McKinsey & Company Consultant Interview Questions, Process, and Tips

Round: HR Interview
Experience: Never underestimate the importance of PI. I wish to lay emphasis on PI questions as it can be used as a metric to judge the ‘drive’ of a candidate and Sasi made it explicit that he wanted to test my ‘drive’ by understanding how I went about developing my musical skills – which happened to be a stand-out section in my extra acads. Also, the more structured you are in your answers the more impressive it would come across. To give you an exerpt:

Sasi: “So you chose to study economics at IIT (interesting choice) then you picked up music at IIT, then I suppose you would have had to balance your academic goals with your music right?”
Me: “Sir, there are three parts to your question as I understand it: 1) Why did I choose economics at IIT, 2) How did I work upon my music ? 3) How did I trade one off against the other?”
Sasi: “Let’s stick with the question on the music” Me: “ Sir, I look at this as a 5 step process:
1- Listen to more music [ For this I contacted seniors and got myself hundreds of GB of music on my harddisk]
2- Sing and listen to myself sing [ Used a software called Audacity where I would record and replay to myself and
understood inconsistency in tone, pitch, volume and beat]
3- Learn singing techniques like pitch control, vibrato, falsetto, runs and riffs [ looked at videos of vocal coaches on
youtube like Eric Arceneaux

Round: Case Study Interview
Tips: •So this being my first interview, there were jitters – but Sasi made me feel very comfortable

• PI set a good tone to get cracking
•Honestly, when I heard the question I didn’t feel like I’ve got this under the belt. It takes time for a case to build up along the way
•I made it a point to keep voicing out my thoughts, interjecting with “one moment please!”, “I need a little bit of time with this” to which the response invariably was “take your time”
•At times, thoughts don’t necessarily flow in the form of a tree – but jag around. Don’t flog yourself in order to come back on track. It is perfectly okay to talk about issues, considerations and concepts in order to engage your interviewer unless he forces you on track.
•You are actually being tested for your ability to come up with a bunch of relevant points on the topic, your ability to make smooth conversation in a professional context, and your ability to keep your cool. Don’t make an imaginary score chart in your head corresponding to the tree diagram that you’ve been used to practicing. To reiterate, McKinsey cases can be unstructured.
•I struggled a bit with math but I was able to laugh it off. I really doubt people judge you really harshly if you are making mistakes within the realm of human nature. Keep it together, offer a laugh if you can and move on.

Skills:
College Name: Indian School Of Business (ISB)

Round: Case Study Interview
Experience: Recommended Approach
- Broke down the value chain of the business – basically everything from design to delivery
- Asked about the business model. Was told to explain what I already know / make assumptions about the same. Gave my understanding about the business – that there would be a set of requirements given by the client possibly through a standardized procurement process involving floating of an RFP. This would be followed by design of structures, procurement of materials, construction and hand-over
- Understood the various elements of costs and dwelt on each
- Notable points/suggestions included i) making provisions on cost escalations during framing of the contract, ii) protecting against obsolescence of material in case of delay initiated by the client, iii) supplier rationalization for securing raw material, iv) some suggestions on achieving scale in transportation either by sub-contracting or some other means.

Suggestions weren’t fabulous so the case only went moderately well

Tips: •Don’t expect every interview to go in the same way. Snap out of your previous one and expect something new in the next one. This interview was open ended and required a lot of driving by the interviewee.
•Don’t get stuck in points where you aren’t able to ideate. Think of the interviewer’s time as limited. If you are in a spot – offer to give some ideas in an area where you think you might be comfortable. No one will ever refuse. He would love to have you bore him a little less !
•There are some cases which are just not up your alley. Again, don’t flog yourself for not aceing it.
•For a bunch of reasons your performance might not be consistent in a set of interviews. All your psychological phenomena come into the picture – overconfidence (the last one went so well, this is a piece of cake !),
denial (I can’t be screwing up this case – there must be something wrong with either the question or the interviewer
), nervousness(Oh my god ! This guy is a partner with McKinsey !)
or just white-noise (revenue minus cost…..bzzzzzz…bzzzzzz….where was I?
• If you rock one interview and pass another, you will typically get a third interview so don’t worry if you don’t own the case

Skills:
College Name: Indian School Of Business (ISB)

Round: Case Study Interview
Experience: •We discussed about the advantages of online banking from a customer’s perspective – saving time (queues, transaction time), getting value added services (online shopping) and established that there would be high demand side pressure for online services
•Segmented population and found mid-high income groups being the target audience (with internet access, requisite income and proximity and service time at bank branch being influencing factors). Renny pointed out that the unorganized sector would prefer branch banking if cash transactions are common
•We then talked about the advantages from a bank’s perspective (saving on manpower costs, real estate etc)
•In terms of strategy we talked about identifying geographies, promoting online services, offering competitive products etc
Tips: •In such a situation, you might find that scoping a question is becoming tough if you aren’t receiving active participation from the interviewer
•Proceed to explain your own understanding of the problem and try make a structure if you see one.
•If you stop seeing a structure – don’t hesitate to put your pen down and start making conversation about what you feel are the major issues. List down 4 or 5 such issues. The need to create and conform to a structure can become a liability at times like these, but trust me, your ability to merely survive a round like this may result in your being given an offer.
•
Can’t undermine the importance of dynamically adjusting yourself to an interview. In this case, it’s better to think freely and give a few good points than to draw a blank at the second branch of the case

Skills:
College Name: Indian School Of Business (ISB)

