You hear that BCG uses an online case.
Someone else tells you about Casey.
A third person describes a completely different experience.
So which one should you prepare for?
Start with the invitation in front of you, not recruiting folklore.
“BCG online case” can hide more than one preparation problem
Experienced hires are especially vulnerable to secondhand advice.
A former colleague may have interviewed in another office, another recruiting cycle, or for another role. Their experience can be useful, but it is not your instruction sheet.
Formats can differ.
What does not change is the deeper demand: you need to interpret business information, decide what matters, and move toward an answer without a manager sitting beside you.
That sounds like normal work.
There is one uncomfortable difference.
You cannot ask the room what they meant.
Casey feels conversational... which can make you too comfortable
A chatbot-style case can feel less intimidating than a live interviewer.
No partner is staring at you while you calculate. No awkward silence fills the room.
That can lower the pressure.
It can also lower your discipline.
When the interface feels conversational, it is easy to read casually, respond too quickly, or forget that the sequence is still testing structured business judgment.
You still need to ask yourself:
- What is the objective?
- Which information changes the answer?
- What calculation is actually required?
- What is the business implication?
- What would I recommend from what I know now?
Chat format. Case logic.
The interface changed. The thinking did not.
For a detailed walkthrough of the chatbot-style format, use the BCG Online Case (Casey Chatbot): Guide.
The older-looking format can trigger the opposite mistake
A more traditional online case may look familiar: exhibits, quantitative questions, business scenarios.
That can tempt an experienced candidate to treat it like an ordinary aptitude test.
But a consulting case is rarely just asking whether you can calculate a percentage.
It cares about what the percentage means.
| What you see | The easy reaction | The consulting turn |
|---|---|---|
| A revenue decline | Calculate the drop | Ask what is driving it |
| A market table | Find the biggest segment | Ask whether size changes the decision |
| A margin problem | Compute profitability | Identify what management should investigate |
| Several answer options | Pick the plausible one | Test which is supported by the evidence |
Your job experience helps here.
But only if you translate it into structured reasoning instead of reaching for “what normally happens in my industry.”
So which one will you get?
The recruiting instructions you receive are the source that matters for your process.
Prepare for the named assessment rather than building an elaborate plan around somebody else’s invitation.
And when you practice, do not just ask whether you got the answer right.
Ask where your reasoning slowed down.
Was it the math? The exhibit? The unfamiliar interface? Or the jump from calculation to implication?
If the traditional online case is the area creating concern, How Hard is the BCG Online Case? takes that question further.
Because once the invitation arrives, the real issue is no longer whether somebody calls it Casey, an online case, or an assessment.
It becomes simpler.
Can you recognize the decision hiding inside the format?
That is the part worth preparing for.