Co2010 Consulting Case Book

!

"

#

$

" %

"

#

# # "

"

#

$

!&

"

#

$

" "

$

*

$

, #

# " $

$

#

2! $ #

!" $ /0 /%0

" # $

# #

' !

# # " # !/

$ # # #

" " !

#

!.

! ! ,

#

" 3

! !

#

$ "

"

"

$

$ " $

! "

+ !"

$ $ # "

#

#

#

# ! &

"

"

+

" ! " !

#

" #

(

#

#

"

$

! )

!

"

"

#

$ " #

"

1& -

/0% -

!

#

!

# "

"

# !4 "

! 5! 4 # #

$

& 6 !-

$

7 $

! #

" ! #

9 : # "

##

2 5 ; "

/

/ " #

&

B #

>

/ #

.

) $

'

0

%#

B

$

(

C

#

0 G

J

C

'

$

"

$

B '

!

,

#

C

! (

#

A" #

$ "

3 # H ) /

H/

-

$ 0

$

#

"

$ /

R:% "

%

!%

"

4

#

%

$ !

( % "

#

3 •

%

! " 9

!

$

S:%

•

%

•

"

%

$

#

H

=

( -

B "

3

C

H/ ? 0H -

A&

'

$ 6 " B

H3

! "

C

# #

#

#

#

" $

J-

$

" #

! H 1

! " & D

> " I

)

; % 3

1

H4

# #

" #

#

#

#

"

#

$

:

!

# !?

! #

$

# $

%)

.

/

!

0

J

! .

#

% 3

-

% 2! )

"

B

$

C

3

#

"

J

A% 3

"

3 "

!-

,

"

$

% 3

IB

J

"

I

CL )

"

! '

P)

I

A

$ 12 3

!

!

$

# BI

I

"

4 4

#

# "

4 5 / 12 6

O% 3

P-

Q

3

47

8 "

%

4 4C

2!

LI

12 3!.

3

6 (%

9

/7

8

6

9

%

7% P -8

A OI

? % B $

%

3

-C

% B $

%

3

-C

-P% B $

%

3

-C

Q

-

3

%

&$

'

(+7+* : +!

"

!

(

;! !

< +#(+

;*'

!!+ !' (+= : $ /

#

#

#

%

*+

; (> * =

;*

:. (

#

4 "

)

&?

(

#

4

-

$ $ 6

# - #

)

$ :$ 4

% 3

. B &4 C

$

'

% 3

H

#

# # 6

*+ % 3

% 3

;

. .

T '

$

!0

#

&4

.

.

!

2!

$

%#

H

$

J

#

J-

J

)

$ $

A* #

#

# B B

+J

#

$ C

"

"

J

J #

CJ

%

2

$

/

U I BL ) P 1PI& ? C

4

$

?

: $

/

/

C

B 6 /I

/

"

#

C

% #

!

$

(

(

BC

"

#

A)

/

#

$

# BC

"

A)

/

PI

# B C

#

$ H A 6 /I

CI

#

! L 6 /I

(

BCI

#

A"

:-

#

+ /

' B

:& :%

#

$

C

$ I

#

$

#

5

B ! !A )

C

%< 8?

@ '

9

H

$

"

"

J #

"

$

# • #

#

#

J

/

)

#

H

#

+ J> $ "

/

6

$ (

/ I

0

%

# $ ( 1 1

J

#

$

0

DIJ

J #

J-

$

J&

J

# ,*

/

3

J

J

#

1

H " #

J

0& 0& %

#

-

#J $

"

?

$

#

H

<

#

$ 0

J J

%

.

1

I

1

#

$

"

J

C

/

#

/

(% : $ !"

C

$

( % "

C

(

'

#

"

$

#

# :

( I

#

@

#

"

$

%$

. !

/ 0 4 # " /( /

I / •

/

•

)

) :

B

#

" •

0 $

#

V

• K $

1 $

1

K

)

$!

• $

$ !#

:

# •

# #

(

$

1 $

# #

#

/

# / 0( 0

" 0

)

H

H%

#

0

#

0) • •

%$

• •

# 4

# F

3

C

•

1

•

I

-# #

• #

-

•

0/

•

)

•

0)

? #

0

•

1 $

•

-

•

$

•

%

•

1

• (

H

3 -

- H1

$ $ •

0

• •

" &

• • •

$ #

#

$ #

$ $

# H

H

)

#

H&

$

G

,

=

#

? S/& -? )

$

/0& . - L / .

5 /+

# P

$

# ,

A !!

- - ? S/& -?

•

/ #

• A/ #

%

#

$

% - & 6 /1%6 %

'

#

9

%)

!& + $

"

#

A

:

# ! ! !) &

0

'

# #

"

#

A

#

!

4

:

&

#

$

$

"

"

! !!

> /!%

"

$

!%

# #

$

"

$

$

! %"

$ $

"

! !! 3 3

4

# #

2

#

! !

%( -

"

! R #

(

2

%

'$

;

7 $

'

?

+@ (

2 A 5 B C

2

(;

+@

+@

22

Contributors 1. Accenture a) Jasmeet Singh Marwah b) Shweta Tiwari c) Abhishek Gupta d) Abhishek Bhatia e) Vinayaka Padmanabha 2. Arthur D Little a) Samrat Bose 3. AT Kearney a) Abhineet Sawa b) Sudipta Ray c) Barathi S d) Akash Jain 4. Booz and Co. a) Somesh Satnalika 5. Boston Consulting Group a) Pallavi Malani b) Deepak Deshmukh c) Siddharth Negandhi d) Parag Dhanuka e) Mouneesh Sinha 6. Deloitte a) Rakesh Ranjan b) Apoorv Gautam c) Deepshikha Ganjoo d) Laxmikant Vyas e) Chitra Unnikrishnan 7. Diamond Consultants a) Rakesh Ranjan b) Vivek Arora 8. Feedback Ventures a) Puneet Kataria b) Anant Tripathi c) Nitin Vishwas 9. Global eProcure a) Anshu Vazirani 25

b) c) d) e)

Mohit Gupta Zorawar Singh Abhishek Narayan Singh Sarvagya Sharma

10. McKinsey and Co. a) Ankur Vaish b) Suyog Kalyanji Kotecha c) Kirti Varun Avarasala d) Vivek Arora e) Gaurav Punia f) Aditya Pradip Kulkarni g) Saurabh Vashishtha h) Maninder Gulati 11. Parthenon Group a) Anip Sharma 12. ZS Associates a) Gautam Pande b) Srinivas Sainaga Chilukuri c) Rohit Bhagwat d) Vinit Garg e) Megha Khatri f) Nitya Thandavan

2<

Accenture

2@

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Jasmeet Marwah Accenture Mithul 1 Why Consulting? Which other companies interviewing with? Why Accenture? The company has implemented a demand forecasting system and improved the forecast accuracy significantly, what operational processes will be affected, which process metrics will improve and what will be the financial impact? General Basically, I had applied to the supply chain position and had done demand planning at my previous job. This case was more of discussion. We identified several planning processes in the company (inventory planning, transportation planning, facility planning) and discussed how each of them would be affected. We talked about the differences in sales and marketing forecasts. We talked about promotions and cannibalization. We then shifted our discussion to how marketing in U.S. uses AC Nielsen. Then we discussed the process metrics like no. of stock outs. I started talking about costs but then he said that would be financial impact. I couldn’t come up with many metrics. For the financial part, I wrote the formula for free cash flow and then discussed how each component will be affected. I had a good connect throughout with the interviewer. I honestly told him which my top target companies were, also gave him the reasons. He seemed very convinced. This case was based on the work I had done before. I was not very thoroughly prepared. I took time to understand what he wanted from the case. We had this interview on the AC lawns, where he gave me the case and went on a walk. I called him after 2 minutes and then started discussing in detail. Be thorough with what work you have done before Know why consulting and in case you have several shortlists, be prepared to answer what your target companies are and why? Moved on to the next round

2F

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Jasmeet Marwah Accenture Amit Kumar 2 This was a PI round. Again similar questions – tell me about yourself, talk about your previous work experience, what skills you bring We discussed what happens when a firm acquires another (talked about realizing synergies) No Case No Case

This was a telephonic interview. I was very confident. Nothing

Next round

2G

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Jasmeet Marwah Accenture HR round 3 An exhaustive PI round Asked me instances of leadership, conflict with the client Something beyond your resume How will your previous manager describe you (your strengths and where you need to improve) Why Accenture? It lasted for about 45 minutes and another person was noting down something (don’t know what) No Case No Case

This was an exhaustive PI round and I was well prepared for standard questions. Nothing

Made an offer

29

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Shweta Tiwari Accenture Amit First 2 mins of general introduction asking about my previous experience. 1. A bank of Australia is planning to enter the Indian market. Assess the opportunity 2. Assess the opportunity of Bank A acquiring Bank B in US. 3. Sales of a retail store is going down, provide a strategy to boost sales. 1.Market Entry 2. M&A 1. It was a direct case of market entry. I analyzed the Indian Banking industry in terms of its attractiveness to enter. We then discussed about the existing banks and the products it was offering. The discussion further went ahead with how to enter the Indian market- organic, inorganic ways. 2. Assess the opportunity of Bank A acquiring Bank B in US. 3. Sales of a retail store is going down, provide a strategy to boost sales. I was able to apply my experience in the Financial Services domain to discuss few key essential things which he brought up during the case. Nothing Be Composed & Confident. Next Round

5

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Shweta Tiwari Accenture Don’t remember the name Second 40 mins HR interview – Questions about my previous experience at work. Why consulting? How would you manage the travelling part in the job? Why Accenture? No

Nothing Be Composed & Confident Offer made

5

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Abhishek Gupta Accenture Shantanu (don’t) remember the last name First The regular questions – Why consulting, Why this firm, Why you, Prior Work Experience Process A new business is being set up for collecting car insurance data from different companies focused on accident claim history and no-claim bonus. The agency with collect the history data, validate it, and sell it to other insurance companies who will decide to transfer the “no claim bonus” benefit to the insured party based on their performance with the old insurance company. What is the key issue in this business model I understood the business model quickly. I drew the process on a sheet of paper and got the buy in. The main issue with the business model in this case was data quality. I did not understand the significance of the word “PSU” in the Insurance company context and relate it to bad data quality. I got there, but I think it took a little bit more time than expected. Listen keenly to every word that is said. It is said for a reason. Qualified for next round (which was an HR round) and then final Partner round. Both these rounds were PI questions and I was ultimately given the offer.

5

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

ABHISHEK BHATIA Accenture Mitul Shah First, First

A detailed description about Accenture and what do they do and the various consulting verticals. The Perennial debate about Accenture being much more implementation driven than other consulting firms. Mitul gave his viewpoint of how that was actually not the case but Accenture definitely did projects which were of much longer duration and hence always had a strong implementation flavor to them. Then he asked me a bit about my background and told a bit about himself. Some pointed questions on my other interviews on Day1 and why I was not able to crack the McKinsey interview. This was hence a very short introduction and the main emphasis had to be on the case.

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Not a regular Case Mitul didn’t seem to be in mood of a regular case. He asked me about the upcoming budget proposals and since he was involved in the Logistics which would affect the industry. He asked me to think for a minute and tell the three key announcements which could happen in the budget which will affect the industry. Then he asked me about three key industry trends that would define the industry in the next decade – I harped about the Infrastructure building spree that needs to be matched with China to ensure that GDP growth is maintained, the movement of freight mix from road to rail and the retail revolution which will again spur demand for freight.

