Hi Nathan,
Q: They will be sending me a case study where I have a couple days to complete and then return to them. And then I will have a 45 mins presentation with a couple members of the team. Any help would be appreciated in what steps I should take.
In general for a case study of this type you will have to prepare for three things: how to do the research on the case study material, how to create the deliverable (usually some slides) and how to present your findings.
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1) RESEARCH
For the research part, the exact degree of what you should do depends on what they will assign you, so it is difficult to provide tips without additional information. If you have a few days to create the deliverable, most likely you will have to do some research on your own to complement the material sent.
The key outcome is usually a deck of 5-10 slides with your answers, which you will then have to present to the interviewers.
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2) DELIVERABLE
To create a good deliverable (usually slides) I would recommend to take into account the following:
a) General structure of the deck
Normally the structure for a 5-slide presentation is the following:
- The first slide summarizes the question and provides the answer
- The second, third and fourth slides have the supporting arguments for the first slide
- The fifth slide includes the next steps
If you have/want to create a longer deck, you can increase the number of slides with supporting arguments.
b) Content of each slide
There are three basic components for most slides:
- Title
- Chart/information
- Labels
In some cases, you can add a takeaway as well.
Many candidates structure the title as a mere description of what the chart/information is about.
A great title instead shows the implication of the content presented as well.
Example: say the graph is showing a cost structure for a division.
- A bad title would be: Cost structure from 2005 to 2015.
- A good title would be: Cost structure of Division XYZ is not sustainable”.
- A great title would be Cost structure of Division XYZ is not sustainable due to ABC, assuming you have insights on that.
The rule of thumb is that if you read all the titles of the slides together you should get a clear idea of the message of the presentation.
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3) PRESENTATION
When you present, I would suggest the following steps for each slide:
- Introduce the slide: “Let’s move to slide 2, which will show us why we have an issue with this division”
- Present the main message of the slide: “As you can see, we have a cost structure that makes it unfeasible to be competitive in this market”
- Provide details: “The graph, indeed, shows how our fixed cost is XYZ, while competitors can benefit from economies of scale. Indeed…”
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If you want to prepare more, I do a session exactly on this kind of case study.
Before the session, I can send you a case study to work on. We can then simulate the presentation during the class, reviewing step-by-step all the improvements needed.
For any questions please feel free to PM me.
Best,
Francesco
