Recruiting / Case atlas / Standards
What good looks like, move by move.
Thirty-five moves make up a case, from reading back the first number to stopping after the next step. Each one here has a standard, the check you can run on your next rep, and where to practice it on Harper, with the public source where one exists.
01 · Recognize
What kind of case is this, and what is the client trying to achieve?
Prompt capture
Every given amount is written down with its unit before it is used, and the ones that matter are read back to the interviewer.
Check on your next rep: Rent, wages and demand appear on the sheet with per-month, per-hour, per-day beside them; nothing was retyped from memory.
Objective and metric
The decision, the metric it turns on and the time horizon are stated in one sentence before any structure, and the structure's first bucket answers that objective.
Check on your next rep: The recap ends with the objective; the first workstream name contains the objective's noun (payback, margin, share).
Clarifying questions
Clarifying questions are few, each one changes the structure, and each comes with its reason; nothing is asked that the prompt already answered.
Check on your next rep: At most three questions, none about geography unless it is genuinely unclear, each followed by what the answer changes.
Case type recognition
The business problem is named out loud (enter, grow, improve profit, improve operations, evaluate a deal) and that name chooses the drivers, not a memorized list.
Check on your next rep: The named type matches the bucket a reader would pick on the atlas; the drivers that follow are the ones that type needs.
02 · Structure
Which workstreams matter, and what is the first answer?
Workstreams with drivers
Two to four workstreams, each named as the job a team member would own, each carrying the question it answers and the output it produces; two that would test the same thing are merged.
Check on your next rep: Across then down: the three names, then two drivers under each, in bullets; the interviewer could redraw it on their own paper.
Initial hypothesis
A definite first answer is stated before the framework and revised out loud as evidence arrives; a conditional or missing hypothesis is treated as no hypothesis.
Check on your next rep: The hypothesis is one sentence with a direction; when data refutes it the structure, not the case, is revisited.
Signposting
The listener always knows where in the structure the candidate is and where they are going next; transitions are said, not implied.
Check on your next rep: A summary of where we are, what we learned, what it means, and the next branch appears at every turn in the analysis.
Adapting the framework
The framework is built in the client's own words and bent to the industry and the question; the skeleton shows only in the bones.
Check on your next rep: No bucket is called revenue or costs without the client's product, channel or customer in its name.
03 · Solve
The numbers, the sheet and the exhibit.
Input ledger
A given / unit / conversion table exists before any calculation, on its own, and the calculation table sits apart from it.
Check on your next rep: Two tables: inputs with units, then calculations that reference them; no number appears first inside a formula.
Practice on Harper →Bain Coffee Shop Co. ↗Road to Offer, case interview math tips ↗
One time basis
Every quantity is converted to one time basis before anything is combined, and each calculation column carries one basis.
Check on your next rep: Rent per month, wages per hour and advertising per year all appear as per-day (or all per-year) before the first sum.
Practice on Harper →Bain Coffee Shop Co. ↗PrepLounge forum, common math traps ↗
Units and magnitude
Money stays in one unit, the unit rides on every line, and the one-percent anchor is computed before any percentage of a large base.
Check on your next rep: 3,000 appears as $3,000m; 1% of it is written as 30, labeled million; no line says billion and million in the same column.
Percentage base and sign
Every percentage is said as percent of what, the base is kept, each change carries its sign, and rates are never averaged without weights.
Check on your next rep: A price change on unchanged volume is applied straight to revenue, with the reason said; a mix of up and down changes is netted, not averaged.
Contribution and cost behavior
Price minus variable cost first, then volume, then fixed cost; contribution per unit is a dollar amount, not a margin percentage; overlapping costs are separated.
Check on your next rep: The sheet shows a per-unit contribution line and a separate fixed-cost line; no cost appears in two buckets.
Back-solving
A required value is found by writing the forward equation and undoing one operation at a time, saying each step.
Check on your next rep: The forward equation is on the page before the back-solve; the answer is checked by running it forward again.
Practice on Harper →Bain Coffee Shop Co. ↗Road to Offer break-even guide / PrepLounge forum 5992 ↗
Payback and the investor bridge
Investment is divided by the relevant incremental annual cash; capex stays outside the operating table; business cash is bridged to the investor's share before it is compared with what was paid.
Check on your next rep: The equipment outlay appears once, in the year it happens; the investor's share is computed before the payback line.
Practice on Harper →Bain Coffee Shop Co. ↗Hacking the Case Interview ↗
Market sizing chain
People to buyers to frequency to spend to revenue, each link an assumption said aloud with its unit, then checked against capacity or a known total.
Check on your next rep: The chain is written left to right before any number is multiplied; the result is compared with something real (occupancy, a market total).
Capacity and bottleneck
The process is drawn as stages, the minimum stage is the capacity, demand caps it, and the profit question is incremental, not total.
Check on your next rep: A stage diagram precedes the number; the answer names which stage binds and what demand does to it.
Practice on Harper →Umbrex operations cases / Road to Offer operations guide ↗
Pricing before and after
A price change is judged on a before-and-after contribution table with the retention or volume threshold at which the decision flips.
Check on your next rep: The threshold is a number on the sheet (at most 111 of 1,000 can leave), labeled as a threshold, not a forecast.
Practice on Harper →Bain FashionCo ↗Road to Offer break-even guide / PrepLounge forum 5992 ↗
Reading exhibits
Title, axes and units are read first, then the one comparison the exhibit exists to show, and the so-what is said before any detail.