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Detailed knowledge of the sector Nothing

Cleared Round 1 52

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

ABHISHEK BHATIA Accenture Amit Kumar Second

A detailed description of the GTIN process at Accenture and why they recruit from ISB for this vertical. I think the idea was to tell that ISBians have done well in Accenture and put me a little at ease.

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Logistics – Scenario Analysis Amit’s case question was fairly straight forward. He wanted me to design a warehousing and logistics system for a typical FMCG firm (given my P&G and Reckitt background) in a scenario of GST reforms, as are being planned by the government to happen in the recent future. The idea was to compare the current freight costs, inventory holdings and the location of the warehouses and logistics strategy in case Central Sales Tax reduces from 3% to 2% then to 1% and finally complete elimination of CST from the Indian taxation system. I structured the problem well – dividing it into sub-parts on all possible firm metrics that would be affected due to the same including free cash etc. and was able to compare the current situation to the new one with reduced tax liability. The idea here is to think through the problem like a simple transportation problem where the tax acts like a constraint on the cost elements of the matrix and hence affects the optimal decision.

Structuring a problem vast in scope and impact Nothing

Cleared Round 2

55

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

ABHISHEK BHATIA Accenture Two Partners (don’t remember the names now) Third

This was the final interview which was a classical example of the airplane test that consulting firms have. Was not quizzed on any case here, it was a purely discussion driven, behavioral and general sector knowledge interview – the ability to carry out an intelligent conversation with a partner long enough to impress him. We discussed a variety of things like why attrition in P&G is very low, why I left P&G, how would leadership differ in P&G and in Accenture. He asked me a mini case of “me leading a project team and the work getting delayed beyond measure – how would you deal with the situation and the client” The interviewers were extremely chilled out. All in all, the key thing was me being cool. Stay cool and confident. Engage with the partners in any discussion and steer it to topics which you are comfortable with.

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

None

Got an offer

5<

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch Outcome

Vinayak Nandalike Accenture Himanshu Tambe and Vaibhav First - Expand on career highlights - Specific details of your role in product development for emerging markets - Details of international work experience - Since I have done product development in automotive electronics for considerable part of my career, will I be able to cope with assignments in non- automotive sectors, such as telecom, healthcare, etc - Talk about your extracurricular activities - Talk about two defining moments in life which have made you what you are today - Two positives and two negatives which your family, peers and superiors see in you. What steps have you taken to improve on it? Saurabh Bhatnagar Second - Tools used for product life cycle management - Career progress - How much did you score in DMOP? - What is your CGPA? Amit Kumar Third - Career progress - Will you be able to cope with assignments in non- automotive sectors, such as telecom, healthcare, etc - Talk about your extracurricular activities - Are you willing to relocate to Gurgaon? - Salary expectation None - Work experience - Relevance of work experience for the job description Offered the role of senior consultant

5@

Arthur D Little

5F

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer

Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Samrat Bose ADL 1. Consultant from DOHA 2. Manager from Singapore 3. Principal from Dubai – Mr.Janardan 4. Partner travelling from Bahrain to Doha 4 persons, 4 rounds, 4 days 1. Why consultancy? 2. Why ADL 3. Long term plans 2. The asked a number of brain teasers – which are short shouldn’t take more than 3-4 minutes 1. Telecom company wants to reduce the processing time of applications 2. Farmer grows oranges assuming lot of money in the market. Herd mentality makes everyone think the same, so everyone grows oranges. What happens then? How to tackle the problem? 3. How to find the Appraisal points of a Pilot –KPAs to be more precise 4. How to go about finding the right country to sell Islamic Insurance Ground rules: 1. It’s a telecom – so they are not checking your paper 2. Too much of silence is dangerous, u have to engage them all the time.3 Be very clear with your pronunciation, diction voice modulations as he is not seeing u gesticulate. Be loud. Case 1: This was a typical ops case. A few pokes made me realize this is a local company, a govt body, is suffering from loss of customers due to long time of processing leading to frustration. The guy kept repeating the fact that most of the application did not need any house survey by the officers but still they used to continue with the process (This was a hint). Poke him more he will give u the entire process flow: 1. Receive 2. Documentation 3. Survey 4. Permission 5. Fee collection 6. Approval 7. Installation. Poke him more he will come out with the time on each process. It was found points1, 2, 5, 6 dint take much time. 3, 4, 7 were the time consumers. 4, 7 nothing could be done. Zeroed on 3. Final solution: make categories of applications basis survey requirement. A: Needs survey as it is close to bridges, lakes, rivers etc. B: does not require survey as it is in plain lands. Find indicators to sort out such applications 1. Maps 2. Customer questionnaire 3. Experience from old customers Case 2: Typical micro-eco case. Supply overpowers demand. Prices will fall, profits will go down. Hell will let loose upon the farmers. Solution: 1. Store it to sell in future = So then think of storage cost + lost of quality + Loss of moisture in the fruit 2. Any sort of value addition possible = 1. Pulp 2. Ketchup 3. Juices & Squash etc Case3: That was 5G an easy one, I know u ppl will crack it Case 4: I messed up with this case. Asked the preliminary questions

on the current company ops, why they wanted to expand, and particular revenues targets etc. I dint lay out a structure as such and came out with random variables 1. Size, demo, populations of Islam, income slabs, requirement etc. Missed out on a very big point and that was govt regulations which was declared to me in the end. What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

1. Rapport 2. Picked up the hints well 3. Was honest if I got stuck 4. Dint maintain long silence over the phone 1. Messed up the brain teasers because I was pretty much caught unawares most of the time. The last round’s brain teaser was made to be mailed to me to the partner, and it had to be done on 10 minutes!! ADL needs separate and an early preparation than the rest as the rounds start early than the actual placements Got the Job

59

AT Kearney

<

Name Company Interviewer My State

PI Case

Post Case PI Pls Note

Abhineet Sawa AT Kearney Abhishek Poddar 6:00pm, My 10th interview (first at ATK) I arrived 6 hours late. Parthenon & Diamond had turned down my request to attend the 2nd round of interview because I was late. ATK & Deloitte were the only other options left for my day 1. I had little hopes from McKinsey & BCG had said that they will get “back to me” ATK interviewers were already packing for their flights back. Interview cocoordinator said that all offers have been made and they may not consider me now. Somehow they agreed to initiate my process. Tell me about yourself: The usual stuff Why were you so late? How many interviews have you attended? What other companies did you interview with? Type: Market Sizing / Demand Estimation Estimate the size of car Head lights market in India Me: Mkt Size = Avg. price X # bulbs # bulbs has 2 drivers (#1) new cars (#2) replacements due to “age” of the bulb Interviewer: You forgot one more driver (#3) replacement for bulbs damaged in accidents, which is a big driver Rest of the case was simple. Overall it was a reasonable solution to a simple problem Done in 15 mins. Asked to wait for the second round N.a.

<

Name Company Interviewer My State PI Case

Post Case PI

Pls Note

Abhineet Sawa AT Kearney Mohit Rana 6:20pm, My 11th interview, 2nd interview @ ATK Tell me about yourself: I started with my points. I kept rambling for 1:30 mins when the interviewer interrupted and asked let us get on with the case(1) (They did not want to miss their dinner back home with Family I guess) Type: Market Sizing again Estimate the market size of post-its in India Me: Mkt Size = Avg. price X # post its I used a bottom up approach. Use the population and estimate the # of post its each person uses. Consumption buckets: (a) office use (b) household usage (b) is too small so focus only on (a) Post-it consumption varies by 1. Income 2. Industry type 3. Age of person (post it being a relatively new concept may be highly used by young) Interviewer looked satisfied with the solution What other companies are on your radar? What is the preference order? I was not sure of results from other companies. So I clearly indicated that companies X & Y are still not closed; I rank them above ATK(2) I got hints that I may get an offer at ATK. As soon as I got out of the interview, I requested my wife to check results with other companies. 1. If it is an interview late in the day keep answers short & meaty (especially if the interviewers have a flight to catch) 2. Be frank and honest.

<

Name Company Interviewer My State PI

Abhineet Sawa AT Kearney Mohit Rana & Vikas Kaushal 6:45pm, My 12th interview, 3rd interview @ ATK Tell me about yourself: I started with my points. ? Asked about my role at Inductis? How much client relationship did you handle?

While the interview started with Mohit alone, Vikas walked in to observe the interview after 10 minutes. This was a strong signal to me that I may get an offer.

Pls Note

What was the level of clients whom you interacted with? I said middle management almost twice a day, few CXOs and on rare occasions to the CEO. (Interviewers showed particular strong interest in this question) What other companies are you interviewing with? What is your preference order? I was asked to wait outside. This is when I checked with my wife who said that other companies have dinged me. There was one short discussion with Vikas where he made me the offer which I accepted. Following is a summary of my experience from day 1. 1. Day 1 is extremely crunched if you have multiple shortlists and the process will not allow you to attend all interviews. Companies delay interviews. Sometimes companies have 2 first round interviews when CAS has scheduled only one interview for you. If you have back to back interviews, you will surely miss 3-4 interviews. I had 8 1st round interviews scheduled before 4pm, of which I got delayed for 4 & missed 2. 2. Prioritize among companies based on 2 things (a) how much you like a company (b) What is your chance of getting through. In a more geeky terminology look at the expected value instead of focusing on the payoff alone. Everyone does ‘a’ but ‘b’ is tough to do and must be done on the fly on the date of interview. ‘b’ is dependent on how (i) how well you did in the interview, (ii) has a company given some hints that they are interested in you (iii) how much is the competition for that job. I realized this only after half the day had passed.

and hence currently the demand and supply of coal matched. Our client was planning to increase its capacity to in the next one year. Can you design their coal strategy for the short, medium, and long terms? Supply Chain Strategy The case exploration went as usual. Basically, the issues were that Govt. is involved in procurement of any new coal mines or increasing the capacity of existing mines. The processes of govt. are long and thus whereas in the long run we can think of lobbying for acquiring a coal mine ourselves or helping our supplier acquire one, something else needed to be done in the short run. All the procurement costs had to be looked at and some cost benefit analysis was also involved in deciding that in the long run our client would be better off acquiring a coal mine themselves. In the short run, we had to look at alternate sources in the adjacent countries. Some more cost and risk analysis was involved in deciding which source was the best option. In international transportation of coal, shipping costs came into discussion and Sirish specifically asked me to look into the various shipping costs. At one point, we even came down to F

listing the various costs involved in shipping. When I had exhausted my possibilities, he said that he didn’t expect me to come up with all the possible costs because I was perhaps not acquainted with the shipping industry and he just wanted to see how I went about recognizing various costs (structure?). He then told me some more costs that are involved in shipping. Medium term strategy involved a plan on how to manage the migration from short to long term procurement strategy.

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

After this, he talked for a while about this case and the strategies he thought were possible. He told me he had taken it from one of his real assignments. In the end, he asked me if I had any question. Some of my answers brought out my passion for my hobby – Workout. I realized later that these answers stayed with Sirish even after the interview was over. Nothing. This one was also positive. If you feel strongly about a hobby or any other thing, try to subtly fit that into some of your answers at appropriate places. People have different passions and this differentiates them. Bring out yours. Questions can come from anywhere and many of them will be unexpected. You can’t prepare for every question beforehand. I think a better way to prepare for your interviews is to think a lot about how your life went and made you what you are. Have a consistent story right from childhood to the interview day ready. Then whatever question the interviewer throws at you, just take a thread off your story and frame your answer impromptu. This means you can’t lie but I think being yourself in the interview helps differentiate you because you are unique.

Outcome

I also don’t think it necessary to write down your PI answers during preparation. Just think a lot and have your story ready in mind. Was made an offer.

