Interviewer-led cases give the interviewer more control over the sequence of questions, while candidate-led cases give you more responsibility for deciding where to go next.

The underlying skills are similar, but the pacing and ownership feel different.

In an interviewer-led case, answer each prompt directly and keep linking the pieces together. In a candidate-led case, explain why you want to investigate a branch and what you expect to learn.

Practice both formats so the interview style does not become the main source of difficulty. For more detail, see the case structure vs. case framework guide.

Candidate-led cases felt harder until I got comfortable explaining why I wanted to explore something. Might vary by office though.

Doing cases with different partners exposed weaknesses my usual partner stopped noticing.

tbh Counting cases was not useful for me after a point. Tracking repeated mistakes was.

Counting cases was not useful for me after a point. Tracking repeated mistakes was.