Strategy consulting interview questions
A strategy consulting interview mixes three kinds of questions: fit questions about your background and motivation, a case question that opens twenty to thirty minutes of problem solving, and short math or business sense questions asked along the way. Each page below takes one question, explains what the interviewer wants to hear and shows how a good answer starts.
Fit questions
Fit weighs as much as the case in the final decision. The interviewer wants stories you actually lived, told precisely, where it is clear what you personally did.
- Why strategy consulting?
- Why our firm, and not another one?
- Tell me about yourself: how to walk through your background in two minutes
- Tell me about a time you failed
- Tell me about a time you had to convince someone who disagreed with you
- Give me an example of leading a team through a difficult situation
- Tell me about a conflict with a teammate: how did you handle it?
- Tell me about your greatest achievement
- What are your main strengths and weaknesses?
- Tell me about a disagreement you had with your manager
- Where do you see yourself in five years?
- Tell me about a time you used data to solve a problem
Case questions
Each case family has its reflexes, but none of them is solved by reciting a grid. The structure is built from the client's question, and that is what these pages show.
- Our client's profitability has been falling for two years: what do you recommend?
- Should our client enter this new market?
- Our client wants to launch a new product: should it, and how?
- Should our client acquire this company?
- How should we price this new product?
- Our client wants to double its revenue in five years: how?
- Our client needs to cut costs by 15%: where do you start?
- A private equity fund is considering buying this company: is it a good investment?
- A low-cost competitor has just entered our client's market: how should it respond?
- The CEO walks into the room: what is your recommendation?
Math and business sense
These short questions come in the middle of a case. They are won on the method you announce before computing and on what you make of the result, more than on speed.
- How many coffees a day does this new outlet need to sell to break even?
- Is this 2 million euro investment worth it?
- What market share does our client need to be profitable?
- If our client raises prices by 10%, what happens to its margin?
- What do you take from this chart?
- What ideas do you have to increase this client's sales?
- What is the size of the prescription glasses market in France?
- Sales went from 80 to 120 million in four years: what is the average annual growth?
How to use these pages
Read the page for one question, then close it and answer out loud with a timer running. A fit answer takes about two minutes, and a case structure is presented in under two minutes after a short pause to think. What you can explain while reading you cannot yet say under pressure, and the spoken version is the one that gets scored.
Do not memorise the examples. They show a construction: a direct answer in the first sentence, precise facts, then what you take from them. An interviewer spots a recited answer within seconds, and then follows up on a detail to pull you off the script.
For cases, the trap is to force a memorised grid onto the problem. McKinsey, BCG, Bain and the other firms give cases drawn from real engagements, which never fit a grid cleanly. The method that holds is always the same: restate the client's question, ask yourself what you would need to know to answer it, and organise those questions into three or four blocks that do not overlap.
Frequently asked questions
Which questions come up most often in consulting interviews?
On the fit side, "Why consulting?", "Why our firm?" and the walk through your background are asked in almost every process, followed by one or two behavioural questions on leadership, failure or persuasion. On the case side, profitability declines, market entries and market size estimates are the most common.
Should I write out an answer to every fit question?
No. Prepare five or six strong stories that you know in detail, and practise angling them to the question. The same team project story can answer a question about leadership, about conflict or about failure, depending on what you bring forward. A memorised text falls apart at the first follow-up.
How long is the fit part compared with the case?
It depends on the firm and the round. The most common format gives ten to fifteen minutes to fit and twenty-five to thirty minutes to the case, but some final-round interviews with a partner are almost entirely fit. The firm pages describe each firm's format.
Are the questions the same in French and in English?
In substance, yes. In France most interviews are held in French, sometimes with one interview or part of one in English to check your level. It is wise to be able to tell each of your stories in both languages.