F2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Suyog Kotecha McKinsey & Company Don’t Remember First This was my first interview with McKinsey and was obviously nervous. Normally McKinsey sends out profiles of all the panelist couple of days in advance. But this guy was last minute addition and I had no clue about his background. (Hence don’t remember the name as well!) Got some basic information about him quickly from alums and proceeded with the interview. Started with Usual PI questions… Take me through your resume. Discussed in detail about what exactly was my role at work and he started with the case. The case was about Oil company (Retail Fuel Distribution) having fuel stations at various places all over India. They have introduced a loyalty program but customer do not value the same so suggest possible remedial actions First narration of the problem was vague so I tried to drill it down to a specific question. It was basically about loyalty program where customers can redeem the points earned for small gifts. But customers are not satisfied with the loyalty program and do not value it much. Firstly I had to understand why they don’t value it or not satisfied. : Was it problem with execution of the program (how the points are earned, how they are redeemed, is the whole process customer friendly or there are service problem in between? : Or was it because of the structure of the program itself where the number of points earned and kind of gifts received through redemption process itself are not valuable. After brief discussion, we concluded it was the problem about the structure and basically customer was thinking that kind of gifts received through redemption are not worth it. After that we discussed about possible solutions. : In order to increase the value of the gift we need to increase amount of points they earn. : For that they have to buy more amount of stuff from station. : Limited scope in increasing their fuel consumption. : Hence look at other places like opening up small retail shops and other servicing facilities. Align your loyalty program with all these facilities to increase the wallet spend of your customer at fuel station. F5

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview

Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Outcome

At this stage he asked me to conclude the case. The PI went very well. He was interested in my background and knowing in detail about my work experience which was my strong point. The case went average. I was asking too many questions in order to define the problem very precisely. But he was more interested in getting ahead in discussion. (He thought he had clearly specified the problem and there was no need to further define the problem!) I should have taken hint and closed the initial definition phase as soon as possible. Also did not define the structure of the entire case at start. I was forming sub structures at the start of every discussion but never discussed the complete approach with him at the start of the case. In Consulting prep, the amount of time spent of PI and Case Prep are very disproportionate. Case prep takes 10 times more time than PI. But in actual interview PI is as important (sometimes even more important) as Case. Hence please give due attention to PI prep at least two weeks before the interview dates! While I was solving the case, based on his expressions, I thought I was performing terribly. But later from the alum, I understood that he typically gives that expressions and actual feedback from him in evaluations was positive. Was asked to proceed to second round.

F<

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Suyog Kotecha McKinsey & Company Shirish Sankhe, Director Second Shirish and me were chemical engineers from same college UDCT Mumbai. And we had also good discussions in previous meetings. (dinner organized by McKinsey) I was told by alum that he is director and it is very important that I crack this interview. We started with casual discussion about UDCT and he asked me about my rank there and also at ISB. He went into details about academic performance. At the end of the interview we again had general chat about his work in renewable energy sector and he was very interested in talking about it. Studying some of his earlier projects did help! Overall, in this interview PI took more time than Case. And I was able to build rapport with him in the initial 5-10 minutes of PI which helped me a lot in case discussion. The case was about Mumbai Metro. Basically the investments required are in the range of 40,000 Cr. and government do not have any money to fund the project so how would you go about arranging the finances and making project viable. I started with listing down various ways of raising finances. He stopped me and said he is not interested in those details. It was very clear that private involvement is necessary and asked me to look at how to make project viable. Then I made a small structure about the possible revenue streams from the project. (Asset – Non Asset revenue structure). Then I gave him number of possible revenue streams in both the classes. From that we picked up Tickets, Advertising, Shops as the most significant ones. But after doing some numbers I realized that it was nowhere enough to make project viable. Then he asked me to think creatively and forget about solving the case in structured manner. I started giving him various ideas and then on of that was use of land adjoining the stations and tracks. He was looking for that point and then he took on discussion from there and explained to me how high are the land prices in Mumbai and how the appreciation in land prices due to Metro tracks is more than enough to make the project viable. F@

What do you think went right for you in the interview?

The PI stuff was good. Being from UDCT helped in breaking the ice. Again I made sure we spent more time on PI as I knew I had a strong point there. Because of good start in PI, in the case discussion he was very helpful. He was more in interested in having a discussion rather than going through four meticulous stages of solving the case.

What do you think went wrong in this interview

Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Nothing much. I knew I had done well in this interview but was still apprehensive because I had the impression that first round did not go that well.

Again focus on PI. It is lot more important that the amount of time we give during the prep phase. It is very important to have a personal story which will make interviewer interested in you. Was asked to proceed to third round.

FF

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Suyog Kotecha McKinsey & Company Rajat Gupta, Director Third I was actually supposed to go interviews for other companies. But I was asked to wait and go for third round immediately. I knew Rajat Gupta is also very senior person and two back to back interviews with directors means I had done well in last interview. At the start of the discussion itself, he told me that I have received strong rating from the first two interviews which made me feel relaxed. Then he told me that he is not interested in case or anything like that but would like to know me as person. He went into detail about my rural background, education in vernacular medium and how did I cope up moving from village to Mumbai at the age of 16. He also asked me about family (parents, brothers and sisters) and what do they do. We spent almost 15 mins discussing about PI and then we went on to work experience. I had mentioned one of the troubleshooting project I did at BPCL, Kochi and he asked me explain more about the same.

Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

He told me to take that example as case and explain it to him how I went about doing the troubleshooting and what are the three most important things I learned from the while exercise. I am not giving more details about the case here because it was very directly related to my work experience and did not belong to any general category. We talked about the same for almost another 15 mins then I concluded with three learnings from the project. I think the whole interview was only about PI. At the start of the discussion itself, he made it clear that they were interested which helped a lot. Also knowing in detail about the troubleshooting project helped as I could discuss the same for 15 mins. Nothing much! Whatever you write in the resume, make sure you know enough about it and it is really something you think is very important achievement in your life. You should be prepared to speak for 15 mins on any of the lines in FG

Outcome

your resume. Was made offer.

F9

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type

Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in

Kirti Varun Avasarala Mckinsey Rajat Gupta (Director) R1, 1st interview Tell me something about yourself? How would your team members at work describe you? What is your most memorable achievement in life? Some discussion about the article I had written in WSJ about Green Business How should India reduce its Carbon Intensity by 25%? Public Policy Rajat was leading the Climate Change Special initiative and so he was visibly intrigued by my WSJ article and we had a good discussion around that for a few minutes. He is a very nice and articulate person and he put me at ease immediately. The case started off as an extension of that discussion. I asked him a few initial clarification questions: • What is Carbon Intensity? How is it measured? • What is the level of GDP that needs to be maintained while reducing the Carbon Intensity? • What is the time frame for the implementation? To this he said that Carbon intensity is the amount of CO2 emitted per unit of GDP produced. No compromise in GDP growth from the current trend of 7-8%. Time frame was next 3-5 yrs. I laid out the following approach: • Identify sources of CO2 emissions • Disaggregate them by sectors and geographies within India • Prioritize these based on Amount of CO2 that can be reduced and the impact on GDP that would occur • Implement steps to reduce Carbon intensity for the prioritized areas He was visibly happy with this approach. I detailed out the emission sources and identified the following sectors as the major contributors to emissions: Power, Transportation, Construction, Cement, Steel and Agriculture. As I was discussing the remaining steps in my approach, he said that he understood them and asked me to quickly synthesize the case. I did that and the case ended there. After that he asked a couple of PI questions which I mentioned above. I asked him a few questions about what Mckinsey had done in the Climate Change Special initiative. I also asked him what still keeps him going in the firm after so many years. Pretty much everything. Connected well with the interviewer as he was leading the Climate Change Special Initiative of Mckinsey and had a G

the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

good discussion about Carbon Emissions and the fall outs of the Copenhagen Conference. Also did the case very well. Didn’t answer the question about team members that well. Please read up about the interviewer’s interest areas at work or otherwise and try to have a knowledgeable discussion around that. Yes

G

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type

Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this

Kirti Varun Avasarala Mckinsey Faridun Dhotiwala (Associate Partner) R1, 2nd interview Questions about my work experience at ITC How was life at ISB? Some questions about my co-curricular activities at ISB 5 words that my team members would use to describe me General discussion about ITC and whether everybody in ITC smokes Valuation for a hotel chain that has existing hotels and new hotels in different stages of completion Valuation This was a long drawn out case with lots of details and numbers. Can’t recollect it completely as Faridun asked me to leave my working sheets with him. So, I’ll mention whatever I can recollect. There is a hotel chain whose revenues and EBITDA margins are known. It is also currently expanding with 50 new hotels in different parts of the country in different stages of completion. I was asked to do a valuation. After asking a couple of initial questions about the hotel and its operations, I suggested the following 2 approaches for valuation: • DCF based valuation • EV/EBITDA multiple based valuation Faridun asked me to use the 2nd approach. I did the calculation for the existing hotels based on their EBITDA margins and the multiple values (which I was asked to guess and I told him it could be in the range of 510 and he said use 7). While I was doing the numbers, he shot some quick calculations at me and I was able to respond to them. Clearly, my quant skills were being tested here. After completing the calculation, he told me that for the new hotels the chain was looking for Private Equity investment and I had to present a case for this investment. We discussed about the different new hotels that were being planned and the factors that were needed to be considered like location, competition, region specific macroeconomic factors like income levels, purchasing power, etc. Here it was more of a qualitative discussion and he wasn’t looking for any numbers. The case concluded here. Since Faridun was initially not scheduled to be a part of the interview team, I didn’t have any idea about his profile and the work he does in Mckinsey. So, I asked him a few questions about that. The case was a bit unusual, so I wasn’t completely sure whether it went well or not. The PI was good and he seemed to like my answers. Not sure G

interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Keep your cool even if the case is unusual and is filled with a lot of details and numbers. Show the interviewer that you can handle the ambiguity and still come up with a logical approach. Yes

G2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type

Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in

Kirti Varun Avasarala Mckinsey Noshir Kaka (Director) R2, 1st interview Tell me something about yourself? Why Mckinsey? Life at ISB My most significant leadership experience Questions about work experience at ITC How do you improve the performance of a Call Center? Operations Noshir is one of the nicest and most humble people you’ll ever encounter in an interview. He makes you feel so comfortable that you just don’t realize that you are talking to a Mckinsey Director. He is also probably “the decision maker” when it comes to recruitments at ISB. We were discussing about my experience in ITC in implementing Operations Performance Improvements in a manufacturing setting. As an extension of that discussion, he asked me to apply the same to services industry, specifically in a Call Center. I told him that we could use the following metrics to measure performance – cost, call quality, delivery (meeting customer demand). He asked me to use Cost per employee as the performance metric. I laid out the following structure • Understand the components of Cost/employee • Analyze the process drivers for each component • Suggest suitable recommendations and an implementation plan He was satisfied with this structure and we started off discussing the 1st point. I disaggregated the cost components as follows: • Salary & Compensation • Long-term benefits • Training & Development • Infrastructure We then had a discussion about how can Compensation & Other benefits, which he told me were almost 60% of the costs, could be reduced. We started discussing aspects of motivation and during this I figured out that Attrition is the single biggest problem in Call Centers due to which high levels of compensation are paid to employees and it is difficult to reduce the cost of this component. At this stage, he ended the case. Since Noshir was involved in the design of ISB, I asked him a couple of questions about that and then we had a chat about what ISB should do to further reinforce its position as a top tier global school. Pretty much everything. Connected well with Noshir during PI and he seemed to be impressed with all the answers I gave. The case went very G5

the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

well as I could relate to my Operations experience and knew how to approach the problem and the related issues. Nothing Please enjoy the interview experience and show the interviewer that you are genuinely interested in solving the case Made an offer

