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How to get into management consulting
The document serves as a practical guide for aspiring consultants, detailing techniques for passing case interviews and the rigorous recruitment process typically encountered. Key information includes the profile of an ideal candidate, common question types during interviews, and methods for estimating market sizes through bottom-up and top-down approaches. Additionally, it discusses alternative pathways to consulting and strategies for optimizing various operational elements within a consulting context.
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How to get into management consulting
- 1. 1 How to getinto consulting? Practical guide how to pass the case part
- 2. 2 Management consultants arebrutally efficientOnly 5% of candidates get accepted to consulting
- 3. 3 You will learnhow to solve cases during the job interview to increase your chances of getting the job
- 4. 4 Useful techniques that you should master Market estimationcases Sales and marketing cases Strategic cases Operational cases Recruitment process In this presentation I will show 6 things
- 5. 5 This presentation willhelp you land a job in consulting or as a business analyst
- 6. 6 More cases youcan find in my on-line course where I show step by step how to solve cases Click to check my course How to get into consulting – Management Consulting Cases $45 $15
- 7.
- 8. 8 The ideal consultanthas some important characteristics that help him survive the hostile environment he is usually working in Analytical mind Good at structuring and simplifying problems Good listener that can easily interact with people Independent Fast Diligent and hard working Resilient / Robust especially to stress Good presentation skills Open-minded Computer literacy at least at average level
- 9.
- 10. 10 How does therecruitment process look like?
- 11. 11 The recruitment processis pretty long and the chances are relatively small. Only 5% of those that take the math test get the offer Math / Analytical Test Interview with HR 1st interview with a consultant 2nd interview with a consultant 3rd interview with a consultant Last interview – Partner / Director 100% 30% 25% 20% 15% 5% % of candidate that move to next phase
- 12. 12 Important items inthe CV
- 13. 13 There are thingsthat you look for when you are browsing through the CVs Top universities Top performer Languages Internships Living / Studying abroad Additional project i.e. student organizations Computer literacy
- 14. 14 Most management consultingworkers are recruited from business schools or exact science departments Business Schools and Department of Economics % of all candidates ▪ 70% % of all workers ▪ 50% Exact science (math, physics, computer science ▪ 15% ▪ 30% Medicine ▪ 5% ▪ 10% Others ▪ 10% ▪ 10%
- 15. 15 Types of questionsthat you may expect
- 16. 16 There are 6main types of questions you will get during the interviews Market size estimation Sales and marketing cases Strategy cases Logical math quizzes Operations cases Managing people cases
- 17. 17 Alternative ways toget into consulting
- 18. 18 Recruitment is notthe only way that you can get into consulting Comments % of candidates recruited Direct recruitment to specific position ▪ Used especially by big consulting firms▪ 50-70% Internships ▪ Helps you progress faster later ▪ Can require also formal recruiting but more lenient than the usual one ▪ 10-30% Closer cooperation with students and student organizations ▪ You can help consulting firm organize in events, participate in them ▪ Bigger firms have their brand ambassadors on universities ▪ 10-30% Closer cooperation with the universities ▪ You can get involved in the cooperation ▪ Usually helps you at least to get internship at the firm ▪ 10-30%
- 19. 19 Useful Techniques thatyou should master before the interview
- 20.
