Consulting Interview Mastery.
A complete MBB-level consulting interview preparation system — 120 consulting interview questions, 30 detailed case prompts, frameworks, mental-math drills, chart-interpretation guidance, synthesis coaching, recruiter red flags, and AI-powered feedback prompts. Built for Eccles MBA students and professionals targeting McKinsey, Bain, BCG, and elite strategy consulting roles.
How to use this playbook
A self-serve technical companion for MBB case and fit preparation — and a structured drilling tool for your coaching sessions. Work it in this order:
| # | Step | Why |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Start with fit and motivation | Your "why consulting / why this firm" answer anchors every interview. Get it credible first. |
| 2 | Build a consulting story bank | 5–7 PEI stories cover leadership, impact, conflict, failure, ambiguity. Reuse and re-angle them. |
| 3 | Learn core frameworks — then customize | Know them cold so you can build a tailored structure, not recite a template. |
| 4 | Practice market sizing and math daily | Speed and clean narration are trained, not innate. Short daily reps beat cramming. |
| 5 | Complete case prompts by category | Work one archetype at a time until the structure is automatic. |
| 6 | Practice out loud with the voice tool | Interviews are spoken. Record, listen back, cut filler. |
| 7 | Generate an AI coaching prompt after each rep | Paste your answer into the generator, run it in ChatGPT/Claude, get targeted feedback. |
| 8 | Track readiness by competency | Log feedback scores in the dashboard to see which dimensions still lag. |
| 9 | Repeat weak categories | Let the dashboard, not your comfort zone, choose what you drill next. |
| 10 | Prepare partner-level answers | Final rounds reward judgment and maturity. Rehearse the harder, more ambiguous version. |
The 4-week MBB preparation plan
A structured ramp from fundamentals to final-round readiness. Adjust pace to your recruiting timeline.
| Week | Focus | Daily practice | Readiness milestone |
|---|---|---|---|
| Week 1 | Fundamentals, fit story bank, basic case structure, profitability, market sizing | 1 fit story written; 1 profitability structure; 10 min math drills | Can structure a profitability case and tell a clean "why consulting" |
| Week 2 | Growth, market entry, pricing, charts, math drills, live case practice | 1 full case out loud; 1 exhibit read; 10 min math; record & review | Can drive a candidate-led case and interpret a basic exhibit |
| Week 3 | M&A, operations, transformation, advanced cases, synthesis, PEI depth | 1 advanced case; 1 synthesis rep; deepen 2 PEI stories | Synthesizes (not summarizes) and lands a clear recommendation |
| Week 4 | Mock interviews, final-round cases, partner-style fit, weakness repair, dashboard review | 2 mocks; partner-round Q&A; repair lowest dashboard dimensions | Interview-Ready or MBB-Caliber across most competencies |
Partner round preparation
Final rounds differ from first rounds: prompts are more ambiguous, the case flows more conversationally, and partners weight judgment, maturity, and fit far more heavily. Expect pushback — and be ready to defend a recommendation without becoming defensive. Communicate like a consultant advising a client, not a student answering a quiz.
- Why consulting now?
- Why our firm specifically?
- Tell me about a time you changed someone's mind.
- Tell me about a time you failed.
- What would your teammates say is hard about working with you?
- What business problem are you most interested in solving?
- If you were advising the CEO, what would you do first?
- What risks would you worry about?
- How would you align stakeholders?
- What would you do if the client disagreed?
Question Bank
120 consulting interview questions across 12 categories and four difficulty levels. Each has a conversational live-interview answer, a deep-dive with consulting logic, a coaching note, and the red flag that weakens the answer. Attempt your own answer first — then reveal, and use Practice to rehearse aloud and generate AI coaching.
MBB Case Prompt Library
A complete consulting case-practice library for McKinsey, Bain, BCG and other top firms. Each prompt is built to drill problem structuring, clarifying questions, hypothesis development, market sizing, profitability analysis, exhibit interpretation, consulting math, synthesis, and final recommendations.
Consulting Case Frameworks
The structured problem-solving approaches every consulting candidate should know cold — for case interviews, market sizing, profitability, growth, pricing, M&A, operations, behavioral questions, and final recommendations. Frameworks are raw material for a custom structure, never a script to recite.
Consulting Math & Analytics Drills
The math, data interpretation, and business judgment required for elite consulting interviews. The goal is to perform these clearly and quickly aloud, narrating your logic. Each drill gives the formula, a consulting-style example, a worked calculation, how to verbalize it, and the common mistakes.
Consulting Fit, Behavioral & PEI Preparation
MBB interviews evaluate more than case performance. Candidates must show leadership, drive, resilience, personal impact, teamwork, maturity, executive presence, and genuine motivation for consulting. Each prompt gives a strong answer, a story structure, what the interviewer is testing, red flags, and how to elevate it for MBB.
MBB Interview Battlecard
Your quick-reference cheat sheet. Review before every consulting coffee chat, recruiter call, case screen, first-round, final-round, and partner interview.
Consulting Interview Red Flags
The specific answers and behaviors that weaken candidates — memorized frameworks, weak structuring, unclear math, poor synthesis, shallow business judgment, vague fit stories, and failure to connect analysis to client impact. Know them, then design your reps to avoid them.
MBB Interview Readiness Dashboard
Your readiness is tracked from your actual practice — not self-scored. After each rep, generate the AI coaching prompt, run it in ChatGPT or Claude, then paste the reply back in the practice window. The tool reads the AI's competency scores and updates the dashboard below, accumulating across reps. Scores save in this browser.
Consulting & Business Insight Sources
A curated library of premier consulting and business-research sources. Where a publisher offers a working feed, the latest headlines load below automatically. Where they don't, you get a direct link to their insights hub. Use these to build market knowledge and feed your case prep with current examples.
feeds.json file in your GitHub repo. A scheduled
GitHub Action refreshes it on its own (daily), so the page stays current without any server. If
feeds.json is missing or a publisher's feed is down, this section automatically falls back to
direct links — it never breaks. Setup instructions ship alongside this file.