G<

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of case, descriptively possible

Vivek Arora McKinsey & Co. Mr. Nalinikanth Gollagunta- Engagement Manager Round 1; Interview 1

PI Questions came after the case. It started with Nal asking about my prior work experience. All subsequent questions emanated from the first question which was: “Of all your achievements, which one do you think is the most important to you”. This was a classic case of being able to draw the interviewer to where you want to go. I talked about a very tough implementation project that I did at ITC Factory in Munger, Bihar. I said for me an achievement is about 2 things: (1) The Context in which I achieved it (2) What it meant to me at that stage. In the context part, I talked about managing an un-skilled workforce. Then he asked me how do you manage such a work force? I said by established an internal connect with them. He asked how do you do that? Went into a couple of instances which made me establish such connections. Although he had asked me to talk about just 1 instance, but seeing that he was impressed, I requested him if I could talk of another different type of incident which is also very close to my heart. He allowed. I talked about selling a extravagant project to the company chairman. It was about high-end world class patented Audio-Visual systems. Nal too seemed to have some knowledge about those equipments and thus we had an interesting conversation. The idea was, I could not only show my Project Implementation Abilities but also talk about Planning and Inter-personal skills. A Canned Juice Manufacturer facing drop in profitability. Cost/Profitability the The case was about a canned juice manufacturing company. Recently as they have diversified into different types/more variety of juices. Their as profitability has gone down in comparison to their competitors. Need to analyze, identify root causes and advice solutions to the client. I asked a few ‘Start-Up’ question These are standard questions which you would ask for most of the cases. Some of them were: How big is the client? Has been in the business for how long and how and when has their business strategy changed. Who are the major competitors? What are the various revenue streams (different type of juices et al)? He gave me some info but asked to assume one standard fruit juice for the analysis. Now I approached in the classical Profitability Case. Profit = Revenue – Cost. Problem can be in either of the two factors i.e. Revenue or Cost. I asked him if he wanted to delve into Revenue or Cost first. He advised to go into the cost aspect (we never visited the revenue aspect). Then he asked me about what are the various cost heads in such a business. G@

This was the key!!! Process Value Chain rules I drew the entire value chain from Agri-sourcing of fruits to In-Bound Logistics to Warehousing to Processing/Manufacturing to Out-Bound Logistics to Retailer to Customer. Started from the Left Side i.e. Sourcing. He asked me what could be reasons for lower profits. This was more of a brainstorming session. Coming from ITC (of e-choupal fame) background, I could talk the possibility of competitors being able to backward integrate and establish a symbiotic relationship with the farmers which allows them to remove the middle-men and thus get cheaper and good quality fruits, whereas our client has not done that. Then came to In-Bound logistics. I said that juicy fruits being mostly hygroscopic are prone to damage in transit. Talked about the quality of infrastructure en-route to their plants and quality of logistics partner. Then came the crux: Processing/Manufacturing. At first it was qualitative. I said the client might have a very high Cost/Unit because of excess/high quality infrastructure. Somehow this turned out to be the case. I realized there has been loads of ‘strategy’ based talking and there bound to be some nos. I asked him and he gave me whole lot of nos. about their manufacturing costs as well as the manufacturing costs of competitors. There was Maths involved here as he gave costs and throughputs of different plants of client as well as competition. Had to find out the average cost per unit of juice manufactured by client vs competition. Of course client’s cost of manufacturing was way higher. Talked about some ways as to how can this be brought down. Talked about economies of scale as some of the assets were under-utilized. This would involve launching other related products as well or expanding markets. There were a few more points discussed but this was merely a closure. Asked him a couple of questions on his area of expertise and how markets were shaping this year. What do you think I believe that your work-experience (which is a huge factor in your being went right for you in short-listed) must be reflected in the way you approach cases. the interview? Sometime we lose sight of that in following standard structures/frameworks etc. At each stage, I could use my FMCG and Manufacturing experience to come up possible reasons. So, your experiences must show in case solving as well and I believe I did that well. One very interesting thing, right at the start which I think worked well for me. When I entered the room, I generally talked about the view being great from the window. Nal generally asked whose room was it. I had not noticed the name-plate while entering which anyways was covered with a McKinsey signage. Looking at the books and brochures in the room, I made a guess giving the reason of the guess. It was Bang On!!! What do you think Nothing really. This was one of best interviews I gave on that day. went wrong in this interview Any tips for the Do not lose sight of Who you are and What have you achieved till date. GF

future batch based This should reflect in your interview. in this interview Also, be ready to delve into nos. Interviewer also wants to test your analytic ability with nos. as they back/justify your claims, ideas and suggestions. So ask him if he has nos. when he says “Cost is High” or “Profits are Low” etc. Outcome Passed on to a nearby room of 2nd R-1 Interview

GG

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Vivek Arora McKinsey & Co. Dr. Shirish Sankhe- Director Round 1; Interview 2 Just imagine. It does not get bigger than him. The senior most guy in the panel who is rumored to take the final call on each and every candidate. I was to interview with him in my Round-1. Thought this was the do or die situation. Questions started coming right from my CV. We talked about taking up very good projects additional to normal course curriculum, participation in sports, organizing ILS and some other personal focus areas for the year. Then he asked which one of the 3 academic experiences: School, Undergrad, ISB was most enriching. I split it into 2: Academic and Overall. Academic was School and Over-all was Undergrad for me. He asked me the reason. Came from the CV plus how it was important for personality development and so on…

Case question Case Type Narration of case, descriptively possible

Then he asked about my work-experience. Talked about CAPEX for a while. What did I do as Capex Manager etc. An Agri-Technology company has come up with a patent. This is a never seem before technology. How much should the company price the patent at? Valuation the Started off with the standard warm-up questions but somehow warm-up as questions and Dr. Sankhe don’t go too well. I asked him about the as background of the company/competition/industry. For each question I was quizzed on why did I think that question was relevant and how will it help me achieve the final objective i.e. valuation. Some useful information which I could generate was that the ‘patent’ was for cotton farming and would increase the yield of cotton growth. Realizing that it was a valuation case, I proposed following the a combination of 3 approaches -(1) Value Based Costing (2) Competition Based Costing (3) Cost-Up; to come up with a band of prices and then zero-in on the final price based on other factors. He agreed. Started with Value i.e. Willingness to Pay on the part of the customer. The customers would of course be cotton formers. Then he asked what is the value of the patent to them? I told him about it increasing the yield and asked if he could provide some nos. on the same. He said it increases the yield per sq. ft by a factor of 50%. Believing that it would again be a complicated nos. case, I took some time and came up with a complicated structure to calculate the monetary value of this increase in yield. It involved numerous factors such as average land-holing, no. of G9

cotton farmers, current yield, cotton prices in the market etc. etc. But rest-assured Dr. Sankhe’s cases would rarely involve complicated calculations. He said he was looking for something very simple and asked me to think about it. Now was the moment of surprise. While I was thinking, he asked me to pause. He said “Oh you have worked in Capex right? How would you reduce Capex Cost in a Power Plant?” I was really surprised. I started off by giving him a ‘structure’ (yeah right!!!) which we need to put in place to identify the scope of reduction in Capex. I came up with various stages involved in setting up and commissioning a power plant which would be: Engineering Design > Construction of Infrastructure > Procurement of equipments > Electricity Generation > Electricity Distribution & Transmission Told him we need to look into Capex requirement at each of stage and started off with Engineering Design. Just I as started, he asked me to go back to the Patent Case (strange!!!!) He wanted a simplified model to calculate the value. After some discussion, we have me the annual turnover of cotton in India and the average price per ton. From this I calculate the value of the higher yield that all Indian farmers could get. He asked apart from increasing revenue, how else the patent could benefit the farmers. Now with revenue there has to be cost!!! I said the new technology could lead to reduction in costs. Was asked to brainstorm on the costs involved. I told land, water for irrigation etc. Yes the patent reduced irrigation requirements. So I talked about reducing water consumption, associated energy costs as well as the psychological costs and risks associated with reliance on monsoons which could now be mitigated. He asked what else? Very happily I told him that now lesser seeds may be required. He said “The patent is a variety of seeds only”. I realized I had forgotten to ask him what does the ‘patent’ entail….in one of the professor’s language, “is it a bird or a plane”. Should have asked it upfront. Anyways recovered. Had already found out of the increase in revenue (was asked to neglect decrease in costs). Told him this would be the maximum willingness to pay and thus the upper end of the price band. He agreed. Asked him the cost of Research and Development. He asked why? Told him this would be the lower end of the price band unless the focus was not profitability but social upliftment. He said the focus was completely profitability and gave me a Net Present Value (assume N). Could not understand it immediately but realized that it is Revenue net the costs. Thus, the price band for the patent (in NPV terms) would be between Rs. 0 to N. He agreed and asked me to zero down on a value. Told him we need to look at similar launches in the past to capture some trend (and therefore arrive at a value in the middle) 9

but he cut me short and said that no need to look at past records and you would price it at less than N as we need to incentive the farmers to overcome their switching costs by passing on some benefit to them. Now this is what I eventually wanted to say but could not. What do you think Firstly it seemed that Nothing went right. I wasn’t confident interviewing went right for you in with him. Missed basic pointers and took time to identify the ‘simple’ the interview? model he was looking for. And of course couldn’t conclude well.

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

But, later I was told, what went right was the CAPEX piece He wanted to test how good I was with my basics while I was caught up doing something else. Can’t expect this from anyone but him. The framework was bang on!!! Got a bit psyched. Could not structure the Patent Case well and it was more of bouncing off ideas. But was later told this is what happens with everyone when they interview with Dr. Sankhe Can’t emphasize more the need to be thorough with your work-ex and reflect your experience in the case. And if can, be confident no matter whosoever is interviewing you. Please remember, you know stuff much better than the interviewer. You have slogged your back while working. Who else would know about it better? Made it to Round 2

9

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Vivek Arora McKinsey & Co. Mr. Rajat Gupta- Director (Head Industrial & Operations practice of McKinsey in India) Round 2; Interview 1 I was told that he was very keen to meet me because of my Operations background and was especially interested in my CAPEX experience. I was told that he wanted to know more about what I had done during that stint. So I went in with the frame of mind that I have to maximize on that aspect of my profile. As expected, he asked me thread bare on what all I did in that stint. He did try to intimidate me by passing a few sarcastic remarks but I seemed to enjoy it and gave him appropriate responses.

