All questions tagged preplounge - Consulting Q&A - PrepLounge.com

Hi Anonymous A,

Thanks for reaching out and very sorry to hear that your case partner was unreliable. Unfortunately, this can happen :/

Whenever a case partner cancels a meeting last-minute (i.e. less than 60 minutes before the scheduled meeting), our system will detect this as a "short-term-cacellation" and directly decrease his or her reliability rating.

So you don't need to report the case partner, as our system will detect and indicate unreliability automatically.

Hope this help! If you have any further feedback, please let us know.

Best,

Astrid

PrepLounge Community Management

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Source: Fishbowl - Consulting Memes

Hi there,

We took the time to thoroughly review the PST and here is our feedback to each point you have made:

• Q3: B is the correct answer since it explains clearly and without any extra assumptions why profits are different. Altough C and D explain revenue differences you would imply a cost assumption (for instance no costs) if you picked them as the correct answer. An answer that includes an implicit assumption (that you cannot clearly prove) cannot be the "best" answer to explain a certain fact.
• Q6: Very long indeed. The challenge here is about "picking the right battles". A good candidate deprioritizes answering this question and skips it for the moment.
• Q8: Answer C offers a possible explanation for this observation. However, it does not explain this observation the LEAST. "Only" implies that the current payment options are not as diverse as usual (but we agree that we could have made it more obvious. We will adjust the wording asap). If C would be correct you assumed that other companies have fewer payment options (as you said no credit card for instance). As such a thing is not stated anywhere that is a way "bigger" implicit assumption than assuming that "only" implies less payment options compared to competitors. Interpreting "only" as we did, will offer a good explanation for this observation. Since we are looking for a statement that explains this observation the LEAST, answer C should thus be omitted.
• Q10: Answer B is correct since - again - it involves less implicit assumptions than the other options do. It is clearly and explicitly stated that the CEO is highly concerned about profit setbacks that will be caused by drawing money from nuclear energy and fossil fuels. Since shutting down a nuclear power plant will exactly do that, this option is clearly not what the CEO is looking for. Although it could (not yet enough data to assess) be a viable option from an outside external perspektive, this question does not refer to an neutral outside-in view, but rather refers to what the CEO is looking for.
• Q14: Answer B does not need additional assumptions and thus is the correct answer. Building a brand that justifies higher prices implies that energy is not a commodity and prices can be set by a company (and is not set by the market).
• Q15: You are absolutely right. We will correct that mistaken discount. Thanks for reporting this.
• Q18: Again, you are right. We will be updating to the correct term "GWh" asap
• Q19: Answer C is correct since that is what the CEO explicitly stated. She wants to gain a better understanding of the underlying trends that drive the differences of revenues/profits between geographies. Thus she is asking for a financial analysis and a possible solution (meaning fixing profit losses). This is what answer C is about. Answer B is more about a general understanding (e.g. a market research and maybe a gap analysis). It does not explicity include a solution which is clearly desired.
• Q24: You implied that by "changing mixture between yoghurt and topping", SuperSandwich should increase the topping over yoghurt. That is not stated anywhere. In fact, answer C includes both possible scenarios: It might be beneficial to increase the yoghurt share, although yoghurt prices increased since yoghurt can still be cheaper than the topping. It could also be possible that toppings are now cheaper than yoghurt. In this case you would increase the topping share over the yoghurt. This is clearly stated in the answer sheet which says "Answer D is the best possible measure. Depending on which ingredient is more expensive, SuperSandwich should change the mixture of its yoghurts and use more of the cheaper component".

We hope that this cleared your doubts!

Thanks again for your feedback and for helping us improve our practice material!

Best,

Astrid

PrepLounge Community Management

Follow us on: Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn | twitter

Hi Astrid,

I have personally done a few written cases, and have coached people who did it.

Yes, there are definitely more companies using written cases now compared with a few years ago. However, only several companies (e.g. BCG, AT Kearney) are using this new format, and even within these companies, written case adoption varies across offices. For example, BCG does written case in some of its offices but not others.

It is hard to say how this trend will evolve in the next few years, but my guess is that it will continue to spread, but at a pretty slow pace.

Looks really nice! Thank you Astrid:-)

Hi Astrid,

What do you like about our Consulting Q&A (usability, content etc.)?