Round: Case Study Interview
Experience: First thing to ask is why are they being hit if others are building ATMS? He answered that the client does not have ATMs while now competition does. This is making people shift their bank accounts form us to the competition. Then I asked him what ATM strategy mean in this context? He quizzed me back as to what I think it meant. To which, I replied that there could be the following sub questions we could be asking: ( I used the 4W and one H way of dealing with vague questions!) 1. Where we want to establish the ATMs? 2. What technology /interface we want to use? 3. What is the time frame of the ATM roll out? 4. How do we plan to fund this roll out? 5. To whom do we cater to through this ? I told him that we needed to prioritize these questions according to their importance in order to begin building the strategy. He told me that where to establish was the main question to answer. I began by asking him whether we were looking at specific locations or just geographies. He told me that we were looking at both. Hence, I said that I would start with narrowing down to specific geographies and then talk about specific locations in those geographies. He also told me that we wanted to roll out as soon as possible. I asked him where all we are located geographically to which he responded that we had a pan India presence. With this, I said that I would first look at the factors that affect the choice of a geography. Since the best strategy would be to attract the maximum customers per new ATM– I listed the following: 1. Income level of customers ( Assumption: Since ATMs would be used by people who had more money) 2. Density of customers (Assumption: Only customers would use our ATM service) I asked him if these factors covered or was there something that I was missing? He said this was fine but what I meant by geographies. I specified that what would be looking at is City/town wise data. He also asked me what would be the cut off level of income that I would be looking at? He said that lets assume that with this info we located the Mumbai region to be the highest on the priority list. Now he wanted to know how I would decide on a location. I said I would again look at data inside Mumbai to again prioritise areas with the above two factors.He asked me if there was anything else I would like to look at? He asked me to come out of frameworks and think about the original question. I told him that as per my understanding the locations should be one with high footfalls specifically offices, markets and hospitals etc. He asked me how I would find out where all to put ? All hospitals? Remember we need to roll out as soon as possible.. Finally he told me we could look at ATM locations of competitors and atleast put an ATM wherever they are located.
Tips: Make sure that the personal interview goes well as it sets the btone for the case as well.

Round: Case Study Interview
Experience: Firstly, I clarified what product insurance meant. It was more to satisfy my curiosity and to better understand the context. He told me that it was the insurance on consumer products like electrical goods etc. I said I would first like to understand the whole value chain to better understand the role of the sales force before laying down my approach. He said there was nothing much to it as basically the company was an intermediary between an bank and the customer. It just sent out the sales force and got customers. I asked him what exactly was the structure of the products. He said although it was not relevant to the discussion, I could assume that the premiums were paid each year and the policy lasted for a fixed time (say 30 years). I now asked him who the customer was and how did the salesperson approach the customer. He said that the customer was anyone on the street (think of LIC). Then I asked him that I would like to analyse the question in two ways, qualitative and quantitative. On the quantitative side, I would like to see whether the sales force had the time to devote for the new product. On the qualitative side I would like to see whether they had the skills and knowledge of these products. To answer the first question, we analysed the total idle time per sales person. Then, we would have to see how selling an additional product would affect the time the sales person spends with the customer. This would then determine if the sales person could cover the same number of customers or would that number drop. In the latter scenario, I told him that we would have to see what the tradeoffs were and then decide whether we would want to target lesser number of customers who would have higher value in terms of buying the two products. On the qualitative side, we looked at what capabilities were required for selling the new products. We classified these as already present and new. We found that most of the capabilities like customer lists, getting time from customers to make a call, general selling expertise was already there. What was needed was product information and knowledge. This we concluded could be built through training. He asked me if I was missing something. After a quick summary, I realized that I had not touched the new “capability” of additional budget for higher salaries. (sinece the sales persons were going to be spending their idle time as well, and earning more for the company, they would have to be compensated additionally. We tried to toy with some pay out (pay versus policies sold per quarter) to see what could work best I concluded (we did some number crunching on idle hours etc) that we could use the same sales force but mentioned the additional capabilities like training and revised pay outs.
Tips: On the final day, try and keep your energy levels up as much as possible. One good idea is to carry some energy food (granola bars, chocolate bars or even fruit juice or glucose).

Round: Case Study Interview
Experience: First, I clarified some background information like if there were any more steel plants that the company owned? He said no there were none. Then I asked him at what capacity was the steel plant running. He said it was nowhere close to 100%. I asked him how was our profs in the last few years? He said that they had declined. Then, I began the revenue and cost route. It turned out that revenues had not declined as quantity and price (steel is a commodity so they cant do anything with price anyway) had stayed the same. In costs however, after going through all the components, I found that the raw material costs had increased. The main raw material is iron ore, and that is where the problem was. Then I asked him if we knew why the costs for iron ore had increased. He told me that the iron ore mines were located in West Bengal and there had been some regulation that made it more expensive to transport steel out of the state. Then it started making sense to put up a plant in WB.! But I though not to jump to conclusions and we deliberated more. I told him that there were four options available to us.—run only one of the two lpants, run both or shut both. (helps to be MECE!) I sad that in order to figure out what we should do , we should look at the NPV of all four options. Then we went on to do some calculations into which I will not get into here. Finally, as per our discussions it turned out that we should keep both the plants running. We could purchase iron ore cheaper due to presence of a plant in WB but at the same time it would become cheaper to produce steal at Surat. Since there was a demand shortage in this industry we could increase production in total.
Tips: Do read the profiles of the interviewers before the D day. It helps in making conversation once you are in front of them. And you could also prepare for questions on your previous work experience that is similar to theirs. Also it is important to ask why a certain situation is in the way it is. This sometimes gives important leads into the case. Synthesis should be short ant to the point. Even in the middle of the discussion, if you are asked to give your opinion on something in the case, it should be firm and backed by sound logic.

Skills: Case Solving Ability, Case Analysis
College Name: Indian School Of Business (ISB)