Case question Case Type Narration of case, descriptively possible

Then he asked a very interesting “What do I expect to hear if I were to go out and ask people randomly what they thought about you?” Now McKinsey allows you to be innovative, frank and candid in such questions. But these need to be backed by some logic. Told him that different people are entitle to have different opinions about a person and how my different types of interactions i.e. in class, in events, in sports would result in varied responses. Also, talked about the situational aspect of it being 1st Day of placements and how that could influence the responses. Then came up with a few candid ones. You can call me to find those out The case was about a company thinking of launching a Hovercraft- a motor boat based transportation system between two parts of Mumbai. Was supposed to advise the client on the optimal fare for such a service. Valuation the Was told this is a short case and we need to wrap up the case fast. as Without asking too many ‘Start-Up’ questions, came to the 3 dimensional as approach of (1) Value to Customer (Willingness to Pay) (2) Competition (3) Cost-up. Started with Value. Was asked to brainstorm on how could this service be valuable to the customers? Talked about the qualitative aspects of Mumbai traffic having various tangible and in-tangible costs. Tangible benefits could be saving of time, fuel and fare. Intangible benefits could be alleviation of psychological costs like being stuck in traffic and getting to spend less valuable time at work and office. But he said that fare is something we need to find out Then moved to the 2nd aspect of competition. Asked him what were the other modes of transport available to the public? He said two alternatives existed- Road (Taxi) and Rail (Train). Asked him information on Time and Cost. Don’t remember the exact nos. so will use indicative figures. By Taxi you took 45 minutes and incurred costs (all inclusive- tangible + intangible) of Rs. 250. By train you took 30 minutes and incurred costs of Rs. 50. Now asked him the time supposed to be taken by Hovercraft and how many 9

of them were there. He said that a hovercraft would take 20 minutes to cover the distance. The company was planning to start off with just 1 hovercraft. Asked him it’s capacity and he gave a figure of 100 people. In a flash of rushing ideas, I just said that then there would be a capacity constraint or atleast the hovercraft would always be full as the no. of travelers would far exceed 100 in a busy place like Mumbai. Although at that stage I didn’t know how this was important in the context of the case but he liked it Ok, coming back. Hovercraft saves 25 minutes over Taxi and 10 minutes over Train. So though would try and valuate in monetary terms this saving of 25 minutes and 10 minutes. But point to note is that cost of Train is much lower than cost of Taxi. So, value based approach if applied on both the modes would result in two different nos. poles apart. He quizzed me how to proceed and after some discussion, I concluded that it made no business sense for the Hovercraft company to compete with the Train and thus focus on competing with the Taxi only. Plus, with only 100 seats, there would be no issue of in-sufficient traffic. Now this is where the earlier remark on capacity made sense At this stage he asked me to synthesize by giving an elevator pitch to the client CEO, asked me to fit it in 1 minute and started looking at his watch saying I was being evaluated for brevity.

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

To wrap up, knowing that he Head the Ops practice, I asked him a question on benchmarking in operations and whether Indian firms are at a stage where they can be set as international benchmarks. Surprisingly, he asked me why I wanted to know about it. Now this was strange as I had never ever heard of an interviewer asking the interviewee a counter question on the closing question. I told him how we had to benchmark many of our expansion/ up gradation projects with Japanese firms and wanted a view from someone who has been exposed to such facilities across the world. He was satisfied and then answered the question. Discussion on Work-ex. Taking the sarcastic remarks in the right way and not getting intimidated. Again reflecting the learning from the workexperience in the case. The synthesis could have been better. His staring at the watch for an accurate 1 min pitch intimidated me a bit. My bad. Otherwise nothing much was wrong here. Again, work-ex thoroughness is imperative. Think through carefully the closing questions that the interviewer offers to answer at the end of the interview. The questions need to make sense in the backdrop of your profile, experiences and those of the interviewer. Moved to 2nd R-2 Interview

92

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

Case Type Narration of case, descriptively possible

Vivek Arora McKinsey & Co. Mr. Noshir Kaka- Director Round 2; Interview 2

PI came after a couple of cases. This PI for this interview too was WorkEx centric. Noshir asked me about the two most important leadership instances in me work life. Again my idea here was to use these 2 instances to reflect upon 2 different sides of my profile. First example was of course on leading one very tough project in a logistically challenging location. The other was captaining my ex-company’s cricket team which comprised of my bosses and super-bosses, and the leadership tools that you need to put into use in such situations. I was given 2 mini-cases in this round: (a) You need to advice Mr. Tata on how he would design Nano (materials cost Rs. 65000) from Indica (materials cost Rs. 245,000) (b) Indian IT industry has grown at over 20% in the last 15 years. What do we need to do in order to maintain this growth trajectory for the next 10 years? (a) Procurement Cost Management (b) Growth Strategy the This 11th interview of the day and for sure the final/most critical interview as for McKinsey. When I was given the first case on Tata Nano, he could as figure out looking at the time of the day as well as the previous few interviews that all he wanted was a structured brain-storming output on strategic cost management. So, I did not spend any time on asking clarifications/start-up questions and got down to business. As there wasn’t any readymade framework/structure for this, I imagined myself a part of the Nano team and thought through the sequence in which the material design and procurement process would unfold (of course, again, my experiences at work came in very handy). After a minute of thought, I started off by saying that this was a huge cutdown on costs (by almost 75%) thus process improvements won’t suffice and that it called for radical changes in the design and sourcing processes. I then recommended that we should first identify the various steps that are involved in the material procurement process and see how we can cut costs in each one of them. The sequence I gave was as follows: Technical Specifications of the car and individual parts and subassemblies > Preparing the Bill of Materials (BOM) > Identification and Selection of Vendors > Negotiations > Logistics- Freight, Duties, Insurance, Taxes etc. I asked Noshir for his approval which he promptly gave. Then I brainstormed various ways of cutting costs as each step. Car & Parts 95

Specifications: Car to adhere to the bare minimum specifications that are needed to be adhered to by Indian Rules n Regulations (E.g. no need to Euro N+1 of Euro N compliance required in India) but without compromise on the safety of the passenger which is very important. Technical Specifications of the parts and sub-assemblies to the at Minimum Technical Standard (MTS) i.e. the specs need to be just right to meet the requirements. Bill of Materials (BOM): Talked about how big companies being risk averse always order and add extra quantity of material in everything. E.g. if 90 kgs steel is required, they would order 100 kgs and end up putting 95 kgs. So optimal safety margins need to defined and be adhered to. Identification and Selection of Vendors: Said for experience that big companies chose their trusted and loyal vendors, and are inclined to have single vendors/point of contact for a plethora of related/unrelated materials. This way, the vendors make unnecessary money. Thus, to manufacture the lowest car in the world, we need to rationally evaluate vendors outside our ‘Zone of Comfort’ and their scope of supplies. Talked for Chinese manufacturers that give both cost and quality advantage. Gave examples of some proposals of Chinese manufacturers that I had evaluated at work. Negotiations: Then, negotiate hard. Tata can use their buyer power (multiple businesses and product lines) to fleece suppliers but showing them possible opportunities in near future. Logistics- Freight, Clearance etc.: This was a pure brainstorming session with ideas like bulk shipments through sea (no part shipments, air freights etc.). Centralized insurance and clearance agents. Managing road taxes etc. Finally, something which is typically talked of in manufacturing: INNOVATION. Although setting Indica as an anchor and working backwards is a possible way, big companies like Tata Motors which have presence in the foreign markets (talked of JLR) and access to the modern technology, must mobilize their R&D department to come up with revolutionary car design. Some cutting-edge innovation like a new cost effective fuel injection system etc. Whoa…I spoke for 20 minutes continuously non-stop. Did not find the need to. Noshir was constantly smiling and acknowledging. Then straight away came the second case on IT. Now that’s his area of expertise and he wanted to check if I could talk about an industry I had no prior exposure to. I came to know later that this case was in some past year’s case-book and he had written a paper on that. Anyways, I had missed both Again I gave the initial questions a pass and asked for a minute to think. Exhausted after so many cases, I was not able to recollect any jazzy structure and thus stuck to the basics. I proposed looking at 2 types of factors/aspects which need to looked at by the IT giants of the country: (1) Internal Factors (2) External Factors 9<

Told him that I am a firm believer that any individual/organization should first have an internal introspection and then start looking at the world outside. Thus would recommend starting off with the Internal Factors. He smiled and said go-ahead. Internal factors meant how the company needs to improve and uplift it-self internally. Said the biggest assets for IT firms were its people and it boiled down to (a) Productivity (b) Innovation. (a) Productivity: Here, I used Productivity = f(Efficiency, Effectiveness) . Explained the difference between the two and gave some ideas on how IT industries could do that. We could see Microsoft from one of the windows so pointed out and shared some experiences I had while I was visiting an old friend there. (b) Innovation: This is always a safe point to say. No one will challenge Innovation as an improvement measure . Talked a bit about Google and how it fostered a culture of innovation. This again translated to sound people practices. (2) External Factors: Here I used the 3 Us framework in disguise- Users, Uses, Usage. Users: Talked about IT firms expanding their user base in India and un-explored markets abroad. Once, once you get an organization on-board, need to penetrate to all departments. Uses: Used some SAIT funds to discuss codability and measurability. How certain key process where still handled by companies internally (gave example from work) as they were highly strategic in nature. Here, IT firms could built enhance their credibility and build stronger partnerships with the clients. Usage: Discussed growth through service provisions like AMCs etc. And then of course, Mergers and Acquisition abroad. Talk of more and more Indian firm’s expanding outside India through this medium and how biggies like Infosys, TCS etc. could continue this trend. This was followed by PI (explained above). Asked him a couple of questions on increasing role of consultants in assisting implementation and talked about the trend at McKinsey. What do you think By this time, I was a robot. This was the best interview of the day for me. went right for you in the interview? What do you think Nothing went wrong in this interview Any tips for the If you can’t immediately think of established structures, just think-through future batch based the logical sequence of events. If you were there in that situation then in this interview how would things unfold stepwise? Then within each step, ministructures/frameworks would readily fit. Again, give examples from workex and life beyond work. If you have seen something happen, it has to be true. Also, industry awareness is important to some extent. Reading a Financial Daily for 2 months before the interviews if enough. Outcome Made an Offer

9@

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Gaurav Punia Mckinsey & Company Sameer Shetty, Engagement Manager Round 1 – Interview 1 Tell me about yourself Why do you continually push yourself to perform well academically Sameer is into sports himself hence my interest in running became our topic of conversation for several minutes including how I train for half marathons. Our client is one of the largest banks in India. They have done fairly well in retail banking but have struggled in commercial banking division. Identified details about the bank – which region, products etc …… Next identified the competition and the products they offered. Grouped products as per the total volume of transactions. Was able to isolate bad performance to a single product - forex derivatives. Then tried to understand how banks make money from forex derivates and by benchmarking with competition was able to ascertain why we aren’t selling.

What do you think went right for you in the interview?

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

At this time we realized we had already spent about 35min on the PI + Case – so was asked to synthesize the case. Was able to scope the problem well and isolate the problem to a single product. It was never an interview, more so a conversation. Honestly speaking, for atleast the first 10min of the case I had little idea on where it was going but I tried to employ a MECE structure and spent considerable time on being absolutely clear on the problem. Finally, even though I had not touched upon the recommendations in the case analysis, I was able to give 2 recommendations as part of my synthesis. This was something which Sameer actually liked. My lack of practical knowledge about the banking sector. PI is important! Read and be comfortable on different sectors. Also don’t lose you cool even if you think the case is going around in circles. Went for Round 1 second interview

9F

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Gaurav Punia Mckinsey and Company Rajat Gupta, Director First Round, second interview Walk me through your resume. Questions on my academic performance at School, Engineering College and ISB Strengths If you had to relive ISB again whom would you want to be Weaknesses – here was really grilled as he continually pushed back on each of my prepared answers until I finally cracked Lots of questions on my work experience. Why do you want to move from EDA to consulting Do you think you will do well in a consulting company Why Mckinsey and how will you make your decision between firms No Case

Really got along with Rajat. Nothing Practice your PI!! It is as important as your cases. Moved to round 2.

9G

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Gaurav Punia Mckinsey and Company Vivek Pandit, Partner Round 2 – Interview 1 The interview started on dramatic note as I came about 15min late. Was asked the reason for coming late and promptly responded with the truth. Vivek was a little shocked but finally told me that he appreciated my honesty – “integrity was as important as intellect in consulting” Again some questions on the resume especially the work I had with Taiwanese client and the challenges I had faced while working with them. Since I had also worked with Indian clients – was asked to compare them with Asian clients. Toughest position I had been in at a client and how I handled it Where do I see myself in 10 years. Why consulting If not consulting then what Haiti Crisis and why does a country like Japan respond well while countries like India suffer. A little bit on Reliance and Lyondell deal and what I thought were the risks for that.

