Just a video call, online. It was quite chill, they started by asking questions about yourself, strength & weakness, etc. They also asked about why you want to join SPP and why consulting. Then they asked 2 qns about case study.
Enjoyable, should be easy if you practice enough. Market sizing and general case questions. Bring positivity to interviews to impress, good communication skill, be yourself.
Practice market sizing without calculator to gain bonus points
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 1+ week. I interviewed at Strategic Project Partners (Melbourne) in Feb 2017
Interview
SPP team had presented to post grad students at Uni Melbourne in Feb 2016. I applied sometime in April 2016 and I was called in for a contract position interview (2 cases). The feedback was positive, but I never heard back form the hiring manager or the team. Anyhow, I contacted the new hiring manager in 2017 and I was then called in for a fresh round of interviews (as they couldn't find the notes from the previous one) for a full-time position. This was 4 cases split between 2 days.
The overall experience is no different from any other Consulting firm and nothing stands out about these guys. The cases were typical problems mixed with graphs etc. One thing I found extremely odd and ridiculous is that they expect exact calculations and no rounding of numbers. Hell, in one case, the number was something like market size of 39B$ growing @ 2% and our market share is 13% or something. God knows why you would want to test such precise numbers on people after they have 2 degrees and experience at billion $ companies.
Anyhow, after the 1st round I was told I did really well and they called me back within 48 hours. Then again both the interviewers said I did well and in fact, on one case the interviewer mentioned my recommendations were out of the box and above & beyond their recommendations to the actual client few years ago. I still didn't the FT position though. Feedback to me was 1) I jumped to the solutions too quickly (though honestly I don't remember even one instance of that happening) and 2) my cover letter (written 8 months ago btw in my initial application) has grammatical errors.
I'll take point #1 as something to work on, but point #2 just astonishes me. I have lived in 7 countries, worked in 3 and speak 3 languages. After an Engineering degree from one of the top 5 Universities in U.S, MBA from #1 Uni in APAC and experience at billion $ projects, they will use 4 paragraphs to judge my writing skills. I would love to ask SPP's consultants to write a perfect cover letter in their 2nd language?? Challenge accepted?
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
- Why Consulting, why SPP (as I mentioned, nothing different from other firms)
6 cases: 1 pharma, 1 govt unemployment program, 2 of education (1-school and 1-Uni), 1 Mining and 1 non profit