It's such a great feature, and, I believe, keeps the community alive! It's great not just informing users on important topics, but in allowing users to better connect with each other and find case partners + experts.

What can we improve?

Reading inline:

• View responses inline (without clicking). I.e. an expandable column.
• (Related) When clicking ""more" open inline

Search functionality:

• Full word search functionality(i.e. "rite" returns "criteria", "write")
• Highlighting of location of searched word in returned results

Kepe up the great work!

The number of hairdressers depends on three main factors: # of haircuts done per year, time spent per haircut and capacity of each hairdresser.

Number of haircuts: Number of haircuts depends on US population that gets a haircut and how often people get a haircut. I will first tackle the population. Obviously, people aged between 0-10 do not get haircuts. Even if they do, it is exceedingly rare. I assume health expectancy is 80 years and population is evenly distributed among each groups. That means, only 87.5% of the US population gets haircuts. I assume there are 160m males and 160m females in the US. That means, 140m males and 140m females gets haircut each year. I also assume males get a haircut once every month and females get once every three months, which means 12 haircuts per year for males and 4 haircuts per year for females.

This means, total number of haircuts per year is 140m * 12 = 1.68 billion for males and 140m * 4 = 560 million for females.

Time per haircut: I will assume a haircut per male will take 30 minutes while it will take 1 hr for females.

Capacity per hairdresser: I will assume there will be on average four hairdressers per shop and each will work for 40 hours per week. Assuming they will work for 50 weeks per year, capacity of each shop is 8000 worker hour.

Obviously, the number of hairdressers is total hours worked / capacity per hairdresser.

Total hours worked: 1.68 billion * 30 minutes (for males) + 560 million * 1 hr (for females) = 0.84 billion worker hours (for males) + 0.56 billion worker hours (for females) = 1.4 billion worker hours

Capacity per hairdresser: I calculated it above to be 8000 worker hours per year.

Number of hairdressers: 1.4 billion worker hours per year / 8000 worker hours per year = 175,000.

There are approximately 175,000 hairdresser shops, or 700,000 individual hairdressers working in the US.

Hi,

It's always better to prepare using the real cases from the company (or even the office) you are applying to.

Casebooks are the least trusted resource in terms of cases. The cases itself might be good, but the solutions that they propose are usually useless.

Preplounge, as you can see, is in the middle of the spectrum of your resources.

Best

Are you talking about caseinterviewmath.com? I often recommend that specific tool, since I used it myself to great effect. It will rank you by accurracy and speed against other applicants. I do not know that it is exhaustive however.

PrepLounge didn't exist when I was preparing. All the tools & materials that I've seen here were of great quality, so I will hypothesize that the math tool is as well. That other website is free however, so no downside in checking it out as well anyway

Hi consultant-to-be,

I would like to share a BCG market entry case, Pharma industry – not like a super difficult one but interestingly tricky, which makes it my fav case. Hope you guys enjoy crack the case as much as I do J

Our client is a pharmaceutical company who has recently developed a drug for apoplexy. The drug has been clinically proven to be safe and effective, and is the only product that is at this stage in our client’s business. Should our client proceed with commercializing the drug?

Some useful info are

From that we figured out the number of patients with automatic trigger that reach hospital in the 3-hour window: 260,000*20%*100% = 52,000 patient

Now, the tricky part is the timing

It takes 8 minutes for an ambulance to dispatch and 10 minutes to load a patient. It takes 12 minutes one-way for an ambulance to go from the city to a hospital and an extra 8 minutes one-way to go from the suburbs to a hospital. Given that, total time it takes for a patient to go from the city to a hospital:

8 + 10 + 12*2 = 42 minutes (it’s very easy not to double the 12 as 2-way)

All patients from the city should be able to receive treatment in the first hour. Time it takes for a patient to go from the suburbs to a hospital:

8 + 10 + (12+8)*2 = 58 minutes (again round way)

Although patients from the suburbs reach hospitals in 58 minutes, 2 minutes isn’t enough time for them to receive treatment. (Fair enough yet given the pressure in real case, we might not notice this)

Therefore, these patients will most likely go for the competitor’s drug (which is cheaper and has the same success rate after the first hour)

Number of patients who call ambulance that get treated in the first hour: 260,000*80%*60%*80% = 99,840 = ~100,000

Total number of patients who will use our client’s drug = 52,000 + 100,000 = 152,000

Revenue = 152,000 patients*$8,000/patient = $1.2 billion per year

One step further, regarding profitability

If fixed costs are $240 million/year and variable costs are $5,000 per unit, how much profit can be made from the drug per year?