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this

Problem with Airline industry in India Thankfully had read up on this. • Started out through the first principles – supply of total seats and the total demand. • Quickly established the various cost heads – fuel, leasing planes, facilities and staff It really was a conversation and soon realized that Vivek didn’t really want me to solve it like a case but just discuss. So we started on the analysis phase where we started discussing what is that Air India can do. Identified the places where Air India loses more money compared to competition (both India and foreign). Was able to use some points from Southwest and Singapore airlines and did a great job in identifying the problems with hub and spoke model of operation – price competition on arterial routes and operational efficiency. Everything. Kept my composure at the start. Nothing 99

interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Practicing cases is important but please don’t neglect your PI and general reading. An intelligent conversation backed by well researched data can really help. Got the offer

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Aditya Kulkarni McKinsey

First interview A lot of questions about Google and what it is like to work there. He was very interested in how Google maintains market share. He wanted to know how Google suggest works (It was on my CV that I wrote Google suggest for India), and we discussed the scale and infrastructure that Google has and how it’s gaining competitive advantage from it. I told him searching porn well is very important for a search engine entering a new market, and from there we went into market entry strategies for the search engines. The PI went on for 20-25 minutes, at which point he realized he had to ask me a case. He asked me a really simple case which got over in 5 minutes. It was a case about a pineapple juice manufacturer. He wanted me to calculate the capacity that would be required for the plant. The case was very trivial. It was just multiplying a bunch of numbers together. Less than 5 minutes.

Went into the 2rd interview

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Aditya Kulkarni McKinsey Noushir Kaka Second interview Was very interested in my background at Google. We talked for over 20 minutes about the work that I’d done. He asked about the projects I had on my CV (Orkut, Gmail) and what impact they had and working at Google. Wasn’t really a case, but more of a discussion. “What should Infosys do today to move up the value chain?” Noushir also works in IT, so he wanted to discuss what Infosys should do next. We talked about their business model, about billing rates and how they can leverage their assets. I brought up the point of “Centers of Excellence” and how they don’t really work in IT services. He asked why, then asked me to come up with alternatives to the model. I talked a while about a skunk-works type project team that they should set up. We discussed the future of the market etc… The interview was very conversational. No case really, more of a discussion around what I thought of the IT industry and where I see the future of the industry. Nothing much, really.

Went into the 3rd interview

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Aditya Kulkarni McKinsey Rajat Gupta Third interview This interview was about 20 minutes long, and it was all PI. He asked about why I did an MBA, what I liked/disliked about working at a place like Google. This interview was very different from the traditional case interviews. He asked me “What would people on the campus say about Aditya Kulkarni?”, “Why consulting when you’re doing so well in Google?” etc…

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

I was very honest with my answers, and didn’t use any of the canned responses. I even said that I’m quite lazy and don’t like doing hard work. We even discussed strategies to do well at exams without studying for them. No Case.

I was very honest and upfront about what I wanted from McKinsey. I didn’t use any of the “prepped” answers, and just told him what I thought. I even told him that I was undecided about joining McKinsey (if they made an offer), and he seemed OK with that.

On offer was made at the end of the interview

2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Saurabh Vashishtha McKinsey and Co. Engagement Manager 1st round – 1st interview Tell me about yourself? Why ISB? Why MBA? Why consulting? A publishing firm has been seeing a fall in profits off late. Help them diagnose and fix the problem. The case started on a very generic note and on the outset seemed like a standard profitability case. I started with some clarifying questions such as : What does the company do? The company is into magazine publishing (2nd highest selling weekly magazine, in addition to few other magazines. : Who are the competitors? There are a few other competitors. 2 other large competitors, 1 larger and another smaller than our company and the segment is dominated by these 3. There are a few other smaller players too. : How long have they been facing the problem? Facing it for the past few years. : How are the competitors doing? Doing fine. Have been more or less constant. I started with structuring the problem in a standard profitability problem (profit = revenue – cost). He told me that the revenues have been fine and they have actually seen an increase in revenue over the past few years (he threw some numbers here such as % increase in revenue etc). Then I told him that I would focus on the costs. In order to handle the costs part, I created a value chain of the complete process from the time of collection of news and articles (reporting) editing printing distribution. Here he asked me to think if there could be something else also in the value chain. I realized that after distribution there should be something related to ‘returns’ also. He was expecting the same answer. Then I went through the various parts of the value chain to understand the costs involved in each part and if something had changed or could be improved there, but there were no major issues. Since he had asked me specifically for the returns part, I asked him a little more about the returns policy and what happens if the vendor/retailer has overstocked the magazines. He told me that the company takes them back and the value is practically zero for those magazines. (Throughout the discussion he was giving me numbers on how much it costs per magazine at each part of the value chain).). At this point, I asked him if there had been an increase in the number of returns (overstocking at the retailer’s end and he gave me some data which indicated that was the case). I told him that at this point, we can evaluate the implications of both under-stocking and overstocking at the vendor’s end and find if the 5

company is supplying the optimal quantity. This was basically an application of the ‘newsvendor problem’ we studied in the basic operations course. Post this it was simple, I completed the calculations and he looked satisfied. What do you think went right for you in the interview?

It’s very important to listen carefully during a case interview. Most interviewers will give away hints and will try to help you solve a case. Catching those hints and solving the case together with the interviewer is the key. Another thing that I think went right was the conversations before and after the case interview. I was done with the interview in 12-15 minutes. For the remaining time, I chatted with him about his experience interviewing at ISB and how he found it different from interviewing at the IIMs. And then we went on to talk about the different models that the schools operate on and how the education sector in India has evolved etc etc. All of this helped me strike a note with the interviewer. Finally the fact that I could remember what the newsvendor problem was

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Nothing really went wrong. Listening skills are very important. Go through the core term concepts. The ability to apply concepts studied in the various subjects to your case interviews give that ‘wow’ factor. Through to 2nd interview.

<

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Saurabh Vashishtha McKinsey and Co. Noshir Kaka (Partner & Director) 1st round – 2nd interview Tell me about yourself? A majority of this interview was PI. He asked me a lot of questions about my work experience and about my company (Trilogy). He then asked me about what I thought was the best way to encourage innovation in a technology company. Although this was a PI, I tried to put a structure to my answer. I basically divided the reforms into a few buckets, like organizational changes (incentive structures), employee focus, customer focus etc. And then elaborated under each of the subheadings. There were also other questions related to the biggest challenges at work etc. Tata motors was producing Indica (which costs around 3 Lakhs), and wanted to produce a 1 lakh car. How can they go about doing this? This was a very small and simple case. He was primarily looking for ways to not just reduce cost but how to approach a radically different problem. I went through the standard set of cost reduction measures throughout the value chain but told him that this would only achieve only so much cost reduction. In order to create a one lakh car, they need to look at something from the scratch. It needs to be a fresh design (not just of the engine, but also design of how the various processes work today, including where the assembly happens, how distribution works etc). Most of this interview was about my work experience (Software product development and technology consulting), and my views on the technology sector. It helped to have researched the various trends in the sector and having an opinion on the various things. Nothing much, though it may have helped to go through the casebooks from earlier years in detail, because this case was very similar to something that was asked in one of the previous years, but I heard it for the first time in the interview. : Be very thorough with your work experience related topics : Do research on the trends etc in the relevant sector. : Try and structure your responses even in a PI. Shortlisted for 2nd round.

@

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Saurabh Vashishtha McKinsey and Co. Shirish Sankhe (Partner & Director) 2nd round – 1st interview Tell me about yourself? The Maharashtra government wants to build a plan for the Mumbai metro project and wants it to be a completely self financed project. How could this be achieved. This was again a small case, where Shirish did most of the talking. I started with telling him that there would be two key aspects to this project, the first being the financing (sources, procedures) and the second being the revenue generation, and both of these together need to contribute to a self financed metro project. I started with the revenue part first. I approached this through an asset monetization approach (basically analyze the various assets that the project would own and look at ways to monetize each of them). Here I talked about the train, the tracks, the land near the tracks and the stations etc and suggested ways to monetize these. The most important thing that came out was the land that is allocated to the metro project, and which is not used directly for the project and can be developed as a commercial property to monetize the project. Once we reached this stage, Shirish talked at length about how this worked at the Mumbai metro project where he was involved and how they were able to collect many times more revenue than the amount needed for the project. Then I talked about the financing part. Here I basically started with the pecking order and suggested ways to finance. I told him that given that government guarantees could be explored and this could lead to ways of reducing the cost of financing. This turned more into a conversation, where Shirish talked about the various kinds of securities that could be used and how the government often provides sops in the form of tax breaks etc. Again, listening helped. He kept giving me hints and helped me progress through the case. Also, during the case prep sessions, we had touched upon the asset monetization strategy, which helped here. Nothing really. It would have been nice to know about the various securities that Shirish mentioned could be used for financing such a project

Was made an offer F

The Parthenon Group

G

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

Anip Sharma The Parthenon Group Karan Khemka (Partner and Mumbai Office Head) 1st round – 1st interview None There is a company in UK which organizes outdoor trips for field students. A private equity company wants to pick up a stake in the firm and wants to assess the validity of the claims of company with respect to the market share. The revenues of the company are given. How would you go about solving it? For a second I thought that the case of around assessing if the revenues of the company were reported correctly. So I wrote the formula: Revenues = No of students going of trips per year * Number of trips per students But after going astray for a min I realized that I have to estimate the total market size. Then the usual line of questioning of what is the population of UK – 60 Mn (given by Karan) -> Assuming uniform distribution -> trips organized for people in the age group 7yrs – 15yrs (given) - > attenuate further to estimate total number of people going for such trips - > further I asked if I should attenuate on affordability but it was not required. At this point I had forgot to question on the lines of number of trips per person and Karan pointed this out. Thankfully, I had written it earlier in front of him and he was ok.

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

We briefly chatted about my restaurant business and then Karan asked if I had any questions. I asked how did he see Parthenon evolving and he explained that he still expected the office to be small but doing meaningful work. Writing the formula early on helped not goof up. Didn’t get mired in a lot of detail Could have remembered the other parameter The simplicity of this case is actually what throws people off track. The case was simply about estimating the total market size of the outdoor trips industry and then assessing if the market share claimed = actual market share. So just be grounded in basics. Moved to second interview, 1st round

9

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Anip Sharma The Parthenon Group Abhinav Mittal 1st round – 2nd interview None No case We just discussed about my restaurant business. What went well and why did it not work. Then moving on to the viability of organized food services business but really no case. Just conversation. I tried to point out to key business insights in a structured fashion. I disagreed a lot but was polite.

Moved to second round

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview?

