Unorthodox case questions

Question

Hey everyone, encountered some interesting questions recently and keen to hear your brainstormed answers (and particularly, how you would structure these answers):

1. Your client wants to introduce and charge for in-flight WiFi services. They currently offer food / drinks and TV / entertainment in flight for free. What would you do to encourage passengers to take up this WiFi service?

2. You are looking into high doctor turnover at a public hospital and find out compensation is an issue as it is lower vs. peer public hospitals. What reasons can you think of for this low compensation?

3. Related to question 2 above, doctors are also leaving for reasons other than compensation. What other issues can you think of that might cause their dissatisfaction?

4. You are investigating high unemployment in country X (assume you are hired by the government) and are interviewing employers / companies - what would be your key questions, and what are your reasons behind asking them?

Welcome any and all thoughts!

Answer 1

Q4 . Unemployment in Country - what questions from employers ?

1. What is their current demand ? a. How many departments ? % age of vacant spots in each department ? do we see that vacancy number growing / shrinking ?

2. How do they plan to meet this demand ? a.)what are the skills they would require for each position ? b. How would they go about looking for those skills - campus recruitment / job portal etc. c. What metrics they would use to test these skills in a potential employee - analytical tests etc.

3. how would they ensure employees are retained after being hired ? a. means to increase job satisfaction ? b. Robust Learning Management System .

Answer 2

The WiFi one:

1. Passenger WiFi needs: acceptable speed, mbs, do they want to use it through own devices or ours?

2. Economics: Rev/cost. Rev is #passengers * % WiFi * avg MB * price per mb. Cost is F.C. and VC. The investment and the ongoing payments to providers etc.

3. Ability to execute: fits within strategy to offer premium service? Can we implement it? Got cash for it?

4. Promotion: include in 1st class tickets, get trial, get free first x MB, sign up for membership, bundle with other services such as food.

Answer 3

4. You are investigating high unemployment in country X (assume you are hired by the government) and are interviewing employers / companies - what would be your key questions, and what are your reasons behind asking them?

companies:

1. What type of employees do you lack most? Background?

2. What is the gap?

3. What is the salary / other benefits that you offer?

Employees:

1. What type of companies do you want to work for?

2. Background?

3. Needs? Salary other benefits

4. Are you actively looking?

Answer 4

WIFI

1. Demand - 1. How many passengers ? what percentage would want wifi ? Time they would use wifi on average per flight .

2. Profitability : Revenue ( price per hour * demand in hours that we calculate from 1. - (Investment + FC +VC)

3. Operations : Can we promote wifi as a service to make it attractive to people who had not demanded in 1 . ( eg. providing it free for first hour )? Can we market our other services like food / other flights / have an additional source of revenue from advertizements ?

4. Risks : cannibalization of other paid service like food / paid movies ? Government clearance / regulations on using wifi in air ; how stringent they are ?

Answer 5

2. You are looking into high doctor turnover at a public hospital and find out compensation is an issue as it is lower vs. peer public hospitals. What reasons can you think of for this low compensation?

compensation is driven by:

1. Experience doctors. Perhaps lower exp.

2. Location hospital. Perhaps avg pay lower in this city.

3. Type of work they do. Driven by patients. Maybe different type of patient demographics.

4. Operations efficiency. Perhaps not efficient hospital which means more doctors are needed for the same amount of work. More doctors mean dividing the pie amongst more people.

Answer 6

3. Related to question 2 above, doctors are also leaving for reasons other than compensation. What other issues can you think of that might cause their dissatisfaction?

1. Impact of work they do. Perhaps different patient demographics. Can be less exciting.

2. Hospital culture.

3. Growth potential.

4. Secondary benefits such as training.

5. Hospital reputation

Answer 7

Q1: What would you do to encourage passengers to take up this WiFi service?

Place:

- Which part of passenger most likely to use WiFi service? (ex: business class, first class)

Product:

- What feature in WiFi most passenger needs? some example of the type of product:

WiFi for social media
WiFi for Youtube/Spotify only
WiFi for open anything

Price:

-At what price most customer willing to pay for the product?

-Three-way to assess price:

based on the cost incurred for making the service,( cost driver: Set-up cost (FC) and Data cost (VC))
based on competitor price, and
based on customer perceived value (one way is to compare similar product ex: compare with on-demand movie service, since you can find any movie on internet, the value for WiFi service is more than on-demand movie service, therefore, can charge higher)

Promotion:

- What kind of promotion works with a different kind of passenger?

Economic class: focus on price/cheap
Business class: focus on speed

Answer 8

Q2: What reasons can you think of for this low compensation?

Compensation = #number_of_patient*patient_average_spend*%compansation_rate

(if you can't tell this is just quantity*price*rate, similar to revenue formula)

Low #number_of_patient

Not enough patient in the area (low pop, higher healthy rate)
Enough patient but choosing other hospitals (technological advanced, cheaper)

Low patient_average_spend

Low economic level
Mostly come for generic treatment
Hospital price is too low

Low %compensation_rate

Too low compensation rate from hospital

Answer 9

Q3: What other issues can you think of that might cause their dissatisfaction?

From Hospital:

Hospital is too small (no potential growth)
Bad management
Bad colleague (bad hospital culture)
No personal development training

Not From Hospital:

Hospital is too far away from home
The same patient problem (boring)

Answer 10

Q4: High unemployment rate, what would be your key questions, and what are your reasons behind asking them? (question to companies)

Question: (to know if the problem is in supply or demand)

How many new employees you hire previous year? and How many new employees do you need now?
- If hiring is lower than the previous year, it is a good indicator of slowing economy for the company therefore little work demand.
What kind of competencies do you need for an employee?
- If the competencies are higher than the average employee, it could be because of shortage in good employee supply. It is a good indicator that employee competencies need to be increased

Answer 11

Q2 - I would add one more factor to consider (being a doctor myself) - we're also talking about an option that there is funding for this hospital but it comes from restricted donations.

I'll explain: in countries where medicine is public, like my home country of Israel, most of the funding the hospital gets is from the government plus donations. The problem is that many of these donations are restricted - they tell the hospital what it should/shouldn't spend the money on. Unfroutnaley, salaries for doctors are usually not one of the options, as donors prefer to have their donations cover for a new CT, MRI, new ward, etc.

This is actually one of the big reasons for the low doctor:patient ratio in many public hospitals as far as I know. Money could be there - but not to fund doctor compensation.