- 21. 21 …the one youwill for sure use is bottom-up approach where you go from single (typical) consumer to market research ▪ First you should imagine the typical users ▪ Then you should try to guess his consumption level ▪ By estimating the number of typical users you and their consumption level you get the rough size of the market
- 22. 22 …sometimes it makessense to divide markets in segments and estimate them separately (i.e. average and typical users, women and man, people in different age groups or segmentation by lifestyle) Segment A Segment B
- 23. 23 …lets do asimple example. Imagine that you want to make an application for franchised restaurants ▪ You pick the sample group / area you want to estimate i.e. city (here Warsaw) ▪ You count the number of all restaurants in the area ▪ For the chosen area you count the franchising restaurants ▪ You check the population of the whole country – here Poland ▪ Assuming similar density as in Warsaw you scale up the number of franchised restaurants proportionally to the population
- 24. 24 …to make youbetter at this method imagine you want to sell home made dog food….. First you have to estimate how many dogs they are….. ▪ First you should pick your sample – can be your friends or neighbors ▪ Next step is to calculate how many dogs they have ▪ Once you have the number also calculate how many households they are in the sample ▪ It is now enough to know how many households there are in the country ▪ And assuming similar proportion as in your sample you scale up the number of dogs +
- 25. 25 …with the numberof dogs you just have to estimate the number of food eaten per year by average dog…..and you get to the size of the food market ▪ We have the number of dogs in the whole country. Now we have to get from here to the dog food ▪ This requires us to estimate additionally how much food would average dog eat per year ▪ In this way using annual average consumption per dog and the estimated number of dogs we are able to estimate how much food is eaten every year in the country +
- 26. 26 Lets sum upthe bottom-up approach ▪Bottom-up approach enables you to estimate within one minutes the indicative size of the market ▪It is very good for the B2C markets ▪For better estimation you should segment customers and increase the sample size
- 27.
- 28. 28 When to usetop-down approach? ▪You know the size of the whole market ▪You are interested in a specific segment of the market ▪Segment is big enough ▪You are thinking about niche strategy or low cost strategy (market re-segmenting)
- 29. 29 For a changelets see how it would work with top-down approach ▪ You use the total market size to get to the size of the segment in which you are interested ▪ You have to use some sort of sample measure ▪ By applying the result from the sample you can get to the size of the segment in which you are interested
- 30. 30 … let’s usethe top-down approach to estimate the market for science fiction books sold in Poland…. ▪ You use the total number of books sold in your country ▪ Then you go to the bookstore that belongs to the biggest chain of bookstore and check what percentage of the shelves are take by science fiction books ▪ If you use this proportion to the whole market you should get the rough estimation of the science fiction book segment
- 31.
- 32. 32 Imagine that youwere supposed to say how much you have to spend to create a company that has revenue of $ 100 M dollarImagine that you were supposed to say how much you have to spend to create a company that has revenue of $ 100 M dollar
- 33. 33 You could usefor that the so called backward reasoning CC: Flickr; Cycle Track
- 34. 34 Imagine that youwere supposed to say how much you have to spend to create a company that has revenue of $ 100 M dollar Total Costs $ 400 M Cost of 1 lead $ 2 K # of leads 200 K ÷ % Conversion 10% x # of customers 20 K Average revenue per customer $ 5 K Revenues $ 100 M x
- 35.
- 36. 36 There are 2types of compounding effect Time related Operations related ▪ Even if the growth is small applied over long period of time gives big end-results ▪ A lot of small changes in many areas may produce a big end-results # of customers Average revenue per customer Revenues x +15% +20% +38% = 2,6 x StartStart x (1+10%)^10
- 37.
- 38. 38 Issue tree -general Area of analysis Area 1 Problem 1 Problem 2 Possible Reason 1 Possible Reason 2 Possible Reason 3 Possible Reason 4 Possible reasonsSuspected problems Analysis to be performed Analysis 1 Analysis 2 Analysis 3 Analysis 4
- 39. 39 Issue tree –example – chicken meat producer Area of analysis Transport High costs of transport per ton of goods Big level of waste and breakage in transport Possible reasonsSuspected problems Analysis to be performed Analysis of correlation between type of packaging and percentage of damaged Analysis of time spent on the way and kilometers covered in that time Analysis of designed routes, their length and the influence of possible changes Analysis of fuel usage and kilometers covered by vehicles Analysis of load carried on the way back Badly designed routes Too big fuel usage No shipments on the way back Low usage of resources Badly designed method of packaging which makes the product prone to damage Speed not adjusted to the product Badly organized work and schedule of deliveries Limitation on delivery time of finished goods Analysis of level of overtime, daily organization of drivers work Analysis of Clients’ preferences on delivery time
- 40.
