I know that some people reading this entry are pretty nervous right now because they’ve got a first round with McKinsey, Bain, Booz, or some other consulting firm staring them in the face. Having been in that position only a year ago, I feel your pain but know that you can get through it. I just finished typing out some words of advice to some friends of mine who are about to start their consulting first round interviews and thought that some of you might find the advice useful. I tried my best to make the following as general as possible, but I think the message should get across well…
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Overall
- RELAX!!! Don’t let yourself get too stressed out before, during, and after the interview — Succumbing to nerves is the quickest way to sabotage yourself. No matter how these interviews turn out, remember that you’re going have a [X School] MBA in a few months…you’re gonna be alright, whether you’ve got a strategy consulting job or not.
- Be confident but humble during the interview. When you’re as talented and qualified as all of you are, there is the risk of sounding a little stuck on yourself. Don’t let that happen because it can leave an interviewer with a terrible impression of you.
- Be sure to have a strong list of questions to ask the interviewer — This is your chance to gain insights from his/her experiences with [X firm] and show that you care enough about getting a position with us to ask insightful questions
- If you make a mistake during some portion of the interview, learn from it and move on…Don’t let it fester in your mind because it’ll serve as a distraction later on
- Make sure the interviewer understands your thinking at all times. Talking through what’s going through your mind (in general terms) can give the interviewer a chance to give you correct information if you’ve got something mixed up or ask follow-up questions to gain more insight about you as a candidate. This tip goes for when you’re doing your math, brainstorming, and providing some sort of insights in response to a question.
- Take time to think about what you’re going to say before you say it. There is nothing wrong with taking 5 or 10 seconds to think through something when the alternative is simply saying the first thing that comes to mind. Remember, you’re not in a race against the clock…you’re in a race to get an offer from [X firm].
On Cases
- STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE!!! — It’s in all-caps because being structured is the thing you should focus on most from the start of the interview until the end. Structure everything from the paper that you take your notes on…to the way you do your initial case issue breakdown…to your set up and execution of the math…to what you say in your final case wrap-up. Often, having a structured approach to everything you do in a case interview is just as important as getting the “right” answer to “crack” the case.
- Think about the “Big Picture” whenever you can…don’t dig too deep in the details until you have to. Based on some of your backgrounds, I know that there’s a natural tendency to “get into the weeds” as early and often as possible, but the danger in that is that you might get lost in the weeds and miss out on information that might get you to the desired answer. If the first thing that pops into your mind is the details of what info you want, take an extra second to think about why you need that information and it will likely give you another layer of structure for your analysis. The “Big Picture” thinking should be the foundation of your approach at all stages of the case, but it is especially important when you’re doing your initial case “roadmap” and issue tree. The executives and managers that you’d be working for on your consulting study team will likely have a “Big Picture” view of things, so you should train yourself to have the same sort of outlook.
- Make sure you bring out the “So what?” insights and not just surface level ideas. [X firm] and any other companies you interview with know that you’re smart…otherwise, you wouldn’t be at [X School]…so simply reciting facts likely won’t be enough to distinguish you from the pack. The thing that can truly make you look like a star is being able to look at that same set of facts and draw out some deep insights about the specific situation in the case and some larger business situation and/or context. It’s all about the “So what?”‘s…
- Be as efficient as possible when doing the math on your cases. Writing out every equation may seem like a good idea, but it can use up a lot of time that would be better spent doing case analysis and gathering data. Try to find shortcuts to get through your calculations quicker, such as canceling zeros, using the units of measure in a problem for hints, and recognizing patterns in numbers. For some other quick math strategies, refer to the case prep guide presentation that I posted up here at the end of the summer.
- Make your notes as neat and clear as possible. As I may have mentioned before, some firms collect the ntoes you take while doing the case for any number of reasons, one of which could be to gain insights on how you structured your analysis. In this case, it is important to have very clear notes so they can follow your thinking as they read the notes. A more practical reason for having clear notes is so that you don’t confuse yourself during interviews. When one is under the stress of an interview situation, it is easy to lose track of a number, a fact, or some piece of data that could help you solve a problem and the time it takes to find that lost data is time that you could be plugging away at your case analysis. Neat notetaking is a simple way to avoid that problem.
- Be creative. This is pretty self-explanatory, but try not to get bogged down and restricted to the format or ideas that a particular framework might lead you to. There are many ways to solve a problem and a little creativity may be just what it takes to get you over the top when the interviewers are doing their evaluations.
- Use assumptions to your advantage, but don’t overuse them. Finding the balance of when and when not to use assumptions is a tough one, so I always default to the following rule of thumb…If you need a piece of information during the case, ask for it. The worst that can happen is that the interviewer won’t have the info and you’ll have to make an assumption about it. The alternative to not asking is making an invalid or incorrct assumption and going down the wrong path when the interviewer had a ton of data waiting for you all along. Basicaly, use assumptions within reason and know that, in many cases, the interviewer likely has data that can help you crack the case wide open if you use it right.
