Practice with Coaches

Hi, I spent nearly 10 years at BCG in the Milan office, so let me give you my very honest view;: Working hours: yes, you do work a lot. Southern European offices, including Italy, tend to be on the tougher side in terms of hours compared to other regions in Europe (especially the Nordics). That said, it varies a lot depending on the client, your team (PL/EM), and the partner. In my experience, long hours were more noticeable when working from the home office; when on client site, it often felt less heavy as you’re fully immersed and there’s not much else going on anyway. Team environment: this is where I’d push back on some of the negative narratives. I’ve never experienced colleagues as competitors. There is a strong sense of camaraderie; if you’re overloaded, people step in and help. You’re all in the same boat. The pressure doesn’t come from internal competition, but from the fact that you’re constantly evaluated; performance reviews determine promotions, progression, and compensation. There are many factors to consider, but the fact that I stayed for 10 years should tell you something; for me, the positives clearly outweighed the downsides. If you want to go deeper, feel free to reach out. Best, Franco

Hi, Referrals mainly help at the resume screening stage;they can increase the chances that your CV gets reviewed more carefully or passed through the initial filter. However, they don’t give you any major advantage during the interviews; from that point on, it’s all about your performance. The ideal scenario is to have a direct contact in your target office who can refer you. If you don’t have one, you can still “engineer” it by reaching out to people (e.g., alumni, LinkedIn, events) and building a connection. If that goes well, you can ask for an internal referral or recommendation, but this needs to be done well in advance of your application, not last minute. Hope this helps. If you want further information feel free to DM me Best, Franco

Hi! OC&C interviews are quite similar to MBB, so your prep should largely follow the same approach. You can expect two main parts: 1. Case interview (core part) Very similar to MBB-style cases: profitability / growth market entry commercial due diligence (very common at OC&C) OC&C is particularly strong in commercial due diligence, so expect cases like: “Should a PE fund acquire this company?” “Is this market attractive?” “How can this company grow revenues?” They tend to be quite commercial and market-focused, sometimes more than MBB. What they look for: clear structure (this is key) ability to prioritize (not listing everything) comfort with numbers practical business sense 2. Fit / personal questions Standard questions: why consulting / why OC&C your past experiences leadership, teamwork, challenges Nothing unusual, but they expect clear and structured answers. How to prepare Practice standard case interviews (MBB-style is perfect) Spend a bit of extra time on market sizing and commercial thinking Be comfortable with quick math and interpreting data Prepare a solid answer on why OC&C specifically (they’re more specialized, more focused on strategy vs implementation) One difference vs MBB OC&C often appreciates candidates who are a bit more direct and commercial: get to the point make clear recommendations don’t overcomplicate If helpful, happy to run through a case together or give you some targeted feedback on your prep :)

This is a key part of the interview! Please do not overlook it at all. DO Ask questions about one the below 3: -consulting industry (how have clients need evolve?) -case (did you wind up proposing this to the client? which were the roadblocks during the project?) -himself (which step of the consulting career did you like best?) AVOID Ask stupid questions on: -questions you can ask to HR (how long before I have an answer?) -basic consuling career stuff (how often do you promote people?)

Hi, I’ll be very direct,  as I think that’s the most helpful. In your current situation,your chances of breaking into top-tier consulting (MBB) are extremely low. This is mainly due to your profile; firms in Saudi Arabia typically recruit from very selective universities and look for strong, consistent academic and professional trajectories. That said, this doesn’t mean you have no chance long term; it just means you’re not competitive today. One important point: you need  to demonstrate stability and commitment to an employer. Right now,  moving between roles after short periods (2–6 months) is hurting your profile. Consulting firms look for people who can commit, grow, and deliver impact over time; frequent job changes send the opposite signal If consulting is truly your goal,I would suggest: Staying in your current role (or the next one) for a meaningful period and building solid experience Targeting roles where you develop relevant skills (operations, problem solving, stakeholder management) Considering further education(e.g., a strong Master’s or MBA) Looking at Tier 2  or smaller consulting firms first as a stepping stone Right now, the priority is not getting into consulting immediately, but building a profile that makes  it realistically achievable. Hope this helps Franco