Check on your next rep: Under thirty seconds of silence, then a sentence that starts with what the chart means for the objective.
Scratch sheet layout
One sheet per analysis with its conclusion as a headline, comparison across columns, driver sequence down rows, every result labeled so it can be reused; more pages beat a crowded page.
Check on your next rep: A reader could assemble the recommendation from the headlines alone; no number on the sheet lacks a label and a unit.
Sanity check and small-number routes
Before a number is said it is rounded, bounded and compared with something known; an impossible result is caught by the candidate, not the interviewer.
Check on your next rep: An order-of-magnitude line appears beside the answer (about 4,000, so 3,900 is right); a share above 100% or a payback under one year is challenged out loud.
Method before numbers
The equation is stated and agreed before anything is computed; the math is chunked and each interim result is checked aloud.
Check on your next rep: The interviewer hears the method and nods before the first multiplication; no stretch of silent arithmetic longer than ten seconds.
03b · Brainstorm
Ideas in groups, with a number where one fits.
Structured brainstorm
A brainstorm pauses, names two or three headings, lists ideas under them, puts a number on the ones that can carry one, and closes; breadth across, then depth down.
Check on your next rep: Under thirty seconds to structure, one to two minutes to speak, and the ideas arrive grouped, not as a list.
04 · Recommend
The answer, the reason, the risk, the test, the stop.
Answer first with one number
The recommendation opens with the decision and the one number that carries it; the case is not recapped.
Check on your next rep: The first sentence contains a verb (enter, raise, do not buy) and a figure; the reason follows, not the story.
Risk and next test
One risk that could flip the answer is named, and the next step is the test that would check that risk.
Check on your next rep: The risk and the next step pair up (demand cushion, then validate traffic); next steps are not a to-do list.
Clear ending
The recommendation stops after the next step; nothing new (a geography, an idea, a caveat) is added while closing.
Check on your next rep: The last sentence is the next step or a thank-you; the timer shows time left.
Practice on Harper →BCG ↗Road to Offer synthesis / Hacking the Case Interview recommendation / PrepLounge pyramid principle ↗
Acknowledge the numerical winner
If the recommendation goes against the modeled winner, the numbers are acknowledged first and the assumption that would change the choice is named.
Check on your next rep: Both options' payback appear on the sheet; the chosen one is justified with a named assumption, not a preference.
+ · Presence
How it sounds in the room.
Asking for time
Twenty to thirty seconds of silence are asked for by name, used, and followed by structure; the pause is expected, not apologized for.
Check on your next rep: The candidate says what they are taking time to do; the return opens with the structure, not with the first idea.
Conversation over recitation
The interviewer is treated as a client: reasoning is said aloud, the specific missing input is asked for by name, and the tone moves.
Check on your next rep: The ask is for price, not for the data; a sentence of reasoning precedes each request; pace changes at the so-what.
Driving the case forward
The candidate proposes the next analysis instead of waiting, and keeps moving through a wrong turn.
Check on your next rep: After each result the candidate names what to look at next; the interviewer never has to prompt the next step.
Repairing an error
A mistake is corrected once, aloud, with thanks rather than apology, and the structure survives it.
Check on your next rep: The words are thanks or good catch; the corrected number replaces the old one on the sheet; the next step follows within a sentence.
Practice on Harper →BCG ↗L.E.K. careers blog (Tom Adams, London) ↗
Reset when overwhelmed
When overwhelmed, the candidate states the output, plans the relation, labels the units, calculates in steps and ties the result to the decision.
Check on your next rep: The five moves are visible on the page in that order; the reset takes under a minute.
Practice on Harper →Road to Offer recovery playbook ↗Management Consulted ↗
Taking a redirect
An interviewer's hint or correction is taken as data: thanked, explored, and folded in; the original route is not defended.
Check on your next rep: After a redirect the candidate works the interviewer's path first and says what changed.
Energy and levity
The voice modulates, warmth is visible, and one well-placed light moment lands; the interviewer has run nine cases today.
Check on your next rep: The pace changes at the so-what; there is eye contact off the sheet; the candidate smiles at least once on purpose.
∞ · Practice
How the reps are run between sessions.
Practice process
A case log travels with every rep, two to three cases a week are mixed with drills, firm practice cases are treated as evaluative, and progress is expected to be non-linear.
Check on your next rep: The log has a row per rep with feedback and a rating; this week has at least one live case, one qualitative drill block and one quantitative one, and not every rep is with the same partner.
Why these are not a generic checklist
The firms publish the floor. The room sets the standard.
What the firms publish
The firms publish what they want: a clear objective, a structure that fits the case, thinking said aloud, and no single right answer. Those pages are the public floor and every standard here links to one where it exists.
What only the room produces
What no vendor page can carry is what happens in the room: which slips actually recur in a cohort (a monthly figure treated as daily, a percentage of the wrong base, capex folded into operating cost, an ending that keeps adding ideas), how the club runs partner practice, which casebook it uses this year, and what the firms said on campus this season. The standards are written from that.
Where only a worked example will do
Several moves (one time basis, percent of what, the investor bridge, capacity and bottleneck, the reset) have no firm page at all. Harper’s worked examples are the only place a reader will find them with numbers attached.
Harper’s synthesis of public firm guidance, the club’s workshops and coached practice this season. Roles, never names; every number in the checks is illustrative.