Total costs = $240m + $5,000*152,000 = $1 billion; Profit = $200 million/year

Our client is thinking of lowering the price of their drug to $6,000 per use to capture more of the market. Is this a good idea?

In this case, our client will still capture all of the patients who will receive treatment in the first hour, which is 152,000 patients. In addition, our client will get 50% of the patients from the suburbs (since our client’s drug is now identical to the competitor’s after the first hour)

Number of patients from the suburbs = 260,000*20%*60%*50% = 15,600

Total number of patients who will use client’s drug = 152,000 + 15,600 = 167,600

Total revenue = 167,600*$6,000 = ~$1 billion

Total costs = $240m + $5,000*167,600 = ~$1.1 billion

At this price, our client would not make any profit and would make a slight loss instead. Therefore, they should stay with charging $8,000 per use of the drug

Conclusion:

I recommend that the client proceeds with commercializing the drug at $8,000 per use. This pricing strategy allows them to capture a reasonable portion of the market (given the higher effectiveness of their drug within the first hour), generating a profit of $200 million a year. Some major risks are competitive response and the possibility of new market entries, so moving forward, our client should develop a solid marketing plan, and push for the replacement of the competitor drug with our client’s (using the argument that it will simplify the supply management of hospitals)

Hey, unfair! We don't know who you are. Ok, I think I have a good idea, but... ping me offline please, I'm curious where you are going. And remember - if you were my client once, you are my client forever. Tomorrow, next month or in 5 years, I'll always be there to help & answer questions you may have.

Cheers -

Dear A,

Watching videocourses is a good interactive way for learning skills.
However, I suggest talking to people, solving cases with them and thus learning from them.

In the end of the day you should communicate with clients. Learning how to do that effectively is one of the criterias MBBs are looking for.

I attach a guide on how to prepare for a case-interview.

Case-interview

Ist stage. Theory

• Wharton casebook 2010- you can check how all industries work there (airlines, retail etc)
• Case-in-point – you can check what frameworks exist, try to practice and learn them (product launch, M&A etc.)
• Check how former business consultant approaches different cases with best interviewers – listen to at least 3 cases
• Check out MECE principle, top-down, bottom-up àpyramid principle (book Barbara’s Minto Pyramid)

IInd stage. Practice

• Create your own case schedule (solve at least 1 case per day) with partners in local groups, universities/preplounge (extreme case)
• Structure everything you do (how to go the shop, structure long-read articles you in Economist)
• Solve at least 1 case per each case type you found in case in point
• Learn how to analyze graphs (practice looking at graphs and asking so whats out of them) Check my answer: https://www.preplounge.com/en/consulting-forum/can-i-have-some-advice-on-how-to-make-insights-from-graphstables-2761
• Brainstorming is a must = generate at least 10 ideas on an topic in 30 seconds

Link to casebooks
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/sca51sb0um1e977/AAAYwPuNM27lQKhJK8Vg6mKaa?dl=0

Additional to read:

• Mind of a strategist
• McKinsey Marvin Bauer

All the best,
Egor

I am a PhD student, so not much business background, and I am pretty strapped on cash. But, I asked myself, how upset would I be if I didn't spend a few hundred dollars and that was the difference between getting and offer or not at my dream job?

I did two sessions with a case coach after my first round at BCG, and before the final round, and received an offer. I would say it was definately worth it, since I think it was the small, advanced tweaks that helped put me over the edge to get an offer.

I think booking a case coach before you practice on your own to the point of being very advanced would be a waste of money, since you can learn the basics for free. I think the value of a case coach is helping you go from good/great to exceptional. There are certain aspects of casing that our peers just can't help us with because they lack the experience, expertise, etc.

Hi,

Viktor Cheng material is good, however, it is definitely not enough to pass the interview. I recommend rereading and relistening Cheng every 10-15 live cases you do - you'll find many new things there.

