Case Preparation Process of an Aspiring Consultant (Part 3)

Max (not his real name) is an aspiring consultant who is looking to secure an analyst role with one of the top firms for the upcoming recruitment cycle in September 2011. His interest in management consulting was sparked by a failed McKinsey interview last year. In this series of blogs, he will be sharing his background, case preparation process, useful resources, and any breakthroughs or setbacks that he experiences.

Post 3 – Coming Up with an Action Plan

In my previous post, I went over some of the resources I discovered for case interview preparation. Now that I was armed with some frameworks and sample cases, it was time to actually set up an action plan. My personal goal was to have twenty to thirty live case interviews under my belt before any first round interview in the upcoming recruitment cycle. I figured that case interviews, like everything else, has a learning curve associated with it, and I wanted to be extremely comfortable with the mechanics of doing a case by the time real interviews rolled around. As I mentioned in my first post, the lack of preparation for my first-rounder with McKinsey was absolutely embarrassing. The foreign nature of the case interview made me nervous, and that probably amplified the negative effect of my poor case performance. Having done six co-op terms during my undergrad, I am usually extremely comfortable in interview situations. My friends and I had, on average, five to six interviews for every co-op work term so I am no rookie when it comes to communicating my abilities to an interviewer. However, success at normal “fit” or “experience” interviews will not translate into success in the case interview. I designed my preparation around four areas:

1)      Doing live case interviews

2)      Solving cases by myself

3)      Reading business articles to acquire “business acumen”

4)      Working on my mental math abilities

When it comes to doing live case interviews, there is no choice but to find an individual who is willing to feed you cases. Ideally, this person will be a high caliber candidate who is also going through the recruitment process. While doing research on the firms, I found that there were four main ways in which the case interview is delivered (and perhaps the firmsconsulting team can comment on this):

1)      Candidate-Led: In this method, the interviewer presents a short problem like “The client’s profits are down, and the CEO wants to know how to proceed”, and basically shuts his or her mouth. It is kind of like a police interrogation where they will only divulge information when asked.

2)      Interviewer-Led: In this method, the case is structured into different sections. The first section will usually involve the description of the case, and the interviewer asking you “What are the important questions”, or “How would you structure your analysis”. They are basically looking for you to develop an upfront structure, but not dive into a particular branch just yet. They will most likely point you in the direction they want you to analyze if they are satisfied with your upfront structure.

3)      Group Interview: In this method, small groups of candidates are given a case. They must solve the case together while the interviewer silently observes.

4)      Written/Presentation Interview: In this method, all of the data is given too you. The challenge here is to cut through the fluff and get to the important information. At the end, you will present the conclusion and recommendation.

Even though there are lots of variations on the case interview, it is my opinion that practicing the “candidate-led” version will prepare you for all of the variations – but it is useful to mix it up when you are preparing just to get a taste of what the other types are like. I found practice partners through two methods. First, there were other people in the university consulting club who were preparing for interviews. Since we were in different cities, we had to do the cases over Skype. My plan was to do two cases a week with these individuals. Second, http://www.consultingcase101.com/case-partner/ provides a small forum where people looking for case partners can correspond.

When it comes to doing cases alone, there are far fewer hurdles. All you need are some samples cases, and a bit of free time. Some of the best samples cases I found are listed below:

1)      Vault Samples Cases

2)      Wetfeet Sample Cases

3)      Case in Point

4)      A book called “Crack the Case” which is great because it contains lots of data

5)      Sample cases from the consulting clubs of various business schools

Of course, it is not possible to simulate the entire case when you are by yourself, but you can practice the open and close of the case. By open, I mean reading the case question and structuring your approach. After you structure the analysis, you can go through the case to see if your line of questioning would have led you to the key insight in the case. By close, I mean the conclusion and recommendation to finish off a case. It is very useful to actually talk out loud when you are doing the opening and closing portions. In addition to the case samples mentioned above, most firms have sample cases on their website. I really liked the BCG ones because it is a step-by-step process that is easy to do alone.

Another great resource for practicing cases solo is FirmsConsulting TV. The thing that I love about this is that you have the ability to play and pause a case, and this allows you to structure your thinking to see if you would have gotten the same answer they did. I previously mentioned that I like to use the frameworks from www.caseinterview.com, but I feel that the www.firmsconsulting.com way is equally good – it just so happens that I came across the caseinterview.com method first. In my opinion, once you are familiar with cases it really becomes a critical thinking exercise and particular frameworks don’t really matter too much. The important thing is to be MECE (mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive).

The next part of my process is reading business articles. Coming from a technical background means that my vocabulary doesn’t include a lot of business terms, and I don’t want to get bogged down with terminology during a case interview. Furthermore, I believe that most cases given at the top firms are sanitized versions of something the interviewer actually worked on. By reading about real life business situations, you can populate your mind with ideas and solutions just in case the interviewer wants to see some creativity. I found the following sources to be fairly helpful:

1)      http://www.ft.com/

2)      http://www.businessweek.com

3)      http://www.economist.com/

4)      http://www.firmsconsulting.com

It may seem odd that I have listed firmsconsulting.com as a good resource for this, but I feel that the accounts of actual engagements are invaluable in gaining insight about real business situations. In addition, I feel that many of the articles on the site provide useful information with regards to what the interviewers have to deal with on a daily basis. By understanding this, you can gain a greater appreciation for what they are looking for in candidates.

The last part of the process is doing mental math. It is a little bit embarrassing to admit that my mental math isn’t as sharp as it should be considering that I come from a technical background. However, most advanced math and engineering courses emphasize conceptual understanding rather than number crunching. Besides, once you get past simple math (addition/subtraction/multiplication/division), it is almost impossible to do calculations in your head. I would be amazed if you can find someone who can do a triple integration to find the volume of a sphere from first principles without writing anything down. Of course there are those who can do that, but 99% of the population probably can’t. Luckily, it is easy to practice mental math, and I would recommend that you practice things that are likely to come up in a case interview. For example, what is 30% of 70%. Another one would be what is 3 billion divided by 1.2. The point is to keep it practical, and not practice things like what is 7.5 to the power of 6. You can either come up with these questions yourself, or find some resources online.

You are now caught up with where I am in my preparation process. I invite you to continue reading my blogs for weekly updates. In these updates, I plan on picking a case I did over Skype with one of my practice partners that week and breaking it down. Furthermore, I will keep you guys updated with any advances or setback I had with regards to my application process.

Related articles

• Case Preparation Process of an Aspiring Consultant (Part 1) (firmsconsulting.com)
• The True Gate Keepers to BCG, Bain & McKinsey (firmsconsulting.com)
• Are McKinsey consultants in smaller offices getting worse training? (firmsconsulting.com)
• From Pepsi to Bain: My life as a management consulting star and partner (firmsconsulting.com)