.

It is important that in part 3 you make your cover specific to a particular firm – the rule of thumb is, can you send the exact same cover to another consulting company if you change the name? If that’s the case, your cover is too generic.

For some offices (eg the Middle East) you should also make clear why you are applying to that particular office.

Hope this helps,

Francesco

Hi there,

What do you think? And do you think it's a negatively or positively correlated relationship? :P

Of course, the more experience you have, the higher the expectations are. Moreover, each of these segments will likely be apply to different roles, which also have different expectations.

That siad the following needs to be met no matter what segment/role you are:

"Someone who can approach a complicated problem and think + communicate in a structured way in the right context+objective of the case, while being personable, adaptable, and coachable, so that, ultimately, the interviewer can see themselves working with this individual and putting them in front of a client."

Hi there,

I would not list all the synergies in the initial structure – that would indeed take too much time.

What I would recommend is to:

• Present the synergies with an initial level (eg “In terms of synergies, I can think about revenues and cost synergies”)
• Provide a few examples (eg “For example, for the revenue synergies, we may use one of the distribution channels of the company to sell beers there. On the cost side, we may be able to reduce the cost per unit of the raw material used for beers, negotiating with the suppliers since we are going to be bigger”)
• Explain you are happy to expand it later if needed, so that the interviewer knows that you have additional points there (eg “I would be happy to analyze this further later on if needed”)

Hope this helps,

Francesco

Senior Partners often do that. They have already tested you inside-out in the previous rounds and if you showed a solid analytical mindset, you are very structure and with sharp business judgment, the Partners at the last round may just want to check your fit with the company culture. I know firsthand many Senior Partners that rarely do cases (despite still doing a lot of recruiting).

So, difficult to say without knowing you, but it could be a good sign.

Both in my view, the more comprehensive you are the better it is.

Have a look at this thread- https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/brainstorming-risks-in-case-interviews-8960

Hello there,

I think you will receive a plain email in case of rejection and a call in case of positive feedback. Having said that you always have the possibility to reach out to the HR department to ask for additional feedback on how to improve next time.

Usually, a pass comes only if there is a unanimous decision from all your interviewers, that's why it's better to perform consistently well across all the interviews rather than being excellent in one and mediocre in another one.

Give them some more time and if you will receive negative feedback, don't get yourself down, and feel free to ask for genuine feedback.

Hope it helps,

Franco

Dear Aytaj,

I have written in detail about

• the McKinsey interview process: https://strategycase.com/the-mckinsey-interview-process-the-only-post-you-need-to-read/
• the McKinsey PEI: https://strategycase.com/mckinsey-personal-experience-interview-the-only-post-you-need-to-read
• the McKinsey case interview specifics: https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/mckinsey-pre-1-round-case-screening-interview-9369
• structuring a McKinsey case: https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/how-long-should-i-take-to-develop-my-framework-during-a-case-interview-8952

These 4 resources should be good starting points for your journey. Please reach out if you have more McKinsey-specific questions.

Cheers,

Florian

Hey there,

I'd challenge the initial assumption that you need to lead the interviewer through your actual intermediate results while you are calculation. It is much more efficient and also easier for most candidates to break the process down into 3 steps.

First, take time to structure your approach and communicate it to the interviewer (''I want to break the calculation into 3 steps, 1.....2.....3......).

Second, ask for time to perform the actual math in peace and quiet (of course, ask if the interviewer is fine with this approach)

Third, communicate your answer to the question top-down; if you want, you could communicate intermediate results and steps here but it is not needed!

A case interview represents a hypothetical client-facing situation with a CEO. The CEO does not care about intermediate results. They care about

1. Correct logic and assumptions, which you communicate initially
2. The actual answer to their question; they don't want to be bombarded with irrelevant figures, number, or data

That way you will make sure to have 100% focus and concentration on the math and not split attention to approach, calculations, and communication.

This is a turn-key tip to make many candidates much more comfortable with math and reduce errors by a large margin.

Cheers,

Florian

Yes, I agree with your list. Cost must also include cost of disposing/recycling/ equipment and any other admin fee (legal, environmentatl).

Whats your solution? Please post here for us to comment.

If you looking to get started, there are some hints on two approaches I can recommend. You will still need to follow structured case solving- open the case-> claryfiying questions->hypothesis/assumptions-> etc etc

Approach 1

• Light integration- Buyer and acquired company still co-exist as standalone environments but with limited integration of most critical services/applications
• Rapid integration & consolidation- move straight to cloud, leverage SaaS standard solution

Approach 2

1. Due Diligence: align on the integration vision, cost targets, project plan and RACI
2. Integration Planning: identify high priority application, assets, infra & licenses. Create sprints
3. Delivery: leverage cloud, SaaS to speed up integration

Hope that helps. This will require some understanding/knowledge of IT areas otherwise you can keep your solution common sensical. Give me a buzz if you need more help.

Hi there,

Henning's answer is clever, but is not an answer I would expect a (strategy consulting) interviewer to be happy with (sorry Henning!). They want you to do a market sizing here.

As such, the clear clarifying question here would be: "Is it safe to assume this is the price/value of earth to humans?" To which, the answer would surely be yes.

Then, you need to state that price = WTP = value. Value = everything that the earth can provide.

Method 1

So, you'll want to split up the earth by its major producing parts. This would be Land (surface), Water, and Materials (below surface land).

Estimate the value of agriculture (trees, crops, etc.), fishing, and materials (common earth metals like iron and copper as well as rare earth metals such as Lithium. Don't forget oil, gas, and coal!).

