Case interview
Stay in the framework during a case
A case is judged on structure first and answers second. The interviewer is listening for whether you cut the problem into pieces that do not overlap, and then for whether you can do arithmetic while talking. Both of those degrade fast under pressure.
One card
What an answer looks like in this room.
Trippi Cue
Case interview
Heard in the call
Our client is a regional airline losing money on short-haul. Where would you start?
Suggested answer
Split it into revenue per seat and cost per seat, then ask which side moved. Start with load factor and route mix — on short-haul, a half-empty plane explains more than fuel prices do.
An illustration of one card, not a screenshot.
A case answer that opens with “there are many factors” has already lost the room. The card opens with a cut, which is what the interviewer is waiting to hear.
What is hard here
Three places this round goes wrong.
The opening cut
The first thirty seconds set the frame for the whole case, and a weak frame cannot be recovered later — you spend the rest of the hour defending it.
Arithmetic out loud
Market sizing with somebody watching turns simple multiplication into a stumble. A number on screen is something to check your own against, not a substitute for doing it.
The recommendation at the end
Answer first, two reasons, one risk. Everybody knows this shape and it is still the part people ramble through, because by then the hour has done its work.
Before the call
One line of context changes every answer.
“About this meeting” is a plain text field in the window. Whatever you put there travels with each question, which is the difference between an answer written for you and an answer written for nobody.
Telling Cue your own failure mode changes what comes back: named in the brief, it shows up as answers that pull you toward the side you neglect.
About this meeting
Consulting case round, profitability case, second round with a partner. I tend to go too deep on costs.
Typed once, before you join. It is kept with the call window for 30 days and then deleted, like everything else Cue sends up.
Honest limits
What it cannot do in this round.
Said here rather than discovered halfway through an interview that matters.
Exhibits are out of reach
A chart shared on screen is nothing to Cue. If the interviewer says the numbers out loud it can work with them; if they only point at them, it cannot.
It does not run the case
No framework library, no scoring, no practice cases. Cue answers the questions put to you during a live call and nothing else.
Where we stand on using it at all: responsible use →
FAQ
Case interview, specifically.
Can it do the maths for me?+
It answers with the arithmetic when the numbers were said out loud. Do the calculation yourself as well — partners ask how you got there, and the model is not sitting in the chair.
Does it know the standard frameworks?+
It answers in the shape a case expects, which usually means a clean cut rather than a named framework. Reciting a framework by name is not what this round rewards anyway.
What about a market sizing question?+
It gives an estimate and the assumption under it. The assumption is the part being graded, so say it out loud rather than the number alone.
Will it work in a partner round that is mostly conversation?+
Yes — that round is behavioral in everything but name, and the cards behave the same way there.
Is it allowed in a consulting interview?+
Firms differ, and several say plainly that outside help is not permitted. Cue does not conceal itself, and we promise nobody that it cannot be noticed; reading the rules is on you.
Walk into the next one with a second pair of ears.
Trippi Cue is in the Chrome Web Store. Add it, write one line about the call, and click the icon when it starts.