- 41. 41 Opportunity tree Gross Margin Sales %Gross Margin % Front Margin % Back Margin # of transactions ATV Traffic % conversion ▪ YouTube ▪ Ads on instagram ▪ Affiliation with bloggers ▪ Guest blogging Opportunities ▪ Long form / Short form ▪ Reduction of delivery methods ▪ No account ▪ Emailing for people abandoning cart ▪ Upselling and Cross selling ▪ Free delivery for higher tickets ▪ Introduction of new categories ▪ Reducing number of suppliers ▪ Finding new suppliers ▪ Renegotiation
- 42.
- 43. 43 Cost drivers arecausing the cost to go or down Cost of a Udemy course Slide preparation Recording and editing # of slides Cost of 1 hour # of hours per 1 slide # of lectures Cost of 1 hour # of minutes per 1 lecture
- 44.
- 45. 45 * Sort,Set,Shine,Standardise,Sustain ** TotalProductive Maintenance *** Overall Equipment Efficiency Kanban Kaizen Poka Yoke Produkcja gniazdowa Zero defectsOEE***TPM**SMEDJust in time Process mapping Continuous flow management Standaryzacja pracy Heijitsu box 5S* Lean Manufacturing is a philosophy of working with little waste and highest quality. It consists of many techniques that should be gradually mastered
- 46.
- 47. 47 Overall Labour Efficiencyhow much work there is in the work ☺? Workday Time that you can devote Time left for real workLack of work 100% 54% OLE = 100 % 54 % x x 98% Work 98% 37% No work due to organizational issues Movement 70% Work well done 70 % Liczba dostępnych godzin lalka Stawka Godzinna Dodatkowe przychody
- 48.
- 49. 49 Bottlenecks are dangerousas their hurt the efficiency of the whole system
- 50. 50 What is thethroughput of every system and where is the bottleneck? Example 1 7 5 7 Example 2 5 10 20 Example 3 5 5 3 x Stage capacity
- 51. 51 The are 4rules that you should follow when it comes to bottlenecks ▪ Identify what is the bottleneck ▪ Increase its throughput by lowering the time needed for everything that goes through the bottleneck ▪ Add new resources to bottleneck ▪ Adjust everything to the bottleneck – so it works at the same pace
- 52. 52 Imagine that youare working in a company working in a content marketing Research topics for a post Write a post Create illustration Edit and modify post, add illustration and schedule 20 5 7 10 # of post that can be done in a week by 1 person ▪ Speed up the writing process (faster typing, better tools, shortcuts for the most popular words) xx 20 8 7 10 10 9 10 10 ▪ Make the researcher do also par time writing and making illustration ▪ We have almost doubled the production of post with the same resources ▪ The same principles would apply if all the activities were done only by you – in this case it would mean that you should not do too much research and illustration but rather improve the typing speed and match the number of illustration and researches to your capacity in writing ▪ If you have no impact on the process (you are one of the guys above just doing his own part and your boss does not want to listen to you then simply do less – identify the bottleneck and adjust your speed to his speed. ▪ On the other hand if you are the bottleneck then speed up because the whole team depends on you.
- 53.
- 54. 54 Market size estimation- Introduction
- 55. 55 In those sortof cases they want to check a few things ▪ Can you structure a problem? ▪ How do you behave when confronted by things that you know nothing about? ▪ How do you fill in the gaps? ▪ Your approach to analyzes?
- 56. 56 I will showyou few examples
- 57. 57 I recommend goingon your own through cases before seeing the solution Go through the lecture with the tasks and questions Pause the course for 5 minutes and try to solve the problem on your own as if you were in a real interview Go to the next lecture with solution and go carefully through it Before going to next lecture compare your answer with what I have shown in the solution Proceed with the next case
- 58.
- 59. 59 Imagine that youwere asked to estimate the market for TV sets What is meant here by “the market”? Annual sales or total ownership? What is included in the TV sets (i.e. monitors are in or not)? Do you want the market estimation to be in volumes or in values?
