How to bridge the gap between performing well in case interview vs. real consulting work?

Hey!

You are absolutely right that the case interview performance does not always correlate with your performance on the job. There are candidates who truly struggle with the case interview part but are stellar performers on the real projects.

Regarding your questions, I would break it down into two parts: 1 - how to improve your consulting toolkit and 2 - how to successfully pass the probation period.

1 - Regarding the consulting toolkit: 
- Leverage all the possible resources that the company offers in terms of formal trainings and participate in them;
- Enrol on such trainings outside of your company, if possible;
- Ask your friends / colleagues who are good at the skills you want to improve in to coach you. I once struggled with a challenging ppt presentation for a personal project and asked my friend and a former colleague who was good at making slides for help. He gladly assisted.

2 - Regarding passing the probation period. Since you are already a manager, you must be aware of this, but still: getting ahead in management consulting is not just about your hard skills, but about the relationships you build within the company. If they like you as a person and would be willing to work with you, they'll keep you. In order to cultivate those relationships aim to:

- Ask for feedback (formal / informal) both from your superiors and your peers whenever possible and make sure to course-correct on the go;
- Find an informal mentor (buddy) within a company who will be willing to stand up for you and recommend you for engagements;
- Get to know more people within the company and build connections with them. That way you can always get more insight about what's going on inside the company, whom to work with (and not to) etc.

Good luck with you probation,
Nick

 

Hi there,

I love this question.

Most people think it's just about getting the offer…but that is just the beginning.

Now, genuinely speaking, my candidates constantly come back to me and tell me my training (the way I teach the why + how) actually prepared them for the job. Because of my approach to teaching how to think like a consultant in order to pass interviews, my candidates also do much better on the job itself.

Now, how can you do this?

Well, learn from the cases. Recognize that they are real life. On the job you need to framework and be organized. You need to have an objective-driven approach. You need to understand the so what of data/information.

A case is just a mini-project.

Consider hiring a coach to help ensure you're prepared on the job itself - don't wait until you're on probation to try to fix things!

==========How to succeed===============

MOST IMPORTANTLY: Know that no-one can perfectly prepare for the job and that's the point: You will mess up, you will learn, you will be trained and supported. That's OK!

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First: Read the 25 tips in my consulting handbook

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Second: In terms of things you can learn/do to prepare beforehand:

1) Daily Reading

• The Economist, The Financial Times, BCG/Mskinsey Insights

2) Industry deep-dives

• Learn, in-depth, how the industries/companies your office advises, work. (PM me for an industry overview template)

3) Analytics tools

• Alteryx, Tableau, etc.

4) Excel

5) Powerpoint

• Best practices/standards
• Different layouts
• Quickly editing/updating slides
• Thinking in PowerPoint

6) Presentation skills / sharp communication

• There are some online/virtual classes for this

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Third: In terms of doing well in your role when you're there:

1) Understand the context/prompt (what role are you in, what company, who's watching, etc.)

2) Understand the objective (what, specifically, is expected from you...both day to day, and in your overall career progression)

3) Quickly process information, and focus on what's important - Take a lot of information and the unknown, find the most logical path, and focus on that.

4) Be comfortable with the unknown, and learn to brainstorm - think/speak like an expert without being one

In summary, there will always be a flood of information, expectations, competition etc. and not enough time. Find out which ones matter when. (i.e. be visibile and focus efforts on the things that people care about)

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Fourth: Here are some great prior Q&As for you!

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/what-makes-a-good-consultant-how-to-get-a-good-review-6790

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/how-hard-is-it-to-excel-in-top-consulting-firms-6762

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/how-to-become-an-engagement-manager-and-partner-quickly-6722

https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/need-to-learn-skills-in-the-ample-free-time-before-starting-at-an-mbb-what-should-i-do-6774

Hi,

Congrats on your offer. The phenomenon you have described is something that I have witnessed myself - having been a manager/principal at BCG leading and managing teams.

• Sometimes I have consultants that are not able to demonstrate some of the skills they supposedly had demonstrated in the case interview (e.g. MECE, comfort with quant)
• Sometimes someone who had received a high interview score goes on to be a ‘flop’ at work 

The case interview tests relevant skills that we are looking for on the job, but it cannot test all the skills, habits and mindsets that are required to perform at a high level on the job. 

This is all the more significant for the manager role. Manager year 1 is IMO the worst role in consulting. You are squeezed from every direction, and I really struggled in my first year as a manager despite having already been in consulting for several years before that.

So, what can you do? There are a couple of things that worked for me that I'd like to share

1. Find strong internal mentors
   • This is extremely important and I cannot emphasize this enough - these are the people that will give you the practical guidance on how to navigate your daily work as well as your career trajectory 
2. Leverage your peers and juniors
   • Don't be afraid to reach out for help from peers, or to also listen to your juniors who have been at the firm longer than you
   • Treat your juniors as partners and not ‘resources’ to manage and you'll start noticing the true leverage you can get out of your team
3. Learn and use firm resources
   • On Day 0 - reach out to your mentors/peers to ask for samples of great decks that they can share
   • You can also read certain useful books in advance e.g. Pyramid Principle; Say it with Charts
4. Have a growth mindset
   • Be open to feedback - you will get alot of it
   • Sometimes it is difficult to accept harsh feedback, but trust that it is given in your interest and show a positive growth mindset

The above helped me, and from being at an absolute low point on my first ever project as manager (I felt like I wanted to quit), I managed to get fast promoted to Principal eventually. Happy to share more tips over a chat - just dm me.

All the best!

Hi there!

This is an excellent question. 

Do bear in mind though that what you've heard might be an exaggerated account of what's actually happening out there. I've spent around 5y in McKinsey and saw very very cases of people being pushed out early because of underperformance. 

Still, I agree with you that it's important to be among the top performers. I've put together everything that I've learned that was useful for my first year in consulting in the following two articles. Hope you'll find them useful:

• Expert Guide: How to Become A Distinctive Consultant
• Expert Guide: How to Manage for Lifestyle in Consulting

Aside from this, I suggest you try and find mentors early on. That's what really changed things for me - once I identified senior people who were willing to guide me and show me what will turn my performance around.

Best,
Cristian

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Practicing for interviews? Check out my latest case based on a first-round MBB interview >>> SoyTechnologies   

The big difference in your new setting vs. your new background is that now you always have to be evidence based. No opinion, no repeating what the client says, no stating the conclusion without the supporting facts.

This is really about having a very high degree of intellectual rigour. You cannot state a conclusion without also stating the supporting facts/evidence. By the way, you rarely state any opinions, but always state the facts and the innevitable conclusions. This is a shortcut you simply don't take at MBB/Tier2.

You also don't care that much about the methodologies or tools. Strategy is not about filling out the SWOT, the 5-Forces or any other specific tool. This is about customizing answers to a specific client problem, not about filling out templates.

Finally, rigour applies to everything. The action title matches exactly what is on the slide. The graphs are aligned. The sources are there and are thorough, etc. 

To sum up… the difference is a higher degree of obsession towards perfection and intellectual rigour.

What I am explaining here usually takes 6 months to learn. Some people embrace it and get there sooner. Some avoid it and are not successful. 

There's not really a gap between interviews and real work. They're just different things. But if you performed well in a case it means you have the intellectual ability to bring this same intellectual rigour to your cases. Some people from other backgrounds are not successful because they were trained in a different way and avoid changing their old habits.