BCG First Round Interview

The basic ones, like "why consulting," "why BCG," or "XYZ on your resume looks cool, tell me about that" are common. But you only have a very short time for the behavioral interview portion since the case/questions for the interviewer take a long time and the whole thing is only 30 minutes to 1 hour at most. So as an interviewer, I usually select an "icebreaker" question by checking the bottom part of the resume for interesting hobbies and ask about those. That both makes you less nervous (so a better case performer) and tells me if you are an interesting person I'd like to spend time with in an airport (as consultants tend to do).

Meghan is right. Btw, make sure to prepare a few questions for your interviewer in case there is time at the end. Good examples would include "what is one think you'd like to change about the company", or "what is one advice you'd give your younger self as you were about to join BCG" => Basically, a question that will force your interviewer to think rather than give a canned answer.

PS: Bad questions are anything that you can find an answer to on the web, such as "what does your typical day look like". I also avoid the "what keeps you at BCG" because too many interviewers will just answer "the people" and wait for your next answer. Obviously, absolute worst types of questions would be "who is the CEO" or "how many consultants are there"... :)

Good luck!

Guennael.

ex-BCG Dallas

Hi Rohan!

I would like to share with You some tips that may help You get prepared for the interview. They might be useful for the behavioral part in particular.

Interviewers will ask questions targeted at the behaviors and qualifications You need to be successful in the job. Following the plan I am going to provide You will make it much more easier for You to succede: 

1. First of all determine and list the competencies that the interviewer is likely to be looking for. (The duties and qualifications listed in the job announcement).

2. Compare this list to Your past job history or personal experiences and list examples of how You have demonstrated those competencies.

3. Prepare to tell a story with a structure: a beginning, middle and end.

4. Outline some special examples or stories to show how You demonstrated the needed competencies. Think also of examples with negative outcome to show that You have learned something from this experience. 

5. Use STAR framework to make Your answer structered and provide all needed information to the interviewer.

S - Situation, T - Task, A - Approach, R - Result. So you can tell about the situation You have been through, the tasks You had to do, Your personal approach and what actions You have done to solve the case. Finally, You will have to conclude with the outcome of Your actions.

6. Practicing in telling Your stories might help as well. For each example You identifed, describe what problem occured, who was involved, what You did to resolve it, and what the outcome was.

The topics of the behavioral part can be quite different. You should just google some common examples to get understanding of what it will be like.

Hope, this helps!

Best,

Andre