- 60. 60 Let’s start byfinding the main drivers for TV sets. We assume that it depends on the number of families. If we have the number of families and the number of TV per family we an estimate how many TVs are owned # of families # of TV set per family # of TV sets owned by all families x
- 61. 61 To get fromTVs owned to the number of TVs bough every year we need to assume how often TV are replaced # of families # of TV set per family # of TV sets owned by all families x # of years of usage of a TV sets ÷ Number of TV sold during the year
- 62. 62 Once we havethe number of TV sold we can calculate the value of the market # of families # of TV set per family # of TV sets owned by all families x # of years of usage of a TV sets ÷ Number of TV sold during the year Average price per TV Value of TV sets sold during the year x
- 63. 63 If you donot know the number of families you can estimate it using the total number of people # of families # of TV set per family # of TV sets owned by all families x # of years of usage of a TV sets ÷ Number of TV sold during the year Average price per TV Value of TV sets sold during the year x Total population Average size of a family ÷
- 64. 64 Below how itwould look like for Poland 10 M families in Poland 1 TV set per family 10 M TV sets owned x Every 4 years replacement of TV set ÷ 2.5 M of TV sets sold annually USD 1 000 per TV SET USD 2 500 M of sold TV sets x 40 M people in Poland 4 people per family ÷
- 65. 65 More cases youcan find in my on-line course where I show step by step how to solve cases Click to check my course How to get into consulting – Management Consulting Cases $45 $ 15
- 66.
- 67. 67 Sales and marketingcases- Introduction
- 68. 68 In those sortof cases they want to check a few things about you: ▪ What is your general knowledge about sales and marketing? ▪ How analytical and goal-oriented you are when it comes to sales? ▪ How innovative you can be in sales / marketing? ▪ Are you a good sales / marketing person?
- 69.
- 70. 70 Imagine that asa consultant you were asked to analyze your client situation- FMCG producer that is using different channels of distribution. How would you check whether his using the right mix channels Own shops Retail chains E-commerce Marketplaces Wholesalers
- 71. 71 How would youcheck whether his using the right mix channels What “right means”? What metrics you should look at to decide on the right mix? What are the strategic goals? What would you do – next steps?
- 72. 72 How would youcheck whether his using the right mix channels What “right means”? ▪ Right = the most profitable ▪ Right = the most profitable, still close to the structure market What metrics you should look at to decide on the right mix? What are the strategic goals? What would you do – next steps? ▪ Net margin per channel ▪ % Net margin per channel ▪ Market share of specific channel ▪ Number of customers or middlemen in a specific channel ▪ % of revenues in a specific channel generated by top 3 players ▪ Have higher share in channels experience high growth and have chances to become significant in the next 3 years ▪ Have higher share in channels that are not consolidated and the middlemen or the customer does not have significant purchasing power ▪ Step 1: Get the data on sales, COGS and direct and indirect channel costs ▪ Step 2: Calculate the profitability on all levels for all channels ▪ Step 3: Get the data on the market: % share of specific channel, number of players in the specific channel, % of revenues in a specific channel generated by top 3 players ▪ Step 4: Find out the strategic goals ▪ Step 5: Compare and decided on targeted mix of channel
- 73. 73 Potential for growth- retailer
- 74. 74 Imagine that youare retailer with 200 stores in the whole country. Gdańsk Szcecin Bydgoszcz Poznań Wrocław Katowice Łódź Kraków Rzeszów Kielce Lublin Warszawa Białystok Gdynia-Sopot Gliwice Olsztyn Opole Zielona Góra Current number of stores
- 75. 75 How you wouldestimate the potential for growth? What “growth means”? ▪ Build new store ▪ Like For Like growth (LFL, L4L) What metrics you should use to decided whether to build a new store in a specific place or not? What are the strategic goals? What would you do – next steps? ▪ You should first establish the capture area for every type of store. It can be defined as an area or number of potential customers ▪ Define the expected profitability per store ▪ For every city you should calculate the number of stores at the saturation point ▪ Is the Retailer willing to sacrifice profitability just to capture more market share? ▪ What market share it aims at? ▪ What are his limitation in-terms of capex ▪ Step 1: Get the data on number of stores per city, population per city and data needed to calculate the saturation point (i.e. the minimal number of customers per store) ▪ Step 2: Calculate saturation point per every city ▪ Step 3: Compare the current number of shops with the saturation point ▪ Step 4: Decide on the basis of saturation point and strategic goals what to do
