Business awards are an acknowledgement of the merit of your company and they build its reputation in a much more effective way than any PR activity can do. Besides creating great business prospects for you company, these awards also make employees more motivated. However, a business has to showcase its performance and achievements properly in order to win these awards. (more…)
What are the advantages of outsourcing to the Philippines that have made it a first choice outsourcing solution for businesses across the globe?
- Lower Costs
Outsourcing to the Philippines can save a company as much as 30-40% in operational expenses. This is huge savings for small and medium-sized companies especially. (more…)
A combination of several approaches undertaken with a coordinated effort is likely to serve as the most realistic (and effective) use of business planning tools. Complex solutions will usually be required to solve complicated problems. A series of business planning and management maneuvers that can take a number of months to complete will often be the result. (more…)
Companies outsourcing business processes should be well prepared for accomplishments. The only factor that can make the BPO strategy work is extensive preparation.
Before working on outsourcing strategies, companies should be aware of outsourcing relationship management. (more…)
Why do some corporate strategies succeed? And why do some of them fail? The answer is in effective strategic management. While most managers and executives are quite familiar with what strategic or institutional management is, many of them do not really have a good grasp of what this concept really means. And also, many of them fail to see that an understanding of strategic or institutional management should not only be kept within the managerial or executive level. This concept should be understood by all the people who are part of the company.
Strategic management is simply the formulation, implementation, and evaluation of cross-functional decisions and strategies that are aimed to help the company or organization achieve its long-term goals or objectives. It involves developing and specifying the mission, vision, objectives, policies, and plans of the company or organization. More often than not, these are expressed in terms of projects and programs designed to achieve the goals or objectives of the company or organization.
It also involves the proper allocation of resources so that the policies, plans, projects, and programs can be successfully implemented. In this manner, the mission, vision, and objectives that have been set can be fully realized. To help check whether the company or organization is on track, a balanced scorecard is often used. Through this balanced scorecard, the overall performance of the company or organization can be evaluated to check its progress towards the achievement of its goals or objectives.
While strategic management is meant to be a level of managerial activity, it also involves everyone in the company or organization. It involves the formulation of goals by thinking about doing more than just tactics. It helps give an overall direction to the company or organization. And more than just having a strategic alignment within the company, it also seeks to have a strategic alignment between the company or organization and its environment.
Simply put, strategic management is an ongoing process that seeks to evaluate and put control on the different businesses and industries that a company or organization might be involved in. It also helps evaluate competitors to help set specific goals and strategies so that existing and potential competition can be met or addressed. More importantly, it re-evaluates the each of the different corporate or organizational strategies regularly to help determine how it has been implemented, and whether the strategies have succeeded or they need to be replaced with new ones to better address different corporate or organizational and environmental changes.
Here, I’ll focus on 10 important steps to prepare for business consulting interviews. As an overall piece of advice, the best way to become a strong interviewer is to interview in live situations frequently – thus the reasoning behind spreading a very wide net and applying to many different consulting firms.
Getting ready for case studies
1. Read Case In Point – a thorough, 100% case study-focused resource
2. Browse Victor Cheng’s site www.caseinterview.com – Victor’s a former McKinsey consultant who provides great case tips and techniques
3. Practice online case studies – most firm websites have plenty of cases (some like Bain even have video case studies). The key is to answer the question yourself before reading the suggested answer. There are good consulting websites with case study materials as well, including Rice’s Consulting Club
4. Practice with friends – if no friends can be found, search sites like Craigslist, consulting forums, and the like for suitable partners
5. Practice estimation questions in spare moments (eg, if you see a Chrysler while driving, think about how many Chryslers are manufactured in the U.S.). It seems silly, but this is how you become quick and agile in your thought process
The key here: practicing as many cases as you can with actual consultants. Don’t underestimate their capacity to help you
Fit/experiential interview prep
1. Create fake fit interview questions and prepare sample responses – avoid rote memorization, but outline your main bullets.
2. Practice answering in front of a mirror – this helps familiarize you with body language, hand gestures, tone, etc
3. Practice with friends and family – have them ask you questions where you don’t have prepared responses. Improvisational interview skills will serve you well for consulting interviews
General interview prep suggestions
1. Wear something that looks clean, sharp, and makes you feel confident – first appearances are deceptively powerful. Dress like a management consultant, and people will think you deserve an offer.
2. Talk to as many consultants as you can – the better you understand the actual job, the more comfortable you are with consulting terms like “5,000 mile view” and “good client hands“, the better you’ll do. It’s also great for consulting job networking
That wraps up our tour of how to prepare for business consulting interviews. Good luck!