Recently, more and more companies want candidates to deal with case studies at a job interview. It shows your ability to think under time pressure, use your experience, show your way of thinking, etc. Unfortunately, being a competent specialist is not enough to cope with a job interview case study at the required level. To overcome this obstacle on the way to your dream job, use these practical tips borrowed from GetCaseStudy.com – a professional case study writing company.
- Business case, as a rule, includes a description of some problem situation. It may imply the right decision that a candidate must come to as a result or it’s main idea can be to see how the candidate actually thinks. However, cases with a large number of solutions are used more often in business interviews.
- The decision to which the candidate comes relies on his or her experience, copying it or compiling it, or be completely non-standard, bright, unexpected.
Case provides an opportunity to reflect on a typical situation that candidates may encounter in their activities.
- This work makes it possible to find a verified rational solution to a difficult problem and show candidate’s way of thinking. Here, we will provide you with practical tips on how to deal with the most difficult cases HR specialists use during interviews.
Solve Case Studies Successfully and Get Your Dream Job
- Structure your solution. You will definitely need to deal with all the available ways of structuring cases – frameworks. The main thing is to learn right away to choose the right one and not try to apply the one that does not suit you. One of the best standard approaches is recorded in the book “Crack the Case” by David Orwell, a former consultant who now travels the world and preaches his approach.
- Learn how to distinguish all types of business cases. If a good candidate can use standard frameworks to systematically solve a problem, then a cool candidate looks wider and immediately adapts them for a particular type of business case. Remember about: Market Sizing, Market Entry, Profitability Case and others.
- Learn to lay out the complex issues into simple parts. The interviewer will closely monitor the course of your thoughts, and success here depends on how you can break the most complex case into simple components.
- Understand the main methods of business analysis. In case-interviews, they always pay attention to how well you use the analytical tools for solving case studies. If you use SWOT analysis effectively, take into account the Pareto principle and features of the product life cycle, the interviewer will understand that you can talk on an equal footing. You can also learn about the pareto principle and how to create a pareto chart.
- Broaden your horizon and use it to the fullest. You can understand all the principles of solving cases, but without great erudition you can’t proceed. You must be well versed in the geography, the economic situation in the world and individual states, properly assess the demographic characteristics of different countries and regions. This is perhaps the most difficult thing: you cannot remember such volume of information even in a couple of weeks. Follow the news of politics and economics, play quizzes on your smartphone, scroll through school textbooks on geography, watch documentaries, and most importantly, read more.
- Learn to count quickly. To solve cases effectively you need to develop good mathematical skills. You will have to think very quickly at the interview, they may not give you a calculator, and the calculations on a piece of paper will look unprofessional.
You should also get acquainted with the sample business case studies online and get to know more about the questions you can be asked. It is good to have some standard examples and popular theories in mind, to use them solving any case. Good luck!