Hi there,Best course of action: Get a coach!Second best course of action: Get this course, then message me and I'll get you all of the supplementary materials for the Tech focus part I have a list of real BCG Digital/Tech questions asked in interviews. The cases tend to be more at the strategic level but can be implementation as well. It's quite tough to find adequate tech-focused cases. That's why I created 3 :) https://www.preplounge.com/en/management-consulting-cases/interviewer-led-mckinsey-style/advanced/mckinsey-digital-bcg-platinion-oil-gas-upstream-technology-196 https://www.preplounge.com/en/management-consulting-cases/candidate-led-usual-style/intermediate/roma-solutions-senior-expert-level-tech-case-240 https://www.preplounge.com/en/management-consulting-cases/candidate-led-usual-style/intermediate/yodaphone-195 All of these based on real-life cases and have a tech-focus. Please feel free to reach out if you would: a) Like more technology-based cases b) Like to be cased in the two above (hint: They don't cover all aspects of those projects...i.e. the cases could take multiple twists and turns and test additional themes when I conduct them) https://www.preplounge.com/en/articles/pitfalls-case-interview-preparation https://www.preplounge.com/en/articles/how-to-shift-your-mindset-to-ace-the-case

Hi! The first thing to recognise is why interviewers ask this question. Ultimately, they want to know how aware you are of your development areas, how you feel about you "weaknesses", and whether those "weaknesses" are red flags :) I advise my clients to: Answer honestly & directly... but not too honestly (this is not a confessional :)). Interviewers can tell if you're being ingenuine and know when you're trying to cover up your weaknesses. For example, "I work too hard" is not a weakness so don't say that. And don't say something that will obviously be a complete deal-breaker. Pick a "weakness" that is important for consultants to have. i.e. it should be relevant to the role. Saying you want to be a better investor is not relevant to the role. However, saying you could be better at managing your time is something that is relevant to being a consultant Show that you have already worked on this "weakness" and have a plan to improve it even more. Interviewers want just want to see that you have "weaknesses" (they already know you do because we ALL have weaknesses). They want to see that you're the sort of person who is doing something about it to improve yourself because as a consultant, you have to be open to feedback and take steps to address that feedback. Here's an example of what this might sound like (remember, this is just an example that demonstrates an example that is direct, honest, relevant, and improvement-focused. You will need to cater this to yourself: "A weakness of mine is my ability to present confidently in situations where I'm less familiar with the topic. This stems from a complete fear of presenting just a few years ago, which I worked on through the support of my colleagues and by putting myself in situations where I had no choice but to present, get feedback, and then refine and try again. So I feel like I've already come a long way. The work I'd done preparing myself for these interviews have helped me gain additional communication skills to improve how I feel presenting less familiar topics, but it is still an ongoing effort, which I continue to work on." Hope this helps! Get in touch directly to get some specific practice in. Best!

Every time a candidate would put a word “reading” into the hobbies section on their CV, I really loved to ask this question. I am myself a voracious reader, and I love a good discussion on books – so, I would definitely ask a candidate in the beginning of an interview what is his or her favourite book or what is the good book that they’ve read recently. So you better have an answer for this, or don’t put it on your CV :) As regards to what to reply – of course, there is no right or wrong answer here. Just be honest and authentic, do not make stuff up or mention a book you’ve never read (because your interviewer might have). So, if you enjoy non-fiction and topics like biology and genetics, talk about it. But also if you enjoy adventure novels or modern crime fiction, talk about it. In the end what matters is that you are able to show a bit of who you are. MBB are looking for unique personalities – people who are interesting to talk to, people whose company both clients and the colleagues would enjoy, people who can inspire by their uniqueness. So, do not be afraid to show it :)

