A 2020 Interview Guide for MBA's: How to Break into Consulting
A 2020 Interview Guide for MBA's: How to Break into Consulting
In our previous posts, in our consulting after MBA series, we detailed
out topics such as the definition of the industry, the required skills, resumes,
and entry points into consulting. In this post, we will take the next step in
this series by expanding on topics related to interviewing for consulting jobs.
So, without further ado, let’s dive in…
But wait, wait, before we jump let’s quickly go over a refresher
on what the heck consultants actually do?
To quote our first post in this series—which is a quick and
useful read I highly recommend—"Consulting is about helping a firm attain
its target by providing advice related to matters that are beyond its
expertise. This means a consultant is a professional who has some level of
expertise that a firm finds valuable and is willing to pay the consultant to
access their expertise.”
Here’s a video that does a good job of explaining the nitty-gritty
of consulting.
What’s the consulting interview process like?
Consulting interviews could be divided into two categories: 1)
Fit or Behavioral Interviews which seek to identify a match between your
background and personality with consulting, and 2) Case Interviews which assess
your mental mathematical ability, critical thinking, and analytical skills. Now,
various companies run their interview processes differently and may emphasize
either one of the categories above more or less, or in different manners. Let’s
talk McKinsey, BCG, and Bain& Company to give you a better sense of what I
mean. Keith Bevans, global head of recruiting for Bain & Company describes
the recruitment process for advanced degree graduates such as MBA’s as follows.
At Bain & Company, the recruitment process tends to be two rounds with the
first round consisting of two traditional case interviews and the second round
consisting of three interviews, usually two written case interviews and one
behavioral interview.
Myconsultingcoach.com
Traditional vs Written Case Interviews
Generally speaking, traditional case interviews are conducted in
the form of a casual business conversation between the interviewer and the
interviewee. Such case interviews try to evaluate your general business
knowledge and your ability to communicate your ideas, effectively. On the other
hand, written case interviews target your analytical and critical thinking
abilities. Ultimately, both traditional and written case interviews offer you
a set of facts, look for how you process the given facts, and come to your
conclusions. With that said, let’s have a deeper look into the details of both
fit and case interviews.
Fit interviews in Consulting
McKinsey calls fit interviews “Personal Experience Interviews”
or PEI. More often than not, the outcomes of fit interviews significantly
impact your consulting hiring process. It really is an attempt to measure your competence
in terms of soft skills which, in addition to analytical abilities, are crucial
for any good consultant who will be in constant contact with clients, day in and
day out. Furthermore, fit interviews help
consulting firms to assess your motivation in sticking around the industry
given the fact that junior consultants tend to leave consultant due to the
workload or to move on to other sectors after benefiting from the steep
learning curve of consulting.
Fit Interview - Format
Some consulting companies hold a purposeful one-hour fit interview,
while others tend to combine fit and case interviews together. The latter
format is more common. Consulting fit interviews can be particularly
challenging and so, it’s essential that in your effort to ace
your consulting interview to ground your answers in clear thought
processes. What do I mean by that? For example, McKinsey tends to dedicate an
entire fit interview to only one topic, say your “leadership abilities and
experience” and then drill down on your response with follow up questions. So,
overall fit interviews are a purposeful effort to unravel the reality of your
motivation as well as the relevance and depth of your personal experience. In the
future, we’ll dive deeper into the
nitty-gritty of how to best formulate your responses to ace your fit
consulting interviews.
Myconsultingcoach.com
The much-dreaded Case Interview—What is it all about?
Essentially, a case interview is a simulation game. It typifies
a business project that, in my many cases, the company you are recruiting for
has worked on, in the past. Thus, many consulting companies consider this type
of interviews as reliable measures of how successfully a candidate might perform
on the actual job—there are many arguments against this belief, but we’ll
save that topic for another day.
The typical case interview is usually very formulaic, starting
with 5-7 minutes worth of questions about your resume, followed by a 30-minute
analysis of a case, and the interaction is usually wrapped up with a 5-minute
window for any questions you might have for the interviewer. Many big names in
consulting incorporate 4 to 5 of such interviews in the hiring process to
ensure the compatibility of the candidate with the company.
Case interviews are a scary experience
for many candidates, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Below is a compilation
of resources we put together to help you prepare for and ace this type of
interviews.
How you should prepare for case
interviews—the hardest part of the consulting recruiting process
As I mentioned before, case interviews
are quite formulaic. IGotAnOffer Consulting outlines them as follows: Situation,
Framework, Quantitative section, Creativity section, Recommendation. The good
news is that you can practice and master almost all of these sections as they
are quite mechanical. The place where your talent and intelligence have the
opportunity to shine, however…can you guess? That’s right! The creativity
section! This part of the case interview constitutes about 20% of your case
interview outcome, so it’s important but it’s not a make or break factor. That’s
why many experts suggest getting down the mechanics of case interviews (i.e.
80% of the interview) before worrying about the creativity question. With that
said, let’s briefly go over what does each of these sections of the case
interview entail and from there talk about some suggestions as to how to tack
each category.
The interviewer usually starts by introducing
the situation that the company is dealing with—i.e. Situation. Next, the
interviewer asks you to structure what you heard to identify potential areas
where a solution to the problem at hand could be reached—i.e. Frameworks. Then,
you are asked several quantitative questions, after which you will be expected
to outline initial conclusions before you present your concrete and final conclusions.
The creativity question, usually, is an open-ended question that often is asked
toward the end of the interview. A typical example of such questions is “What
other areas should the company explore to increase its sales/profits?”
Best Preparation Strategies to Ace Consulting
Case Interviews
Start early
As Kevin Bevans, Global head of
recruiting for Bain & Company said, preparing for case interviews is
extremely time-consuming. Cramming the night before is usually a futile
undertaking.
Know Case Archetypes
I’m going to share a small secret with
you: There are only a handful of case types. These usually include new market
entry, product development, expansion strategies, entrepreneurial plans,
enhancing sales/profitability, and mergers & acquisitions.
So, plan ahead of time and develop
structures that help you talk through the information you might receive in
relation to these archetypes. A traditional method to develop structures is the
incorporation of frameworks. Frameworks is a topic that we might cover in the
future as its introduction and nuances will require multiple posts of their
own.
Refresh your mathematical skills
Have ever heard of the “fight or flight”
reaction in stressful situations. Case interviews are stressful situations that,
at times, cause interviewees to have such a reaction. What follows? Well, the
left hemisphere of the brain shuts down and as a result, you might freeze up at
the simplest mathematical calculations! So make sure to brush up on your basic mathematical
concepts—which are all you’ll need!—such as taking and applying percentages and
ratios.
Have current business knowledge
Read on and keep up with a variety of industries
so you could avoid being hindered by a lack of basic information. To that end, our
suggestions are The Economist and the McKinsey & Company app and podcast.
And finally,
Practice like crazy!
The best way for cracking cases is to get
your hands dirty by practicing many cases. Here’s a list of sources that I’d
suggest you take advantage of if you’re serious about your journey to improve
your case interviewing skills. Grab a buddy and use occasions like meal-time to
grill each other and converse over business cases.
The big four websites
Case Clubs
Looking for more resources? Try IGotAnOffer’s post on
how to crack cases!
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