Case interviewing is classist and sexist

Apr 10 85 Comments

Companies require case interviews if they want to hire more white guys. Discuss. Case interviews seem more like an elitist gatekeeping practice than any real assessment of strategic ability and creative thinking.

https://hbr.org/2020/01/what-top-consulting-firms-gets-wrong-about-hiring

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TOP 85 Comments
  • They literally don’t want to hire white guys. It’s probably the most difficult for white guys. Any minority/female instantly has a leg up. It’s a tough pill to swallow, I know
    Apr 13 16
    • Walmart
      akatsuki-

      Go to company page Walmart

      akatsuki-
      Yeah - white males crib about it. But they got it the easiest going in. Bschools usually have 60% international students & 40% Americans, yet 70% of MBB hires are just white americans. So Halliburton’s arguments are just delusional gas 😵
      Apr 14
    • New
      EBTl14

      New

      EBTl14
      #malcolmgladwell has written and spoken about this extensively. The legacy kids seem to have the biggest advantage after generations of donations. Actually, looking forward to watching the new show on why POC don’t transfer their wealth or hold on to it the way white families do, even when they are well educated. Turns out, they give it to poor family members in need, which is what I find myself doing (I’m not wealthy, just have a bit more than my kin).
      Apr 15
  • Plaid
    IMGL10

    Go to company page Plaid

    IMGL10
    Eh I dunno if it’s to hire more white guys. Cases test someone’s desire to get a job in consulting more than their expected job performance. The individuals who get consulting offers are by and large those who put the most time into preparation. (It isn’t impossible to get one without preparation of course, but much less common.) I’ve been consistent in advocating for different approaches throughout my career. I really think firms are passing on truly talented people who, for whatever reason, just don’t click with casing. I do think though that some cases can be heavily culturally biased - a past company I worked for had a case that revolved around running a ski resort, which, well I imagine it’s harder to dig into the case if you’ve never been skiing before, which is expensive!

    I think interviewing in general can be very biased: for example; what is the difference between deciding a candidate “is curious” (a positive) vs “unstructured” (a negative) in their thinking. I’ve seen strong candidates at several companies I’ve worked for get passed over for poor comms (highly correlated to ESL) or just general demeanor. People hire people that are like them, behaviorally and in terms of demeanor, and sometimes race and gender.

    Fun note, I worked at an internal consulting group for a while and it was heavily stacked with affluent white people from private schools. One girl I worked with literally didn’t know that public libraries were free. But she could crush a case. You get what you test for.
    Apr 13 3
    • Citibank
      BlingerHay

      Go to company page Citibank

      BlingerHay
      It’s basically like every other exam-based bar of entry: SWE technical interviews, SATs, the MCAT. If you have the privilege of preparing for it, you have the privilege of getting a high score. It might not be a perfect method of evaluation, but it’s one of the more direct ways to show your dedication to getting in.
      Apr 13
    • JLL
      jspct

      Go to company page JLL

      jspct
      "She could crush a case" - at first I thought beer (ha what does this say about my thought process )
      Apr 14
  • IBM
    hrhrjr

    Go to company page IBM

    hrhrjr
    Case interviews and leetcode are both learnable skills. Do enough and you can pass them. There’s nothing racist or sexist about them. The system can be racist and classist (lots of issues in the us are based on class and not race. But since they’re tied in many cases sadly it’s a double whammy on a lot of folks) so that poor folks don’t have the time or environment to even know what to study. But if you took random kids from around the country of different races. And gave them a 1-2 years boot camp all paid for. With an optional pre year yo cover what they may not have gotten in there poor city schools. They’d all preform equally amazing.

    The issue is that poor black folks for example (since I’m a black dude from a poor family) don’t even know anything about anything. And that sets you up for failure. Looking back there’s a ton of stuff that could have made my life easier. Like I’m an engineer. My mom and dad didn’t even know what an engineer is. As a kid our options for stuff we knew about in the hood we grew up in was literally just rap, athletics, going to college as a nebulous thing (since not many of us had went), lawyer and doctor. That’s it. If I had known what I know now. I would have went to a community college and learned cs then applied to a state school and finished it up.

    Something as simple as that wasn’t even known in my community.

    And that’s the missing factor. Backgrounds where it’s not the violence or the drugs that set you up for failure the most. Is the lack of knowing basic things due to systemic redlining and racism that screwed over my grand parents generation and set my parents for failure.
    Apr 13 7
    • iRobot
      Kis8m

      Go to company page iRobot

      Kis8m
      Not knowing is not an excuse. I get it that your parents didn't know, and the community you grew up in didn't know much, but the same way it is you who got out got education and you're an engineer now your parents could have done the same thing back in the day.

      When people say my grandparents were setback because of this or because of that it just shows the victim mentality. Many whites and other minorities got f***d around the world for being poor. Slavery didn't exist only in the US, but it existed in a lot of places back in the '70s and the eighties in the Middle East in parts of Africa and I bet in other countries.

      And if you think about it slavery or "being a serf" existed for hundreds if not thousands of years around the world, and people still grow out of this shit. I even bet did bunch of people today can claim that their grandparents back in Europe were probably serves of another lord in their country.

      And if we go back as far as our grandparents generation, look in Germany and the rest of Europe. Most of the cities in Europe were totally destroyed, but if you look at them today you would not say there it World War in that region. People and countries massively rebuild the destruction. So people will actually want to do something with their lives do it regardless of anything. People make the conscious decision to stay in the hood instead of getting out getting education or even an understanding about the world and succeed in life.

      Also something to consider, maybe being a white male born in the USA is "privileged", but in a lot of countries around the world they're just one white dude of the pack. And when they come to this country, they don't really understand how their skin makes them privileged...
      Apr 14
    • New
      fisb184cke

      New

      fisb184cke
      Your comment lacks empathy. It’s easy to say from the outside, but we really need to think from their perspective.
      Apr 14
  • Amazon
    vpckeks

    Go to company page Amazon

    vpckeks
    50% of my MBA classmates who went to MBB are women? 🤷‍♂️
    Apr 13 2
    • IBM
      hrhrjr

      Go to company page IBM

      hrhrjr
      Yeah a lot of these articles always mix the two. But women are succeeding in a lot of areas. The issue isn’t sexism. It’s classism. A lot of people from poor backgrounds don’t succeed. That’s the bigger discrepancy. Compare those who are in the field parents medium income to the average medium income. Last time I checked half of Deloitte analysts come from families that had analysts or had money of some sort.
      Apr 13
    • New
      olol

      New

      olol
      Preach. This is 100% the case. If you don't get to have that high level education, you are screwed. I actually wish I focused on communication because being a clear and effective communicator even if you have nothing of substance is more valued.

      It's fucking sad.
      Apr 13
  • Hiring is very tough. That said, making everything in life about racism like Americans do is not going to end well.
    Apr 13 2