Hey Victor, No worries: a few years of coaching taught that learning is a non-linear journey :) I think your problem with structuring cases is that you are overthinking the main buckets.  Intro and example My approach is to see buckets as "areas of analysis" you want to see during your case. They do not need to be directly linked to a specific sub-question of the case, but rather should give you a wide pool of analyzed data to then converge on the solution. I always advice my coachees to use this approach because it's just simple and easy: if you start overthinking at 01:00, you are in for a looong interview :) Let's take a standard market entry case: "A global PE fund contacted McKinsey to understand whether they should enter the market of Padel (i.e., a racquet sport, not dissimilar from pickleball) in the US. The sport is pretty popular in Europe, but almost unknown in America, so they are wondering what the size of the market is, what competition could look like, and what services they could offer."   The approach I would suggest for a beginner is this one: Market  - Size, growth, and profitability (i.e., understanding how big the pie is) - Customer segments (e.g., more appealing to 20-40yo or 60+) - Competitive dynamics (e.g., fragmented vs. consolidated) Target business model - Product/Service offering (i.e., what are we selling here?) - Operating model for the PE fund (e.g., buying a few smaller companies and merging, launching a new player, entering with an adjacent Port.Co.) - Capabilities (e.g., operations, labor, assets, etc.) Financial analysis - Investment criteria (e.g., payback, ROI, ...) - Revenue (P*Q) - Costs (FC + VC, incl. investment) Risks - Market-specific (e.g., competition with pickleball, ...) - Firm-specific (e.g., lack of sports management experience, ...)   Why this approach is helpful Let's go a bit more in depth to see why I think this type of structure helps you. 1. It's extremely comprehensive: you are starting with a framework that considers a lot of aspects that one should check out in a real case. Can you really consider a market entry without thinking about customer, competitive dynamics, investment criteria? These would be lacking in a Process approach, or in an approach that uses sub-questions -- the approach above does not leave any stone unturned 2. It's easy to understand: the interviewer can follow you nicely. You avoid taking a bolder/newer approach (e.g. Process, which is more tailored to implementation projects, typically less strategic) and the interviewer instantly recognizes. I am pretty confident that out of 100 McKinsey Senior Partner, 95 of them got in by using this standard approach :) 3. It still follows a process. In a real engagement (I have done more than a few market entries for PE), you would do exactly the same: first, you start the workstream on the Market, then you start thinking how you play in that market (i.e., Target Business Model); once you have gathered those two pieces of info, you can create your business plan (i.e., financial analysis); lastly, you want to caution your client about risks (or maybe 'Implementation and risks') Why the Process approach is more complicated With Process, let's say that you have 4 buckets: (i) Strategy Definition, (ii) Pilot Project, (iii) Implementation - 0 to 1, (iv) Extension - 1 to 10. A few issues: 1. The 'Strategy Definition' bucket is so broad, that it's hard to be comprehensive/exhaustive within this bucket. You would almost need to replicate my buckets above: a strategy needs info on customers, competitors, needs a financial analysis, potentially risks, etc. 2. The content of the next buckets is heavily dependent on the first: what can you say about Pilot Project if you don't know what the strategy is (e.g., roll-up of padel courts vs. entering with a PE-owned company doing a spin-off) 3. You are implying something you don't know about the client engagement: what if the client doesn't care about implementation (e.g., most PE funds have an implementation or operating improvement team)? Then, you threw away one bucket --> Is the Process approach always wrong? No! But it's harder because it's more specific and has a structural dependency from Bucket1 to Bucket2 ... to BucketN. If the question is about "Launching a product", then it might make more sense, but a lot of cases are not a good fit for this approach Why the sub-question approach is more complicated Let's take the three sub-questions as buckets: (i) what the size of the market is, (ii) what competition could look like, and (iii) what services they could offer. 1. You are missing the main point (i.e., would this be a profit-generating business with a good ROI)? That's because the real answer to the case might be the logical consequence of the three questions you are asking (on top of some more elements), but it's a different analysis that requires different instruments (i.e., revenue and cost estimates, investment criteria, etc.) 2. You are not being super-MECE. Very often, two questions are intertwined: here, you are splitting market between the size and the competition -- but those are two sides of the same coin. When you do a market analysis for a company, you tell the not just the $$$ but also the competitive landscape, I don't love dividing these two things in different buckets. 3. You sound very mechanical. A big part of every real MBB project is taking the questions the client has and transforming them into a coherent plan of attack (with workstreams, deliverables, etc.). My experience showed me that the client might be missing some angles or might be asking only 1 of the 3 real questions. If you just repeat what you hear, you don't sound like someone that can rethink problems/questions from a different perspective -- while I am sure you are a very nuanced thinker! --> Is the sub-question process always wrong? No! It's great when you have three self-contained, fairly independent tasks. I don't think this is the right case for that: the main task we have to deliver is giving an answer to a broader question (absent from the sub-question), i.e., is this a market we should enter? Conclusion My key takeaways: The standard "areas of analysis" approach is by far the easiest to start with (and, again, probably used by 95% of McKinsey Senior Partners in their interviews 15-20 years ago) All the frameworks that you see are just potential examples. Every structure must be fully tailored (both in its main buckets and underlying bullet points) to the specific nuances of the case at hand A very helpful way to view these frameworks is as "potential puzzle pieces." You should select and assemble the right pieces based on the specific needs of the prompt you are given. My answer to your question "why do I keep getting lost?" is that you are probably overthinking with very complex approaches :)))) Do I have to always use the standard approach? No! Start from the simplest one, but then feel free to add more layers of complexity once you feel more confident For advanced candidates: if you are able to formulate a solid hypothesis based on the initial clarifying questions, it is highly encouraged to include that at the beginning/end of your structure. For instance: "My initial hypothesis is that this is a highly fragmented market, and therefore, leveraging M&A could drive growth and capture economies of scale, provided it is financially feasible." I hope this helps, but please let me know if you have other questions. While coaching at Berkeley, I built a pretty comprehensive guide on MBB Structure Frameworks.  Feel free to DM me if you are interested in it (the invite is open to everyone!). It helped a ton of coachees learn enough "puzzle pieces" to then compose their best structure in a few seconds. Best, Tom