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Anip Sharma The Parthenon Group Entire interview panel 2nd round None This round is specific to Parthenon. I was given a 25-30 pager document on a real client situation with a LOT of numbers and I had to come up with a project proposal. I was left alone for 30 minutes with a calculator and was expected to present using a whiteboard. The case was about a laminate manufacturers who was continuously losing market share in a maturing industry as new products were coming up. After I was ready all the members of the interview panel came into the room and I started presenting. They agreed with the overall though process but the discussion ultimately hinged on why the production process is not cost effective. I pointed out to the economies of scale issue but was shot down. I pointed out to operational inefficiencies but was shot down. We were going round and round on this and it was really late in the night. But I forced myself to think from a fresh perspective after taking a break of one min. I realized that there is an issue of learning curve here (Economics of strategy, competitive strategy – competitive advantage of Intel) which I presented. The discussion abruptly ended there as Karan was specifically looking for this insight and I was made an offer on the spot. I think I did a fairly good job of extracting key business insights and didn’t get lost in numbers. I used the board effectively and laid out a storyboard for the presentation. What also helped was that when pushed to come up with more ideas, I did not give up, did not lose my cool and was continuously thinking on my feet

Made an offer

ZS Associates

2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Outcome

Gautam Pande ZS Associates Sandeep First Personal Interview was mostly conversational. Asked about experiences from work. For instance, examples of experiences where you led a team or motivated a team. What issues you faced. How did you resolve them. Personally, coming from an Infosys background, my discussion went into the Onsite-Offshore model and the motivational/leadership challenges that come with it. Multiple It was a sort of a mini case (details below) Basically the interviewer had a (printed out) slide deck about a pharma company. Each slide had some graphs and charts and you are supposed to draw inferences from them. For example, spot increasing/decreasing trends or abnormal behavior and then the interviewer would dig deeper and ask for possible reasons for such trends/behaviors. Once he was satisfied that you have spotted the right trends and the possible explanations he would move on to the next slide. Towards the end there were some calculations involved as well. For example, market sizing estimate figures were to be calculated based on market segment estimates. Calculations were fairly straightforward and logical (no real mba fundae were needed). Overall, I got the impression that they were basically trying to test if you are comfortable with numbers and are analytically inclined, that’s all. I think my PI part of the interview went pretty well. I kind of connected with the interviewer on my motivational leadership example coz it was based on the onsite offshore model (somewhat similar to what ZS has now) and spoke about issues that the interviewer himself had faced at ZS. Not too much. Except that the case/analytical part of the interview could have gone smoother. I was a little slow initially and so towards the end didn’t have enough time to complete the calculations for the last question. Although, the interviewer seemed satisfied with me just showing him the working (and not actually calculating the exact figure) There is not too much that can be done in terms of preparation for the Case. I’d just suggest that you go in with a fresh mind. The questions are pretty straightforward you just need to be confident and also need to show your thinking (perhaps thinking out loud could be a good idea to do this). As for the PI. The usual PI questions should be prepared. For example, leadership/motivation/team work/innovation examples from work etc. Nothing out of the expected here. Went through to 2nd round 5

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Gautam Pande ZS Associates Niara & another person (not sure of the names) Second None. Case based interview. Multiple It was more of a “Case Study” than a typical case interview where we were given about 30-40 pages of information and were supposed to read through it and present on it in 40 mins time (details below) Case involved an ice cream retailing company that was feeling the heat financially. The case was about what options/alternatives the company had going forward…should it expand/cut down on its outlets, acquire new retailers etc. The case itself is not so important as the format. We were given a total of 40 mins where we had to read through LOTS of information and prepare a 10-15 minute presentation of the case (on flip charts). The information was in various formats and was jumbled. For example, there was a complete annual report of the company, there was a newspaper article about real estate rents going down (hence the possibility of renting out new retail shops and thus the connection with the case), letters from the bank to the company about not meeting their financial obligations, stock trends for the company, information about competitors and possible acquisition options etc. etc. I think I was fairly confident with my presentation…that helped a lot. Although I didn’t read through the entire material word for word (that was not humanly possible given the time frame) I managed to get a feel of what was happening overall and put it all together in a story. Not too much. I was asked one question on my presentation that I could not answer coz I had missed out that piece of information. But I don’t think it mattered too much overall. It’s very important to understand that it’s not humanly possible to read through the entire material in the given time frame. What is expected is for you to capture the main essence of each article/piece of information provided. A good idea maybe to start off with the heading of the article and read just the first and last sentences of the paragraphs (basically, “speed reading” whichever way it works for you). Secondly, it’s critical to split up the 40 mins between reading the material and making the presentation. I think what I did was I kept 25 mins for the reading part, and 15mins for drawing out the presentation (on the flip charts). Once again, when making the presentation, it is a good idea to probably draw out four/six (whichever works) slides on the chart (coz typically you wouldn’t have enough meat to fill up the entire chart with just one slide). And then start off with giving headings to each slide so you can build <

your story overall mentally and then start filling in the details (so even if you run short of time at least you have the overall story intact in terms of headings and you can still present).

Outcome

Once again, no hardcore mba concepts tested as such. Just some sensible business understanding/thinking, good time management and smart presentation skills is what they’re looking for. Went through to 3rd round

@

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Outcome

Gautam Pande ZS Associates Don’t remember! Third Personal Interview was mostly conversational and very similar to the first round PI. Asked about experiences from work as in the first round, strengths, weaknesses, why ZS etc. None N/A There was no case as such but they did ask a couple of analytical questions once again similar to the first round. Basically the questions were more like logical thinking puzzles rather than business case questions Once again, PI part went pretty well and I could connect with the interviewer. Not too much. I could’ve answered some of the puzzle questions better but I did well enough I guess. Once again, very little that can be done in terms of preparation. Work on your PI well (the usual PI questions) and come with a fresh mind for the puzzles. They’re not tough at all and all they want to test is if you can think logically. So show them your thinking even if you can’t solve the entire problem Was made an offer I couldn’t refuse

F

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Srinivas Sainaga Chilukuri ZS Associates Panel of two members Round 1, Interview 1 Basically 4~5 questions (and follow-ups on responses) based on resume & EoI 1. Why were you promoted twice before the actual tenure? Can you give some specific reasons? 2. Why did you quit TCS? Would you join TCS back if you were made an offer? Why/Why Not? 3. What is one thing that you felt you did not handle well in your work experience? What would you do different now? 4. Do you have any questions? Data Interpretation It’s a data and graphs based case covering all the fundamental concepts of marketing viz., market sizing, sales force sizing, etc. Wherever there was ambiguity in the case, I asked questions and got clarity on what exactly is expected as the answer? : I have worked out every step of the calculations for quantitative questions thus involving the interviewers through the problem-solving process For one of the questions, I missed the foot notes given in the slide and asked a question that would have otherwise not arisen. :

Be clear with the marketing fundamentals (courses 101 & 102) and be ready to do some calculations (simple though) and data interpretation The case and questions are relatively simple and quite solvable on the spot. So, just keep your cool and focus Shortlisted for Round 2

G

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview?

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Srinivas Sainaga Chilukuri ZS Associates Panel of two members Round 2, Interview 1

I was given around 15 documents (~45 pages) related to an ice cream company and 40 mins to understand those documents and come up with a presentation on flip charts for two of the board of directors of the ice cream company. There were detailed questions from the two panelists during the presentation on the understanding and the recommendations : I have followed the 4c-4p framework approach for solving the case and thus could systematically take the panelists through the presentation : I could remember some important details in the documents and cited the appropriate numbers while explaining my problem analysis and defending my recommendations : One of the panelists looked disinterested after listening to the presentation which gave an impression that my case understanding is wrong but I tried to stay focused and positive about my case analysis : I could not manage my time on the case preparation really well and came up with minimal details on the flip charts. I was mostly explaining the numbers while talking through the presentation : I could not answer some of the questions asked by the panelists : Distribute your time wisely for case analysis and presentation, you have to be prepared to get on to the case really quickly : The amount of data in the given time frame is overwhelming. So, it is important to stay cool and focused : The interviewing panel is very pa Shortlisted for Round 3

9

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Srinivas Sainaga Chilukuri ZS Associates Maneesh Chandra, Managing Principal Round 3, Interview 1 Tell me your 3 strengths and 3 weaknesses Why do you want to join ZS? Give 3 reasons Why should ZS hire you? Give 3 reasons Would you join TCS back in case you are made an offer? Why/Why Not? Was given a sales force optimization problem where I had to distribute X no. of available sales reps for selling two refrigerator brands. The diminishing rate of the marginal benefit with increase in sales force size of each brand is different.

: : : :

Was consistent in my answers for PI questions right from Round 1

In my opinion, there are no right/wrong answers in this round. This is basically a psychometric assessment to check the team fit. If you made it here, you are mostly in

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Srinivas Sainaga Chilukuri ZS Associates Sriram, Managing Principal Round 3, Interview 2 : : :

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Name

Tell me your 3 weaknesses. How do you overcome your weaknesses? Have you encountered any difficult team member? How did you handle the situation? You seem to be a very soft spoken person? How do you handle arguments/disagreements during meetings or how do you make your voice heard in tough situations?

Was consistent in my answers for PI questions right from Round 1

In my opinion, there are no right/wrong answers in this round. This is basically a psychometric assessment to check the team fit. If you made it here, you are mostly in

Rohit Suhas Bhagwat

Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

ZS Associates

1, 2, 3 Round one in the process consisted of a mini caselet, mixed with some preliminary motivational questions. The panel mostly wanted to know your past background and how consulting fit in with your career goals. Would suggest preparation of specific examples from professional/personal experiences to support your answers. The final round especially requires concrete experience-based answers. The caselet was easy and tested mainly the candidate’s ability to interpret graphical and numerical data by identifying trends and possible causes. There was some reference to market entry strategies and risks, but this was not delved into in detail. Suggest future applicants look at Sales response functions in detail. The second round was case-based. There were around 40 pages of information including background, industry research, newspaper articles, annual reports and miscellaneous data. The candidate was expected to identify the issue and make recommendations. Calculations were minimal. The main challenge was to finish the reading and evolve a cohesive and comprehensive strategy to solve the problem at hand. The findings were then to be transferred to chart paper and presented to the panel. One can expect a fair bit of cross-questioning if the coverage of the case has not been complete. Innovative insights and the ability to fend off questions help.

Case Type

Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview?

What do you think went wrong in this

Nothing unusual. Standard 3C, 4P approach to solve the issue at hand. More driven by approach and strategy than numbers and frameworks. Be sure to cover or think of all flaws and angles. Bound by a confidentiality clause. But suffice to say that it was in line with the case books available on the consulting club portal. The first round was strictly OK. I got the data crunching right but felt I could have done better on suggesting the causes behind the data trends in the caselets. The second round was much much better. The key was to read quickly without getting bogged down by the sheer volume of the data and material. I had minimal cross-questioning and felt that I hit most of the salient points of the case. Problem assessment is the key. The final interview was just to gauge the candidate’s fit with a small econ 101 question on MR/MC. If you’ve made it this far, they’re probably serious about your chances. Could have been more prepared for pharma/healthcare practices

interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

It’s all about presentation skills and how you can handle large chunks of data. In that manner, it is slightly different from the other case interviews. Offer accepted

h

2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Outcome

Vinit Garg ZS Associates Don’t Remember First D) Walk me through your Resume E) Discussion on my ELP Project (It was on setting up of back office for a Pharma company): How did we add value, what was my role in the team, further technical questions on the ELP Project F) Discussion on my Project Management Experience: Issues while leading team and how I handled those G) Example of an inefficient management from my work experience and how I will handle such situations now H) What do you know about ZS? What do you think worked for you in the ZS Case Competition (I was on winning team of ZS Competition) I) Any Questions for ZS? There was a series of mini cases, around 4-5 based on a company launching a new product in the market. The caselets were as follows: C) Graphs of the company and its competitors products. I was asked to interpret the graphs D) Survey results about the product perceptions. Again read and interpret E) Calculation based questions – Some data was provided but I have to interpret the same and conduct the calculations

The PI went well providing good start. Understanding the way ZS works by talking to Alums helped in framing the responses better. While solving the case, along with solving individual cases I was able to connect previous cases together to provide better recommendations. Nothing I can think of B) Do get into calculations while solving individual cases e.g. during your recommendations rather than just saying market share is increasing, try to speak market share increased by X% C) Try to throw as many different recommendations or suggestions. Also, don’t forget to speak about your assumptions. D) In terms of preparation, the closest I could think of is refer to MKTR1 & 2 as well as MADM numerical from Core Terms Shortlisted for next round 5

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question

Vinit Garg ZS Associates Jude Konzelmann (Partner) & One more senior person Second None I was provided a packet that consisted of Shareholder’s report, CEO messages, Market Survey Reports, Newspaper Cuttings and other such documents. The whole thing was loosely organized. In 40 minutes, I was tasked to go through the material and prepare a presentation for “What is wrong with the company. What are your suggestions to improve the situation”? I organized the presentation as follows: A) Assessment of Current Situation B) Key Issues C) Opportunities and Constraints D) Recommendations

Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Outcome

After this, I was scheduled to make the presentation on white paper with a marker. There was a lot of cross questioning on everything I mentioned on the prezo. Also, some additional data was thrown at during the presentation and I had to provide alternative suggestions based on the same. Since there were a lot of moving variables, I kept referring to the case during the Q & A.

