Professional Documents
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Vault Guide - 1 PDF
Vault Guide - 1 PDF
INTRODUCTION 1
CASE STRATEGIES 7
Your Objective . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
Don’t Fret . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9
CASE FRAMEWORKS 23
BEING THERE 59
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BUSINESS CASES 73
GUESSTIMATES 193
BRAINTEASERS 209
Brainteasers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .211
Remember... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .211
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APPENDIX 223
8. Taking Wing
This is a good candidate for the Four Ps framework. (Note that the
interviewer has deliberately set this case at a time when you cannot use online
membership as a substitute or addition.) A good analysis would kick off with
some scoping questions to understand the evolution of the idea:
• Are you aware of any programs currently in existence that caused you
to consider this idea for American Airlines? If so, what do you feel are
major advantages/disadvantages?
• Have you done any market research within your customer base to
determine how well this program would be received if instituted?
• Can you sketch the purchasing habits of your top flyers for me? How
much do they currently spend on air travel per year, what percentage is
business vs. leisure, are there a particular set of routes this group
frequents, do they stick with one airline or purchase tickets on many
airlines, etc.?
Price
• Would there be a membership fee for this program? Would this
program be available to all American customers or only those who fly
at or over a certain threshold?
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Product
• Would the program be based on miles, segments, price of tickets, or
another factor?
• What need would this program satisfy that does not currently exist in the
marketplace?
Position/Place
• Are you aware of any similar programs in today’s marketplace? If so,
what would differentiate your program from others that already exist?
Promotion
• How would you introduce this program to your customers? Through
airports, the media, travel agents? Would it be available only to frequent
flyers or all the flying public?
The setup
You have been told in advance over the phone by HR that one of the final
round interviews will involve presenting. The HR person explains that you
will play the role of the consultant, and a number of senior firm executives
will play the role of the board of directors receiving your presentation.
On your interview day, you have a fit interview with one of the partners. You
are then are ushered into a conference room with the following materials:
You are told to imagine that you are a consultant who has just taken a first
look at the attached documents for a client named Pure Meats, who makes
prepackaged raw meat for retail distribution. Pure, it turns out, is concerned
about a new product from a competitor, Gordon, who has been making steady
inroads into Pure’s market share. Today the Board of Directors is onsite for
the day, and they want to hear your initial thoughts on the issues. In advance
of your conversation with the board, you are to take 40 minutes to read
through the given materials and create a handwritten slide presentation using
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the materials provided. Afterwards, you will present your findings to the
Board of Directors, and undergo a Q&A session.
Getting ready
First, let’s get organized and inventory our documents. (See Figures 1-10.)
This is also the right time to establish timing. Set aside at least 10 minutes
at the end to put together your talk (five minutes to put together a few bullet
point slides and five minutes to think through your presentation). Stick to it.
If you get more time than that, great; if not, you will need all 10 of those
minutes.
Approach
You will need to make an assumption as to what your value measure is. Your
guess is that the client isn’t worried about profits as much as a drop in
revenue. What about market share? Not sure. (Quiz question: is declining
market share ever okay? We’ll address this later.)
One other thing to recognize here: you are probably going to be able to figure
out if Pure should be worried about Gordon; however, you are probably not
going to reach a recommendation regarding what you should do about it. You
should offer either a hypothesis or a set of alternatives, plus next steps on how
to move forward. Therefore, you are going to:
You can see now that it’s very important to get the question right! Now you
can focus on what matters.
Step 2: Skim the materials and isolate the key sources of insight
Now that you know what you’re looking for, you can dive deeper into the
materials. Not including the cover sheet, there are ten sheets of paper in front
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of you. This seems pretty overwhelming. Let’s address the figures one by
one and see if we can focus our analysis a bit.
Figure 1: The article excerpt notes that Gordon entered the market in 2002
with a pre-cooked beef product and seems to be doing well. You should
immediately think to yourself, “So what? Who would buy such a product?”
Your intuition should tell you that this is probably a great product for people
in a rush with a busy lifestyle, but wouldn’t appeal to chefs and traditional
cooks. Jot this thought down on your page of notes.
2001 Market
Share in Beef
72% 5% 4% -- 19%
2001 Market
Share in 20% 15% 12% -- 53%
Chicken
2001 Market
Share in Pork
18% 14% 13% -- 55%
2002 Market
Share in Beef
72% 5% 4% 2% 17%
2002 Market
Share in 20% 15% 12% 0% 53%
Chicken
2002 Market
Share in Pork
18% 14% 13% 0% 55%
2003 Market
Share in Beef
52% 4% 3% 27% 13%
2003 Market
Share in 19% 15% 12% 0% 54%
Chicken
2003 Market
Share in Pork
19% 14% 13% 0% 54%
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Figure 3: A memo, the salient point of which is that Pure Meats has enough
manufacturing capacity to introduce a new product or increase production on
a current product. Not much more to this figure than that point. Jot it down
and move on.
Figure 4: You can see that Pure Meats sells packaged, uncooked beef,
chicken, and pork, with beef being its primary product at nearly 80% of its
revenues. The main point is that Pure Meats’ main product is beef, so it will
be concerned about a new competitor. Jot the point down.
6% 2%
Beef
14% Chicken
Pork
Other
78%
Note: all Pure Meats products are packaged uncooked for retail sale.