- 76. 76 Below how wewould calculate whether it makes sense to build a new store in a specific city Total population in the city Minimal number of population per shop Number of shops at saturation point Current number of stores ÷ Built new shops till saturation point if you have money > Don’t build any new shops in this location <
- 77. 77 If we weretalking about Warsaw we could see the following picture 1 000 K people in Warsaw We need at least 100 K per store 10 6 ÷ ÷ ÷ We can build 4 new stores but we have money only for 2 > We haven’t reached saturation point <
- 78. 78 Number of storesby provinces Gdańsk Szcecin Bydgoszcz Poznań Wrocław Katowice Łódź Kraków Rzeszów Kielce Lublin Warszawa Białystok Gdynia-Sopot Gliwice Olsztyn Opole Zielona Góra Targeted number of stores Current number of stores
- 79. 79 How to expandRetail brand
- 80. 80 Imagine that youare a Retailers with 10 stores and very strong brand that are selling toys. How would you grow the business Off-line retail chain Selling Toys
- 81. 81 There are plentyof things you can do. Below some examples Open more stores if below saturation point Work on improving LFL Introduce private label Add new categories for kids i.e. Fashion Enter new channels i.e. on-line Grow by franchising your concept Creating new formats i.e. Store in Store
- 82. 82 More cases youcan find in my on-line course where I show step by step how to solve cases Click to check my course How to get into consulting – Management Consulting Cases $45 $ 15
- 83.
- 84.
- 85. 85 Imagine that youwere responsible for managing the cinema. What KPIs metrics you would look at to see whether you are doing a good job?
- 86. 86 You should firststart by estimating the revenues of the cinema you are managing # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue x
- 87. 87 Average revenue perticket depends on the price of the ticket as well as average additional purchase are people making # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue x Average price per ticket Average additional purchase per ticket +
- 88. 88 Number of soldtickets depends on the capacity of the cinema (number of potential seats) as well as the percentage utilization of this space # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue x Average price per ticket Average additional purchase per ticket Total capacity in tickets % Utilization + x
- 89. 89 On the costside we have rent and the salaries of the people # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue Total Costs x Average price per ticket Average additional purchase per ticket Total capacity in tickets % Utilization Rent People + + x
- 90. 90 Salaries depend onthe number of people and average wages # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue Total Costs x Average price per ticket Average additional purchase per ticket Total capacity in tickets % Utilization Rent People # of People Average wages + + x x
- 91. 91 When we deductfrom the revenues the costs we get roughly the EBITDA of the cinema that you manage # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue Total Costs x EBITDA per cinema - Average price per ticket Average additional purchase per ticket Total capacity in tickets % Utilization Rent People # of People Average wages + + x x
- 92. 92 Once you haveall the KPIs and you can start wondering how to increase the EBITDA of your cinema # sold tickets Average revenue per Ticket Total revenue Total Costs x EBITDA per cinema - Average price per ticket Average additional purchase per ticket Total capacity in tickets % Utilization Rent People # of People Average wages + + x x
- 93.
- 94. 94 IKEA is awell know brand selling furniture. On what do you think they make their money? Think about this and move to the next slide
- 95. 95 IKEA has beenvery successful in implementing low cost model in furniture. Below how they did it Model „big box” built outside the city center Design Consistent message Diversified revenue streams Operational excellence Business scale Retail Acquisition Activation Retention Revenue Referral
- 96. 96 More cases youcan find in my on-line course where I show step by step how to solve cases Click to check my course How to get into consulting – Management Consulting Cases $45 $15
- 97. 97 Math / Logicalquizzes
- 98.
