Dear all: does anyone have good sources to practice “chart interpretation"? I'm trying to find a bunch of complicated charts and try to practice finding key info in a short time frame. I've tried scanning through casebooks, but the quality varies and the charts are not as comprehensive / complicated as you will see in real consultant projects. At the same time, official website and reports seem to be a good source too but usually the chart and data stay at a macro level instead of being company specific. Thanks for advice!
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You don't need to look at complicated charts. Usually the ones presenting in case interviews are not complicated at all. Moreover, the real issue is not finding “hidden” insights in the chart, i.e., insights that are hard to figure out. That's the exact opposite thing of what consultants do! We try to make slides where the insights are actually quite evident (although sometimes we need to “highlight” something to direct the reader on what s/he should be looking at). The real issue is relating what you see with the case objective / question at hand.
So my first suggestion would be to look at some articles from consulting firms. Other than that, I use a few cases that have plently of charts (4-6 charts each).
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Moreover, reading a lot of chats/exhibits won't be very helpful if you don't know how to do it properly, so I'll leave my suggestions below:
- Read the slide by yourself (take your time, ask questions if you need to understand the slide)
- Consider the case objective when looking at the slide
- Start by telling the impact of the slide in terms of the recommendation
- Explain / support with the evidence from the slide.
Candidates usually do four mistakes:
- They just describe what the slide says (e.g. segment X is growing by 10%"). There's no “so what”, no insight".
- They bring up an insights but… they're not related to the problem you are trying to solve.
- They just don't know what to say.
In all of these situations the real problem is that they are not being objective or hypothesis driven. You have to read the exhibit in the context of the problem you are trying to solve.
So the first question you have to ask yourself is: how does this influence the case recommendation? (e.g. “should we invest in market XYZ”?)? Is it supporting evidence or not? Once you find it, you have an objective or hypothesis driven insight.
Then when you read the slide you say: this does (not) support entering market X, because of insights XYZ, which is based on ABC evidence".
Hope this helps!
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Complicated charts in isolation i.e. no context aren’t really good practice.
When presented with a chart in a case, the whole point is to synthesize key info on the basis of the case objectives/context. Depending on the latter, a “simple” chart in a case might present you with a real challenge (don’t let this simplicity deceive you) and vice versa.
Bottom line - practice full cases and ask your peers/coaches to pick those with plenty of charts.
Hope this helps to set you up for success!
(edited)
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Hello!
Agree with Moritz: graphs in isolation is not what you will find.
However, to focus on a couple of dozens of those before never harms, as the ballet dancer that makes barre exercises before the real dance.
For doing so, I would recommend GMAT.
There are free exams in the internet that you can use for practice (the one of LBS MBA page, Verits prep, as well as some free trials for courses such as the one of The Economist
Hope it helps!
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Hi there,
Rocketblocks is a good resource, but honestly nothing beats live casing! You need to find case partners that can give you chart-heavy cases.
Feel free to reach out as well - this is something I focus on extensively with my candidates.
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