And voila.

Method 2

Estimate the world's GDP (you should know the US's, know that China is close to the same, then use the law of 80/20 to calculate the rest). Look at global growth rates. Use NPV calculation to determine NPV of Economic production of the earth.

Hi A!

Note taking is of course a critical piece of a strong case delivery, so it will pay off to practice this early on in your preparation.

Whatever system you chose (and practice), it needs to fulfill 3 main purposes:

• Allow you to note down the critical data and information you hear during the case prompt and have the readily available whenever you need them
• It needs to enable you to note down an initial framework and track the execution against it
• It should provide room to store your key insights (1-2 numbers or 1 short bullet point per branch of your framework)

There are certainly many different styles of note taking that provide these three functions, so you should find our which one works for you and enables you to focus on the case execution, rather than the note taking. Keep in mind that you should practice this system early on in your journey, so you are comfortable with this method when you go into the interviews.

Find below a screenshot of the notetaking system that works for me personally. In this system, I first draw one vertical and one horizontal line. Then I use the column on the left side to take the initial notes during the case prompt and clarifying questions. Then I write down the key question of the case in the top row and develop the framework in the main area on the page.

During the case, I scribble less important stuff on separate pages (e.g. notes during the quant part). However, I will write down the key insights of each branch of the framework at the bottom of my main page. That way, when I get to the recommendation, I can simply read the notes from left to right to have the supporting arguments for the case recommendation.

Hey, do you want to post your solution here for us to comment? Best way to learn..

If you need a nudge to get started, think about following aspects (and add more from your thinking):

• Move to partnership based model i.e have one or two consulting partners do strategy->operations->execution
• Get procurement involved to build a preferred consultants list i.e 20% consultants cover 80% of the requirements
• Bring back work in-house
• Stronger SLA and performance management i.e tie payments to value delivered

Hi there,

This actually doesn't require bids/tenders knowledge! This is a sale/revenue improvement case!

I'd need a lot more infor here in terms of clarifying questions (i.e. how much competition, what's the market landscape, what are we actually selling...product+implementation, to who are we selling, etc.). That said, I'd probably boil down my analysis to:

Product Issue

Is our product inferior, compared to our competitor's products, in the areas our customers care about?

Brand/Marketing/Perception Issue

Do people view us as inferior? Are we not doing enough to raise awareness etc.?

Sales Team Issue

Are we not getting to potential customers properly?

Price Issue

Have we priced too high, out of range of what people are willing to pay?

^lots of depth/complexity to add to the above but this should cover the major causes/buckets

Here are some other ideas:

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/increase-number-of-users-for-a-productservice-8773

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/versatile-revenue-improvement-ideas-9433

Quite generic and old-school framework (comparable to Porters 5 Forces, which were already updated to 6 forces in the early 90s). Embedd your thinking along the way of asking yourself questions "What has to be true in order to sell more?"

... key points to touch upon of course are: what clients expect / need / are willing to pay for, what competitors already offer, and how we fit in (eternal love triangle btw clients, us, and the competition).

The 4P framework are just mere tools, at least in my opinion, potentially to be raised when talking about implementation. You d sell yourself short using that. By the way, there are expanded frameworks on this particularly (6Ps, 8Ps) etc, but this misses the point. Identify what needs to be true, what key questions you need to ask, then back up each question with a framework.

What does the clients need? HOW exactly does our product provide VALUE to them?

HOW important is the product to them? What would they be willing to pay for it? Are there any substitutes?

How would they like to structure the payments? I.e. dop they prefer fixed prices, contracts, spot prices, etc.?

What does the competition offer? Do they fullfil the clients needs?

Do we have what it takes to fullfil the clients' needs?

etc. etc.

Then you can back up every Question with specific contents... separately or merged.

Hi, I confirm some offices are applying this rule of not sharing the candidate CV to the 1st round interviewers. Therefore no fit questions will be asked (sometimes only why consulting or why Bain). In the 2nd round instead, partners do the standard interview with the initial 15-25 minutes of fit. Sometimes you will be assessed also by the recruiting director with a 30-45 minutes fit interview.

Best,
Antonello

Hi there,

Funny question indeed! Haven't hear this one before.

Please stay seated! I understand the impulse/urge, but this is very much a normal interview. As such you should remain seated!

Here are some general tips for virtual interviews:

• Make sure you have a strong internet connection
• Make sure your sound+video work
• Get multiple monitors so you can look at 3 things at once (1 screen makes thought linear which is tough),
• Have a good desk space and keep using paper for solving the case,
• Make sure you'll be in a quiet space with no distractions
• Still dress for the occasion

bcg case 2nd round german office:

1. your client is a german car rental company, charges 250 Euro for renting out a mercedes s-class. the customer can ride 300km for free and gets charged an additional fee for every extra-km. how much should our client charge in order to achieve the same profit margin for the first 300km as for every km thereafter.

very unconventional case; key is costs=purchase price mercedes s-class - sale price mercedes s-class after 20 Th driven km. (70000-60000 = 10000). thus costs (for each km)=10000D/20000km=0.5D/km

some other people got asked following:

1. Please estimate the german market for dog arthrosis medicine; straight-forward: household-based estimation of dogs; age of arthritis; incidenc; how many dogs get diagnosed? how many dogs get treated...

2. how many chicken farms are there in the world?

3. your client is a german drug manufacturer. next year the patent for one of the drugs expires. please estimate the revenues for this drug next year after expiration of the patent.

good luck;)