I was able to provide multifunctional recommendations applying concepts from Corporate Finance, Marketing Services & Competitive Strategy etc. Some witty comments during Q & A also helped to lighten the environment. I forgot to use marker and wrote just with my pen on the white paper. They had real hard time figuring out what I had written C) Be as integrative as possible. Don’t just think of the case as a just a Marketing / Strategy / Finance case. Try to bring out as many elements as possible in 40 minutes. Build on those, during the presentations D) Just Relax and enjoy the process. Nobody can make a perfect presentation. Shortlisted for Final round <

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Vinit Garg ZS Associates Manish (Partner) Third This is a fit interview and ZS plays a lot of emphasis on fit. The questions were same as expected: A) Why ZS? What do you know about ZS? B) Why should we hire you? C) How will your past experience be relevant? D) Any questions you have for me? Each element of my response was digged one to two steps deeper. I was asked to quantify each and every strength I mentioned. There was a numerical type questions. It was about allocation of resources to different activities based on graphical interpretation of payoffs. I was required to determine the exact division.

I think I did well in the PI. I mentioned few things about ZS that Manish was very impressed with and repeated quite a few times. I solved the numerical in a stop-gap sort of form and took a lot of time and clues from Manish to form the mathematical equation. However, I don’t think lot of emphasis As I mentioned, ZS Plays a lot of emphasis on the fit. The fit related questions are similar for almost all. Think through your responses and be prepared to discuss the elements you mention 1-2 steps deeper. Made an Offer

@

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third)

Megha Khatri ZS Associates Jude Konzelmann/Nitin 1 Tell us about yourself, What has been your biggest achievement, What were your job responsibilities at previous company, what were the challenges you faced at job, Why ZS, What other firms did you interview with etc. A slide deck of graphs/ charts/ tables was shown and was asked to interpret each slide assimilating information from previous slides, if needed. Numbers/Graphical Interpretation There were about 12 slides about a drug company and I was asked to go one by one interpreting each slide. They were mostly on sales response, regression data interpretation, some survey data interpretation, and profitability analysis ( MKDM course was very helpful for the whole case). I was able to interpret each slide and gave plausible reasons for why that may be the phenomenon. The reasons included concepts on carry-over effect, optimal level of resource allocation etc., and what parameters to use while marketing the drug (based on survey data and regression results). I was not able to explain one pattern but was then hinted by interviewer to use earlier graphs data and then I was able to explain. The interview went for about an hour. I was calm and it was the first interview so I think the interviewers were also very interested. Both the interviewers were very helpful. I was able to complete the 12 slides. Nothing Be calm , composed, and if you get stuck take hints from interviewer Second round Megha Khatri ZS Associates Group of interviewers ( Maneesh Chandra, Eric, one more Principal) 2

F

Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible

What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Just introduction(1 min) I was given a 40 page case and was asked to come up with business solution in 35-40 mins. This was to be presented to management using Slide deck. Interpretation ( qualitative and quantitative) There were 40 pages about a company in US that had multiple problems ( you could identify operations, marketing, finance angle). I read the case in 15- 20 minutes, jotted all issues, and made presentation in 10 minutes. Basic issue was revenue and profit growth. I had some data to interpret which regions to focus, what products to focus, what channels to focus, what customers to focus etc..so I came up with a strategy to increase profits by reducing costs, and increasing revenue. The listed down ways to reduce cost and increase revenues in current and new markets. Suggested way forward and also gave what studies need to be conducted for developing a product. It was a case where you could pick several issues and work around several solution ( pure Strategy case). I was able to clearly identify all issues and was very structured in approach. I used both qualitative and quantitative ways to defend my case ( which was liked by Maneesh) Could have been calm during presentation but my anxiety while solving case continued while presenting. Ensure you allow interviewers to ask question and have discussion. They really like that format. Third round Megha Khatri ZS Associates Jude Konzelmann 3 I met him earlier so he joked around it and said so we meet here again and said I will not trouble you again, this is the last round. I answered back saying no I would like to be troubled and would want to meet you again. He knew my background so didn’t ask for that. Most questions were behavioral about previous jobs. He kept asking me situations and what I did. Then he asked me what I know about ZS and why is it interesting for me. He asked me if I know someone in ZS and I said yes. So he asked me what have I been told about ZS. He then asked me a very particular question. He asked if I have noticed the trend that all ZS shortlists are from IT background except me and asked me to explain why that could be the case. I told him that the job needed modeling and technological skills. He explained me in detail why that was so. All I gathered was that you need to work with software teams sometimes to develop the G

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

software for a model to be implemented for a client. He asked me if I will be able t do that given that I have not worked in analytics or IT fields. I gave him some gyaan on why I will be able to it…Then he gave a case. He asked me to wait outside Short case on resource allocation based on a response function. Graphical There were two types of products for a company and a response function was given. I was asked to allocate 100 sales people to each of the products. He asked me the algorithm I followed. My contacts at ZS. I took time to solve a mini-case and was also not able to explain why IT people and why me (without IT) Having your own contacts and speaking with them prior to interview helps Offer made

9

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview? What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Nitya Thandavan ZS Associates

First Round (Half an hour of PI + Half an hour of case) Generic questions (E.g.: why consulting) Resume based questions (E.g.: how did your PMP certification help you in your work) Situational Questions (E.g.: Give an example of a highly complex assignment that you handled.) Why a drug was suddenly not doing well when compared to its competitors? Three calculations on sales force optimization. Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis including precise calculations. Some amount of Data Interpretation. Non Disclosure Signed with ZS

The fact that I was able to maintain my cool and answer confidently and logically – clearly showing the problem flow and calculation details. I was able to come up with more than one logical answer for the questions that were asked which impressed them. Ability to talk in mathematical as well as business terms. Kind of blanked out on the first slide. The interviewer had to guide me. But there were a lot of other slides to follow and the PI, where I was able to make up for the initial glitch. Maintain your calm and be confident and optimistic. For this round, don’t narrow your thoughts down by a framework as it tends to limit your thinking. In rounds where precise answers are required – case frameworks will not take you too far. Shortlisted for second round.

2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions Case question Case Type

Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview?

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview

Outcome

Nitya Thandavan ZS Associates

Second – Case Analysis NA How to turn an ice cream chain profitable? What should be the acquisition strategy for this chain? At what locations should new parlors be opened? We were given a case (approx 45 pages) with lots of data and text. We were given 40 minutes to go through the case, analyze it and put our thoughts and recommendations on the flip chart followed by a 15 minute presentation of the case. There was a lot of cross questioning during the presentation. Non Disclosure Signed with ZS

I was able to go through the whole case and get a sense of what sections were important and what were not. Was able to structure my analysis into four buckets - financial, marketing, strategic and others, before coming up with the recommendations. Did not change my stance under pressure during the presentation – kept on providing answers to support my view. Could not do as much quant as I wanted to. •

Time management is the key. Set aside 20 minutes for reading the case, 10 minutes for analyzing it and going through the important parts again and 10 minutes for thinking about a structure and putting it on the flip chart. • Read the entire case. That way you would be able to make out which parts are important and focus on them for analysis. Reading the entire case would also enable you to tackle all the questions that are asked during the presentation. • In this round, use of case frameworks helps to ensure that you have covered all aspects of the problem at hand. • Structure you presentation. Most important!! • Answer all the questions confidently – interviewers will try to change your thoughts intentionally – don’t give up and keep on providing logical answers to support your view. Shortlisted for final round.

2

Name Interviewing with (consulting firm) Name of the interviewer Round and Interview Number (first/second/third) Personal Interview Questions

Nitya Thandavan ZS Associates

Case question Case Type Narration of the case, as descriptively as possible What do you think went right for you in the interview?

NA NA NA

What do you think went wrong in this interview Any tips for the future batch based in this interview Outcome

Jude Konzelmann Third Round – PI with the Principal (went on for an hour!!) • • • • •

General Questions Resume Based Questions (lots of these) Situational Questions (lots of these) Industry Questions Some attitude questions (like your ideas on work life balance)

I had gone through my resume thoroughly a day before and thought of key things to say under each of the heads. Was a great help in answering the situational questions. Was able to demonstrate my suitability and passion for the role by giving thoughtful but spontaneous answers. Nothing that I can think of. Interview went extremely well!! •

A day before the interview, go through your resume. Think of at least three things to say about each of the points mentioned in your resume. • Be confident, spontaneous and genuine. • Show passion in the opinions/views that you express. Job Offer.

2

Appendix – Master List of Consulting Offers (As of March, 2010) 1. Accenture a) Jasmeet Singh Marwah b) Shweta Tiwari c) Abhishek Gupta d) Abhishek Bhatia e) Vinayaka Padmanabha f) Shabber Hussain Badshah g) Deepak Sinha h) Sowmya C 2. Arthur D Little a) Samrat Bose b) Adnan Kadar Merhaba 3. AT Kearney a) Abhineet Sawa b) Sudipta Ray c) Barathi S d) Akash Jain 4. Booz and Co. Somesh Satnalika 5. Boston Consulting Group a) Pallavi Malani b) Deepak Deshmukh c) Siddharth Negandhi d) Parag Dhanuka e) Mouneesh Sinha 6. Deloitte a) Apoorv Gautam b) Deepshikha Ganjoo c) Laxmikant Vyas d) Chitra Unnikrishnan e) Sonali Chhabra f) Tarun Maheshwari g) Mrudula V. h) Yash Mahendra i) Vinitha Vishwanath j) Prayank Swaroop k) Aditya Shrivastava 22

l) Punya Sandhu m) Sushmita K 7. Diamond Consultants Rakesh Ranjan 8. Feedback Ventures a) Puneet Kataria b) Anant Tripathi c) Nitin Vishwas 9. Global eProcure a) Anshu Vazirani b) Mohit Gupta c) Zorawar Singh d) Abhishek Narayan Singh e) Sarvagya Sharma f) Shweta Shankar g) Prashant Ram 10. McKinsey and Co. a) Ankur Vaish b) Suyog Kalyanji Kotecha c) Kirti Varun Avarasala d) Vivek Arora e) Gaurav Punia f) Saurabh Vashishtha g) Maninder Gulati h) Ankit Tandon i) Kartik Rajendran 11. Parthenon Group a) Anip Sharma 12. ZS Associates a) Gautam Pande b) Srinivas Sainaga Chilukuri c) Rohit Bhagwat d) Vinit Garg e) Megha Khatri f) Nitya Thandavan g) Sukesh Sogani h) Kaveri Misra i) Deepak Srikumar j) Tarun Gupta 25

k) Gaurav Chopra

2<