The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Alvarez & Marsal in Oct 2011
Interview
First round consisted of two one-on-one interviews; each had behavioral and case components. Everyone was very nice and cordial. Found out the next morning that I had been invited for an on-site interview.
Final round was a bit odd. We had a group case interview with a huge amount of documents and 3 hours to prepare and create slides (on paper.) People walked in at various times pretending to have certain roles in the client company. The whole thing was very organized, but didn't go well in practice and we were penalized for things that seem arbitrary or unreasonable. For instance, about 10 minutes into the case someone pretending to be the CFO walked in and we were expected to have read all the documents and formulated important questions to ask him in that amount of time. The people watching us seemed displeased that we weren't prepared in that amount of time. They also were upset that we took notes on our papers instead of writing things on the white board.
After the group case were 3 fit/experience interviews, which were about what you might expect.
About 3 days later I was called and informed that I was not offered a position. I asked a contact in the company what had happened, and he said that I should have showed more leadership in the case and that our case group didn't do as well as the other case group. It was, of course, impossible to take charge of the case when a team member had declared at the very beginning that she would be leading the case. Also, being evaluated as an individual candidate based on the performance of a team of people I had never met seemed unfair to me.
Interview questions [2]
Question 1
Long case about decreasing the costs of the finance/accounting wing of a global organization.
A few rounds, retail specific / quick process with directors and a partner. Cases were typical e.g., profitability, market entry etc. The team seems very lean although growing a lot. I ended up not getting the offer/did not hear back from them though (assumed after some time).
1 hour phone screen. It was very challenging. Expect the unexpected. Questions were varied and diverse. Interviewer was very polite. Would interview again. Very competitive process. Lots of hard questions.
It was very difficult, they make you do a case with no time to prep prior the interview. They ask you many questions on it, some that take forever to calculate.
Consultant applicants have rated the interview process at Alvarez & Marsal with 3.2 out of 5 (where 5 is the highest level of difficulty) and assessed their interview experience as 50% positive. To compare, the company-average is 66.4% positive. This is according to Glassdoor user ratings.
Candidates applying for Consultant roles take an average of 42 days to get hired, when considering 35 user submitted interviews for this role. To compare, the hiring process at Alvarez & Marsal overall takes an average of 38 days.
Common stages of the interview process at Alvarez & Marsal as a Consultant according to 35 Glassdoor interviews include:
One on one interview: 23%
Phone interview: 22%
Group panel interview: 15%
Skills test: 14%
Presentation: 11%
Background check: 6%
Other: 3%
Personality test: 3%
Drug test: 3%
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