Get Active in Our Amazing Community of Over 451,000 Peers!

Schedule mock interviews on the Meeting Board, join the latest community discussions in our Consulting Q&A and find like-minded Case Partners to connect and practice with!

Brainstorming practice areas

brainstorming questions
New answer on Oct 31, 2023
7 Answers
764 Views
Anonymous A asked on Oct 16, 2021

What would be some good non-financial topics to have brainstorming ideas for? For eg attracting talent, customer retention etc..

Overview of answers

Upvotes
  • Upvotes
  • Date ascending
  • Date descending
Best answer
Antonello
Expert
Content Creator
replied on Oct 16, 2021
McKinsey | NASA | top 10 FT MBA professor for consulting interviews | 6+ years of coaching

Hi!

  • Reduce time to market
  • Increase product awareness
  • Improve productivity
  • Etc.

Hope this helps.

Best,

Anto

Was this answer helpful?
Cristian
Expert
Content Creator
replied on Oct 31, 2023
#1 rated MBB & McKinsey Coach

These are a good start.

For candidates looking into this topic, these days you can do a lot of good practice on brainstorming with ChatGPT and you can ask it to create alternative structure types of you get a better understanding of how you could break down the same type of problem. 

Adding here also a resource on different brainstorming techniques:

Best,
Cristian

Was this answer helpful?
Ian
Expert
Content Creator
replied on Oct 17, 2021
#1 BCG coach | MBB | Tier 2 | Digital, Tech, Platinion | 100% personal success rate (8/8) | 95% candidate success rate

First of all, please never have a “financial” and “non-financial” bucket! This is essentially “cheating” (when someone asks what do you want to eat, do you say “meat” and “non-meat"?).

Now, in terms of non-financial, there are a ton! People, processes, tools, organization, culture, social, political, economic, environmental, etc. etc.

It's all contextual to the case, industry, and company!

Was this answer helpful?
Adi
Expert
Content Creator
replied on Oct 16, 2021
Accenture, Deloitte | Precision Case Prep | Experienced Interviewer & Career Coach | 15 years professional experience

By “non-financial” you mean any area other than profit/revenue/cost/investment?!

The list can be a mile long to be honest. What specifically are you looking for? Here's a starter list:

  • Environmental
  • Organisation culture
  • Diversity & Inclusion
  • Employee lifecycle management (hiring, onboarding, retention etc)
  • Process efficiency
  • Data monetisation
  • Digital Transformation
  • Automation

Even for the above I have listed, you can see there will be a financial angle:

  • Investment/cost required to change something/launch something/improve something
  • Cost savings due to efficiency improvements
Was this answer helpful?
Chiu
Expert
replied on Oct 16, 2021
Experienced in interviews for Bain, Oliver Wyman, and Simon Kucher

Hi there, good question - I think it depends on what you are applying and what area of expertise you lack. 

Some non-financial topics/horizontal capabilities I can think of are digital, organizational effectiveness, and climate and sustainability. 

Feel free to ask me more. 

Was this answer helpful?
Pedro
Expert
replied on Oct 16, 2021
30% off in April 2024 | Bain | EY-Parthenon | Roland Berger | Market Sizing | DARDEN MBA

Just skim through a business journal, it should give you a lot of ideas on things to brainstorm on (and possibly some answers as well)

Was this answer helpful?
Marco-Alexander
Expert
Content Creator
replied on Oct 31, 2021
Former BCG | Case author for efellows book | Experience in 6 consultancies (Stern Stewart, Capgemini, KPMG, VW Con., Hor

Was this answer helpful?
Antonello gave the best answer

Antonello

Premium + Coaching Expert
Content Creator
McKinsey | NASA | top 10 FT MBA professor for consulting interviews | 6+ years of coaching
261
Meetings
10,492
Q&A Upvotes
107
Awards
4.9
108 Reviews