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I passed the first round interviews of McK and got a feedback that I have to internalize and customize my structure more according to the case instead of using book-specific structure. How can I do that?

Case Interview Final Round McKinsey Structure
Recent activity on Dec 06, 2017
2 Answers
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Furkan asked on Dec 05, 2017

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Francesco
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replied on Dec 06, 2017
#1 Coach for Sessions (4.000+) | 1.500+ 5-Star Reviews | Proven Success (➡ InterviewOffers.com) | Ex BCG | 10Y+ Coaching

Hi Furkan,

there are usually two reasons why you receive feedback that your structure is not enough customized:

  1. You use standard wording for your structure based on conventional frameworks – the most typical one is Victor Cheng customer, product, company, competitors, without any link to the actual case. Freddy Ray provided a good example of how you can change your communication to adapt more to the actual case, customizing the words to the specific client/sector
  2. You do not connect with the goal when presenting the elements of your framework. Eg you say “I would start looking at the market. I want to understand the size, growth and barriers to entry of market XYZ, and also who are the customers and the competitors”. It would be better to add the reasons why you want to analyse such point connecting with the goal. Say the objective is to increase revenues, you can say. “I would start looking at the market. In particular, I would like to analyse the following elements: first, which size and growth is present – with this I will understand if there is the potential for such amount of revenues. Second which are the barriers to entry – this will tell me if it is possible at all to enter the market and obtain such revenues. Third, which is the customer segmentation and the competitor concentration – this will help me to understand how feasible it could be to reach our target amount of market share and thus revenues in this market.”

If you follow these two points, your structure should be customized enough for the case.

Best,

Francesco

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Furkan on Dec 06, 2017

Thank you very much, Francesco!

Anonymous replied on Dec 05, 2017

I had similar feedback for McK phone case. Without diving deep into detail as I am sure someone will have a better answer, two methods that work for me:

1) Try and use a MECE issue tree if you can before resorting to a framework as many times an issue tree will be super specific to the case

2) This may or may not work but its worked for me sometimes: Change the names of some of your categories in your framework to be SUPER specific. For example If you use a 2CP for a zoo/school/etc..instead of saying "I would like to look into the company, customer, competition, and product" say "I would first want to understand how the Zoo itself functions, as well as the effect to the Ticket holders, Other zoos, and the attractions our client's zoo provides"

Take this with a grain of salt as others with more experience may not agree with these two and I have not yet had my in-person yet. My sole opinion

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Furkan on Dec 06, 2017

Thanks a lot, Freddy!

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