By Florian Smeritschnig, former McKinsey Senior Consultant · Updated July 2026 The consulting job market in 2026 is doing two contradictory things at once: firms are cutting thousands of roles while simultaneously expanding entry-level hiring. McKinsey has taken its headcount from a 2022 peak above 45,000 down to roughly 40,000, and in the same breath…
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By Florian Smeritschnig, former McKinsey Senior Consultant. Updated July 2026. A digital transformation case interview asks you to advise a client on whether and how to adopt technology, increasingly AI or GenAI, to reach a business goal. It tests whether you can structure a novel problem from first principles, not whether you can recall a…
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By Florian Smeritschnig, former McKinsey Senior Consultant. Updated July 2026. You have been running cases with ChatGPT for weeks. The frameworks look clean, the answers sound polished, and you feel like you are improving faster than you ever did with a book. You are probably building the wrong muscle. AI is genuinely useful for parts…
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By Florian Smeritschnig, former McKinsey Senior Consultant. Updated July 2026. If you are weighing a consulting career, you have probably typed “will AI replace consultants” into Google at midnight and found two useless extremes: consulting is dead, or nothing will change. Neither helps you decide whether to bet the next few years of your life…
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Updated July 2026 · By Florian Smeritschnig, Former McKinsey Senior Consultant If you reach McKinsey’s final round this year, you may meet an unfamiliar third party at the table. Next to the interviewer and the case sits, at least in the US pilot running since early 2026, Lilli, McKinsey’s in-house generative AI. The task: work…
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Florian spent five years at McKinsey as a Senior Consultant and is a highly experienced consulting interviewer and problem-solving coach. Having conducted interviews with hundreds of candidates, he understands exactly what top-tier firms look for in successful applicants.
He founded StrategyCase.com to make top consulting careers more accessible by providing tailored, up-to-date insights into the recruiting process. Recognized as the most successful case and fit interview coach, Florian has helped his clients secure 700+ offers at MBB, Tier-2 firms, Big 4 consulting divisions, in-house consultancies, and boutique firms over the past four years.
He is the author of “The 1%: Conquer Your Consulting Case Interview,” “The 1%: Case Interview Workbook,” and “Consulting Career Secrets”, all available on Amazon.
