Interview Guide
Employers are looking for a candidate who is…
- Relaxed, confident, and mature.
- A good listener and a strong communicator.
- Engaging and intellectually curious.
- A strong presenter with excellent social skills.
- Able to organize information effectively and to develop a logical framework for analysis.
- Able to determine what is truly relevant.
- Able to quantify a response whenever doing so is appropriate.
- A creative thinker.
- Able to defend a position without being defensive.
(Adapted from Case in Point, Complete Case Interview Preparation by Marc Cosentino)
Common Interview Styles
Behavioral Interviews
- Help the interviewer understand how you reacted in an actual situation.
- Require you to respond with a specific example.
- Are based on the concept that future behavior is best predicted by past behavior.
Behavioral questions are likely to begin with phrases like
- Give me an example of a time when you…
- Describe a situation where you…
Typical questions, and the behaviors they address, include the following:
- Communication: We’ve all had occasions when we misinterpreted something that someone told us, like a due date or complicated instructions. Give me an example of a time when this happened to you, why it happened, and how you rectified the situation.
- Conflict management: Describe a time when you disagreed with a supervisor, how the disagreement evolved, and how you resolved it.
- Decision-making: Give me an example of a situation in which you made up your mind too rapidly, and how that conduct affected the outcome of the situation.
- Judgment or ethics: Everyone has to bend or break the rules sometimes. Give me an example when you broke the rules, why you did so, and what came of it.
- Planning/organization: Describe a situation where you assumed responsibility for getting something fairly complicated or important done and how you went about it.
- Persistence: Describe a time when you encountered an obstacle that you could not overcome and how you handled the situation.
- Teamwork: Describe an experience when you were part of a team, the part you played on the team, and how you handled team members who were not contributing in the way you wanted.
- Transferable skills: Describe your strengths (usually three) and specific ways that you have utilized them. Identify a weakness and how you’ve countered or worked around it successfully. (Please note that some interviewers will ask you to identify a second weakness, and thus you need to be prepared to discuss a second limitation — without sounding as if you have practiced the answer.)
Use the STAR technique to help you answer behavioral questions.
For additional practice, consider reviewing this list of general interview questions.
Case Interviews
- Are used primarily by management consulting firms and, increasingly, investment banks and tech companies.
- Are designed to test the candidate’s analytical skills and “soft” skills within a realistic business context in a pressured real-time environment.
- For examples of case interview questions, read more in Case in Point by Marc Cosentino
Common Interview Types
In-person Interviews
Phone Interviews
Video Interviews
Committee or Panel Interviews
Group Interviews