- 99. 99 Imagine that youhave 9 balls. One of them is slightly heavier. You have weights with scale that you can use 2 times
- 100. 100 First you haveto divide the balls in 3 groups Group A Group B Group C
- 101. 101 Then put twogroups on the scale. Let’s imagine that you put Group A and Group B Group A Group B
- 102. 102 If the scalestay in balance it means that the heavier 1 ball is in group C Group A Group B
- 103. 103 If the scaleis tilting at the group A side it means that the heavier ball is in group A Group A Group B
- 104. 104 If the scaleis tilting at the group B side it means that the heavier ball is in group B Group A Group B
- 105. 105 Imagine that youhave 9 balls. One of them is slightly heavier. You have weights with scale that you can use 2 times Group A Group B Group C
- 106. 106 Let’s assume thatthe scales were in balance. We get rid of group A and B. Every ball in group C gets its own unique number C1, C2, C3. We put C1 and C2 on the scales. If the scale remain in balance it means that C3 is heavier. If the scales tilt at whatever side the tilt is this will point to the heavier ball C1 C2
- 107. 107 Imagine that youhave 9 balls. One of them is slightly heavier. You have weights with scale that you can use 2 times
- 108. 108 To sum upwe did it in 2 phases. In the 1st one we got rid of 6 balls. In the 2nd one we got the heavier ball out of three Group A Group B Group C C1 C2 C3 Phase 1 Phase 2
- 109.
- 110. 110 Content marketing agency- how to increase it's output?
- 111. 111 Imagine that youare working in a company doing content marketing. How much post they can make and how you could improve it? Research topics for a post Write a post Create illustration Edit and modify post, add illustration and schedule 20 5 7 10 # of post that can be done in a week by 1 person xx
- 112. 112 Imagine that youare working in a company working in a content marketing Research topics for a post Write a post Create illustration Edit and modify post, add illustration and schedule 20 5 7 10 # of post that can be done in a week by 1 person ▪ Speed up the writing process (faster typing, better tools, shortcuts for the most popular words) xx 20 8 7 10 10 9 10 10 ▪ Make the researcher do also par time writing and making illustration ▪ We have almost doubled the production of post with the same resources ▪ The same principles would apply if all the activities were done only by you – in this case it would mean that you should not do too much research and illustration but rather improve the typing speed and match the number of illustration and researches to your capacity in writing ▪ If you have no impact on the process (you are one of the guys above just doing his own part and your boss does not want to listen to you then simply do less – identify the bottleneck and adjust your speed to his speed. ▪ On the other hand if you are the bottleneck then speed up because the whole team depends on you.
- 113. 113 It will takeyou around 20 minutes to get to the cash till Number of people in the queue Time per 1 customer Number of cash tilts 32 2.33 30 23 20.0 Time you will wait In min 23.4 Number of people in the queue x Number of cash tilts Time per 1 customer
- 114. 114 More cases youcan find in my on-line course where I show step by step how to solve them Click to check my course How to get into consulting – Management Consulting Cases $45 $15
- 115. 115 You can alsofind useful some tips on Excel Essential Excel for Business Analysts and Consultants A practical guide presentation
- 116. 116 Check also businessmodeling in Excel Business models Practical guide for startups and entrepreneurs presentation
- 117. 117 I recommend alsolooking at some techniques to improve your business. Click on the cover below to go to the presentation How to become world class analyst A practical guide presentation
- 118. 118 ….and how toperform market research Market research Practical guide for startups and entrepreneurs presentation
- 119. 119 Subscribe to ourchannels: www
- 120. 120 Check my extensivepresentation on productivity hacks to see how you can me 10x more productive Management consultant productivity hacks How to be lazy and still get things done presentation
- 121. 121 If you needmore detailed version on productivity hacks you can check our course on productivity hacks Click to check my course Management Consulting Productivity Hacks $45 $15
- 122. 122 Check my presentationon restaurant business model to understand it properly How to open a successful restaurant A practical guide presentation
- 123. 123 Check my presentationon on-line models to understand them properly On-line Business Modesl A practical guide presentation
- 124. 124 For more checkalso my on-line course Click to check my course On-line Business Models in Excel – Practical Guide $45 $15
- 125. 125 Check my presentationon starting and running consulting company Start and run consulting company A practical guide presentation
- 126. 126 There is aninteresting summary of ways to test cheaply businesses MVP – how to test your business idea without building the product A practical guide presentation