In the Fit Portion — Leadership Experience
- The interview is not all about the case, the fit portion is highly important, as well
- Focus on your role — The interviewer wants to hear about what YOU did; Don’t focus too much of your description on what your TEAM did
- Have at least 4 stories in your back pocket that cover a wide range of anecdotes about your leadership experience (you should not repeat stories across interviews on a single day)
- Be concise and make sure you bring out only the most important points; There’s no need to get too detailed…just tell your story and bring out the “showstopper” ideas
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Overall
- RELAX!!! Don’t let yourself get too stressed out before, during, and after the interview — Succumbing to nerves is the quickest way to sabotage yourself. No matter how these interviews turn out, remember that you’re going have a [X School] MBA in a few months…you’re gonna be alright, whether you’ve got a strategy consulting job or not.
- Be confident but humble during the interview. When you’re as talented and qualified as all of you are, there is the risk of sounding a little stuck on yourself. Don’t let that happen because it can leave an interviewer with a terrible impression of you.
- Be sure to have a strong list of questions to ask the interviewer — This is your chance to gain insights from his/her experiences with [X firm] and show that you care enough about getting a position with us to ask insightful questions
- If you make a mistake during some portion of the interview, learn from it and move on…Don’t let it fester in your mind because it’ll serve as a distraction later on
- Make sure the interviewer understands your thinking at all times. Talking through what’s going through your mind (in general terms) can give the interviewer a chance to give you correct information if you’ve got something mixed up or ask follow-up questions to gain more insight about you as a candidate. This tip goes for when you’re doing your math, brainstorming, and providing some sort of insights in response to a question.
- Take time to think about what you’re going to say before you say it. There is nothing wrong with taking 5 or 10 seconds to think through something when the alternative is simply saying the first thing that comes to mind. Remember, you’re not in a race against the clock…you’re in a race to get an offer from [X firm].
On Cases
- STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE, STRUCTURE!!! — It’s in all-caps because being structured is the thing you should focus on most from the start of the interview until the end. Structure everything from the paper that you take your notes on…to the way you do your initial case issue breakdown…to your set up and execution of the math…to what you say in your final case wrap-up. Often, having a structured approach to everything you do in a case interview is just as important as getting the “right” answer to “crack” the case.
- Think about the “Big Picture” whenever you can…don’t dig too deep in the details until you have to. Based on some of your backgrounds, I know that there’s a natural tendency to “get into the weeds” as early and often as possible, but the danger in that is that you might get lost in the weeds and miss out on information that might get you to the desired answer. If the first thing that pops into your mind is the details of what info you want, take an extra second to think about why you need that information and it will likely give you another layer of structure for your analysis. The “Big Picture” thinking should be the foundation of your approach at all stages of the case, but it is especially important when you’re doing your initial case “roadmap” and issue tree. The executives and managers that you’d be working for on your consulting study team will likely have a “Big Picture” view of things, so you should train yourself to have the same sort of outlook.
- Make sure you bring out the “So what?” insights and not just surface level ideas. [X firm] and any other companies you interview with know that you’re smart…otherwise, you wouldn’t be at [X School]…so simply reciting facts likely won’t be enough to distinguish you from the pack. The thing that can truly make you look like a star is being able to look at that same set of facts and draw out some deep insights about the specific situation in the case and some larger business situation and/or context. It’s all about the “So what?”‘s…
- Be as efficient as possible when doing the math on your cases. Writing out every equation may seem like a good idea, but it can use up a lot of time that would be better spent doing case analysis and gathering data. Try to find shortcuts to get through your calculations quicker, such as canceling zeros, using the units of measure in a problem for hints, and recognizing patterns in numbers. For some other quick math strategies, refer to the case prep guide presentation that I posted up here at the end of the summer.
- Make your notes as neat and clear as possible. As I may have mentioned before, some firms collect the ntoes you take while doing the case for any number of reasons, one of which could be to gain insights on how you structured your analysis. In this case, it is important to have very clear notes so they can follow your thinking as they read the notes. A more practical reason for having clear notes is so that you don’t confuse yourself during interviews. When one is under the stress of an interview situation, it is easy to lose track of a number, a fact, or some piece of data that could help you solve a problem and the time it takes to find that lost data is time that you could be plugging away at your case analysis. Neat notetaking is a simple way to avoid that problem.
- Be creative. This is pretty self-explanatory, but try not to get bogged down and restricted to the format or ideas that a particular framework might lead you to. There are many ways to solve a problem and a little creativity may be just what it takes to get you over the top when the interviewers are doing their evaluations.
- Use assumptions to your advantage, but don’t overuse them. Finding the balance of when and when not to use assumptions is a tough one, so I always default to the following rule of thumb…If you need a piece of information during the case, ask for it. The worst that can happen is that the interviewer won’t have the info and you’ll have to make an assumption about it. The alternative to not asking is making an invalid or incorrct assumption and going down the wrong path when the interviewer had a ton of data waiting for you all along. Basicaly, use assumptions within reason and know that, in many cases, the interviewer likely has data that can help you crack the case wide open if you use it right.
In the Fit Portion — Leadership Experience
- The interview is not all about the case, the fit portion is highly important, as well
- Focus on your role — The interviewer wants to hear about what YOU did; Don’t focus too much of your description on what your TEAM did
- Have at least 4 stories in your back pocket that cover a wide range of anecdotes about your leadership experience (you should not repeat stories across interviews on a single day)
- Be concise and make sure you bring out only the most important points; There’s no need to get too detailed…just tell your story and bring out the “showstopper” ideas
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