All questions tagged PST ; McKinsey - Consulting Q&A - PrepLounge.com

Hi Anonymous,

as general practice for the PST, I would recommend the following approach:

1. Try to find at least 5-6 practice cases online. There are several available for free, if needed you can purchase additional ones
2. Do one of the tests immediately to check your score. As the passing score is around 70% and you have 26 questions, your target score should be around 18. In the first test you are likely to score lower than that - don't worry, that's pretty normal.
3. Identify the type of questions where you made more mistakes. There could be different reasons why you are doing mistakes and there is probably a predominant type of mistake you are doing (eg slow math or weak critical reasoning). You have to identify the reasons for the mistakes and a way to fix them.
4. Continue the preparation with the other tests. After you have identified the main reason for mistakes, you can continue the preparation with the other tests before the interview - I would allocate them at a regular time distance, with an increase in frequency closer to the day of the test.
5. Go again through the questions where you did mistakes at regular intervals. Be sure to keep a "failure" spreadsheet, where you report all the mistakes and classify the reason for them each time.

The key areas you will need to practice are the following:

1. Time management. Commit to a time for each question, and go on if you surpass that time. If you do not set discipline, you will end eating too much time for some questions (these tests sometimes are actually structured to have some questions it is better to skip and review at the end). If time and test allows, you can then go back to the questions at the end.
2. Quick math. I would recommend practicing with online tools on a daily base to improve. It is better to allocate a small amount of time daily rather than to practice intensively few days only before the interview
3. Quick reading. Get a Harvard Business School case or equivalent long one, give yourself 2 minutes and check how much information you can absorb. Then repeat until when you get a sufficient level of accuracy. You can also check speed reading tactics (eg Tim Ferriss ones) and see if they work for you.
4. Graph interpretation. You need to practice on how to derive quickly insides from graph. Take some random graphs, give yourself 30 seconds and check if you can get the main insides from them. Then repeat until when you get a sufficient level of accuracy
5. Critical reasoning. The GMAT critical reasoning section could be a good support as practice

Hope this helps,

Francesco

Hi

Firstly, please learn to use the search bar! A valuable skill for consulting if you can land a job.

Secondly, I was in your position 2 months ago.

In 1 month, i went from getting 30% on untimed tests, to passing the PST!

This is what i did:

• Igotanoffer practice tests
• Mconsulting practice tests
• Official McKinsey tests
• Practice speed maths - learn shortcuts like rule of 72, become a gun at the times tables, long division, estimation, growth rates, change %
• Use youtube- Cant remember who exactly but there is this Russian guy who has great tips and logic around the PST.
• I learnt to speed read - i went from 350 words per minute to 650. Youll also learn what info to read and what not to bother with by doing enough tests.
• I went through McKinsey presentations and learnt about the type of charts often used, learn how to read them quickly as this will save you minutes in the test working out what the hell they are even representing!

You will identify trends with answers, question types and the flow with time. Its frustrating and hard work, but worth it to pass! Youll also learn about time traps and which questions to estimate, leave and compute.

Start off doing the tests untimed, and re do tests over and over again.

Then slowly introduce time constraints and work to doing them in just 1 hour.

All the best.

Cheers,

Hi,

You can find the tests on this website (just scroll down for 3 practice cases): http://www.mckinsey.com/careers/interviewing

Best of luck