DHL Consulting Preparation - Case Topics

Question

Hi all, would like to seek your advice on how to better prepare for interviews with DHL Consulting. The internal consulting team works on a wide variety of topics which could be HR, finance, IT, logistics, marketing, etc.

I was told that the case may not necessarily be logistic-related. It could be any type of case that the team has worked in the past. It seems to me that the case topics are quite different from typical strategy consulting firms. I've heard people getting cases related to IT and carbon reduction (which are topics that I am unfamiliar).

My question is - how to better prepare for the “topics” that could be covered in the case? I've seen many experts strengthening the importance of learning “industries”, but there's not much discussion on “topics”. Would focusing more on the operational type of case help? Also, what would be some common topics that I could equip more knowledge on? Thanks a lot!

Answer 1

Hey,

In order to succeed at a case interview it's important to acquire an overview of all the main industries and problem types.
For that, you may want to focus on who things:

1. When practicing solving cases with other candidates, specifically ask for cases on certain industries and problem types you are unfamiliar or have difficulties with rather than solving a random case which is irrelevant to your progress. Communicate it to your potential case partners before scheduling a meeting that you want to cover industry X or an Y problem type. If the candidate doesn't have such a case in the library, move to another candidate.

Draw a table where the columns are main industries (e.g. Metals&Mining, Oil&Gas, Telecom, FMCG&Retail, HORECA, Banking, Aviation, Pharma, Media&Communications) and the lines are the main problem types (e.g. Investment, New Product, Market Entry, M&A, Market Share, Profitability, Customer Experience, Operations) and try to solve a case on each main problem type for every main industry listed in your table.

2. If you want to speed up the learning process, hire a coach. For example, my standard coaching programme consists of 10 sessions that cover cases on all the main industry and problem types.

Hope this helps going forward,
Nick

Answer 2

Hi there,

I love this line: “I was told that the case may not necessarily be logistic-related. It could be any type of case that the team has worked in the past. ”

A pretty universal rule for preparing for these interviews is to train the core consulting skills, DONT try to predict things.

If you learn structured thinking, business acumen, problem-solving, clear communication, etc., you don't have to worry WHEN (not if) you get a case you didn't expect.

Again, build out your core abilities. Practice solving a wide range of cases. The only thing you can expect is that you will see the unexpected….so, become a consultant….consultants land at the client site and know nothing…they figure it out using their toolkit…you need to build out the same for the interview :)

Here's some more info on DHL:

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/dhl-europe-management-consulting-16232

And some more reading to help you with any case type:

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

https://www.preplounge.com/en/articles/dos-and-donts-in-a-case-interview

https://www.preplounge.com/en/articles/candidate-led-cases-what-to-expect-and-example-cases

Answer 3

Hi there!

Lots of great questions.

First of all, the most important thing to keep in mind is that these firms are hiring you (at junior levels) for your SKILLS, NOT your KNOWLEDGE.

So they don't expect that you know that specific industry or topic very well. And in +90% you don't need anything more than common sense to solve the case.

What I would do if I were you is to reach out to the recruiter and try to get a bit more data on what sort of cases you can expect. It's important to know whether they are particularly focused on a specific industry or topic because then you can also calibrate your preparation in line with that.

Last but not least, you can also try to network with recent hires at DHL and ask them what helped them prepare best for the interview (obviously, don't ask them what actual cases they got :) ). Here's an article on how to conduct these conversations:

Expert Guide: How To Handle Networking Calls and Get Referrals

Best,
Cristian

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