"Walk me through your resume"

Hi,

I would recommend the following structure:

1) Start with a 1 sentence summary of your background, why you are relevant for McKinsey and what's your unique selling point

2) Talk about 3-4 of your roles (may be professional, education, extracurricular), 3 sentences each. The more experienced you are the more you should speak about professional roles. It can be also the distinct roles within the same organization. Typical structure:

• What was the company
• What you were responsible
• Greatest achievement in that role, that will stay in the memory of the interviewer (E.g. While working at Adidas supply chain I was personally responsible for the delivery of soccer balls to the Worldcup in Africa)

3) The main reason why consulting (or particular company if you were a consultant before) is the next logical career step for you

Best!

Hi Ivan,

A few things that stand out for me when candidates answer this question

1. Preparedness - they don't only focus on what is in the resume but they talk about the projects in vivid detail and are clear about their achievements

2. Story telling - they are able to weave together a coherent and interesting story that explains their career path and various interests. (This requires a fair amount of self reflection and thinking)

3. Energy - They are truly excited to talk about their resume and what they have to offer. A strong happy personality conveys a lot more than words

WIth regards to time stick to 2-4 minutes, too short leaves you with less time to flesh out details and too long makes it boring. A good way to judge is to ask others to listen and comment on the length

Opening - focus on high energy and making it interesting as opposed to doing a chronological walk through (experiment with what you need to say when)

Hope this helps,

Udayan

Hi Ivan,

One of the aspects I am missing in the existing answers is a more strategic view on this question, which I would like to point out and add: demonstrating your strategic career planning and how all of your career steps contribute to being a strong consultant.

From this perspective you need to demonstrate a clear rationale of why you did all those things in your past, by clearly laying out how they fit to each other/logically lead to the next step, and as a total provide you with an exhaustive skill-set for making an excellent hire!

Hope that helps as an additional perspective to consider!

Robert

Hey Ivan,

there is no bullet-proof because there is no wrong or right here. It's also more about how you deliver that section than what you say.

For the how:

• Display energy - show that you have drive and that you want to achieve something in your life
• Communication style - smile a lot, talk slowly and clearly
• Gestures - use gesturing and keep eye contact

Practice tip: Get a fried to videotype your intro to practice how you deliver it.

For the what:

- ~2-3 minutes

- you can do it chronologically from beginning or from the most recent point on your CV - I personally favor do it chronologically from the start for entry level positions; for experienced hires I would start with the last position

- make sure to include hobbies - Consultants are not machines ;)

- stay quite high level but always include reasoning (Not good: Then I went to Imperial. Better: I decided to go to Imperial because...

- finish with how what you have done in your life translates in why you are applying for the job

Practice tip: Write that part down (at least with bullet points) and then practice delivering it

I hope you find this helpful.

Best

John