In addition to cheng it may help:

1) Start with "Case in point" book - you can download this book for free everywhere. It's not the best guide on how you should approach the cases, however, it will give you the basic understanding.

2) Start practicing cases with partners here or find them locally. !!! Find experienced partners or coaches who can provide a good feedback!!!

3) Practice fast math

• Learn how to multiply double digit numbers (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ndkkPZYJHo)
• Learn the division table up to 1/11 (i.e. 5/6 = 83.3)
• Learn how to work with zeros (Hint: 4000000 = 4*10ˆ6)
• Use math tools (Mimir math for iOS), Math tool on Viktor Cheng website to practice

4) Below you can find a list of the most common case types and some high-level recommendations on structuring:

• Market sizing - structuring from the supply or demand side. Structuring using a formula or using an issue tree
• Profitability - basic profitability framework. Remember about different revenue streams and product mix
• Market context cases (Market Entry, New product, Acquisition, etc). Always start with the big picture "market". Finish with something specific to the case (e.g. How to enter?"). Structure it as if you are defining the work streams for the real project.
• Operational math problem (e.g. Should we increase the speed of an elevator or just buy a second one? How should we reduce the queues? Etc.) - Structuring as a process / value chain, with inflows, operations, and outflows
• Cost cutting - I provided the recommendations on structuring it here: Operations Cases? McK
• Valuation - Purely financial structure with cash flows, growth rate, WACC / hurdle rate, etc.
• Synergies - revenue synergies (price, qty, mix) and cost synergies (value chain).
• Social / economics cases (e.g. How to improve the quality of life in the city? How to increase the revenues of the museum?) - huge variability. Practice 3-5 social cases before the interview

5) Also, I would try to focus on the most common industries in the following priority(sorted by probability of getting a case): 1-retail and CPG; 2-airlines; 3-Telecom; 4-banking; 5-natural resources; 6-tech

6) After solving 15-20 cases start preparation for the tests (Serch for PST / BCG online test here on preplounge)

7) ! Important: don't forget about the FIT interview part. Crafting you stories and backups stories will require a couple of weeks!

PS

Here is a good list of articles regarding the different parts of the case:

1) Start with clarifying questions:

Clarifying questions

2) Communicating while structuring. Here is a long post by me on how to communicate the structure during the case study:

How to communicate the structure for the case study

3) Using hypothesis. I made a post about hypothesis here:

How to state a hypothesis and match to the structure?

4) Communicating while making calculations:

• Always tell the interviewer your approach
• Check with the interviewer that your approach is correct
• Come to the interviewer with some preliminary answers
• Check your assumptions with the interviewer

5) Communicating during the analysis of graphs / tables

• Take a minute to look at the graph. Read the graph title. Look at the graph type and define the type (pie chart, line chart, etc). Look at the legend (ask for clarifying questions if necessary). Identify whats going on on the graph. Look for: Trends, % structures. Look for unusual things - correlations, outliers,
• Make 3-4 conclusions from the graph. Think out loud on potential hypothesis on what could be the root cause / what are the consequences
• Prioritize the most important for your current analysis and move forward with the case

6) Communicating while having questions on creativity

• Ask an interview for a minute to think
• Think of several buckets of ideas (e.g. organic growth / non-organic growth / differentiation). Remember to think as big as possible
• Narrow down to each bucket and generate as many ideas as possible
• Present the structure (buckets) and then your ideas

7) Communicating your conclusion. You can find a good example I've posted here:

How much answer-first should the conclusion be?

8) Communicating your FIT stories

Use the top-down approach while communicating your stories. "The Pyramid Principle" is the must-read by ex McKinsey on this topic.

I recommend using the STAR framework:

• In Situation, you should briefly provide the context, usually in 1 or 2 sentences
• Task usually includes 2 or 3 sentences describing the problem and your objective.
• Then you provide a list of specific actions you took to achieve the goal. It should take 1 or 2 sentences per action (Usually 3-4 actions). Note that the interviewer can stop you any minute and ask for more details.
• The results part should have 1 or 2 sentences describing the outcomes. This part is finalizing your story - make sure it can impress the interviewer and stay in the memory.

Best!