Kearney case interview: 4 practice cases with worked examples (2026)

The Kearney case interview is a live business problem, often 30 to 45 minutes long, that you solve with a consultant or partner. It is commonly drawn from operations, procurement or supply chain, and many candidates describe it as interviewer-steered: you set out a structure, then the interviewer hands you dense tables of spend, cost or capacity data and asks for specific numbers before you recommend. Processes commonly run two rounds of two or three case and fit interviews, with partners in the final round. Some offices add an online test, a group exercise or a written case, so check your invitation.

Kearney, known for most of its history as A.T. Kearney, is a generalist strategy firm best known for operations work: procurement, supply chain, manufacturing and cost. Its cases tend to reflect that. The fit portion is commonly a conversation about your experience, your motivation and why Kearney in particular; prepare true stories that carry numbers.

Two cases in our library are written in Kearney's style, and both have guided walkthroughs. We have added two operations cases written in other firms' styles, Deloitte and McKinsey, because they test exactly what a Kearney interviewer probes: finding the constraint in a capacity table before anyone spends capital.

Work them in that order. Brennick is the gentlest: one clear target and one exhibit per lever. Hartwell is the hardest, because the client's headline number is correct and you still have to find what it leaves out.

The core skills are the same at every strategy firm: structure, maths, exhibit reading and a clear recommendation. The differences are in emphasis, and they vary by office and interviewer, so read this table as tendencies candidates commonly report, not rules.

The biggest adjustment is the data. A Kearney-style exhibit often has six rows and five columns, and you are expected to read across it, not down it. Our guides to the McKinsey and Oliver Wyman case interviews cover the neighbouring styles.

Most Kearney-style cases are built from the same seven kinds of question, and each can be drilled on its own.

Brennick Automotive: find 8% of procurement spend

The prompt. Brennick Automotive makes braking and chassis components for car makers. Its customers demand price cuts every year, its operating margin has fallen to 4%, and the CEO wants procurement spend cut by 8%. Which levers get there, and what is each worth?

What clarifying questions earn you. The 8% applies to $1.0bn of addressable external spend, so the target is $80m a year at run-rate within 24 months. Revenue is $1.6bn and EBIT $64m. Savings are measured against last year's prices adjusted for commodity indices, and moving a part to a new supplier needs re-approval that typically takes 3 to 9 months.

Two calculations. First, the target against profit: $80m ÷ $64m = 125%. The saving is worth more than Brennick's whole operating profit, and more than two years of the roughly $32m (2% of revenue) its customers claw back in price cuts. Second, spend per supplier, which shows where buying power is spread thin: castings is $252m ÷ 46 ≈ $5.5m per supplier, against $120m ÷ 7 ≈ $17m in electronics.

KearneyBrennick Automotive cuts its supplier billOperations · Medium

Brennick Automotive cuts its supplier bill

Play the rest: size the castings lever, read the should-cost chart and decide whether 8% is reachable.

Interviewer

Our client, Brennick Automotive, makes braking and chassis components for car makers in Europe and North America. Its customers demand price cuts every year and its operating margin has fallen to 4%. The CEO has set a target to cut procurement spend by 8% and wants to know which levers will get there and how much each is worth. How would you approach this?

Start the caseGuided, step by step

Hartwell Grocers: four distribution centres or two?

The prompt. Hartwell runs 320 supermarkets from four regional distribution centres (DCs). The operations director wants to close the North and South-West DCs, expand the other two and save $24m a year. Should the CEO approve it?

What clarifying questions earn you. The board approves network projects that pay back within 4 years, and nobody has seen how the $24m was built. Warehousing costs $117m a year and transport $70m. Fresh food must be on shelf before stores open at 6am. The South-West lease expires in two years; the North's has nine to run.

A fitting structure. Four branches: annual running cost (warehouse, transport, inventory), service (drive times and fresh food), one-off cost and payback against the hurdle, and risks. Plan to test each closure on its own as well as the package.

Two calculations. Variable cost is $0.20 a case everywhere, so a closed DC's cases still need picking elsewhere: only the fixed cost disappears. Each expanded DC needs about $3m a year of extra fixed cost. Warehouse saving: $16m + $14m - 2 × $3m = $24m, exactly the operations director's number. Second, the North's $0.47 a case against $0.34 at the Midlands is fixed cost spread over fewer cases, not slower picking.

KearneyHartwell Grocers redraws its distribution networkOperations · Hard

Hartwell Grocers redraws its distribution network

Play the rest: add transport and one-off costs, test the payback and make the call.

Interviewer

Our client, Hartwell Grocers, runs 320 supermarkets served from four regional distribution centres. The operations director wants to close the North and South-West DCs, expand the other two, and says the move will save $24m a year. The CEO wants to know whether to approve it. How would you approach the decision?

Start the caseGuided, step by step

These two are written in Deloitte and McKinsey styles, but both are the kind of capacity problem Kearney's operations work is known for: is the client's expensive fix aimed at the real constraint?

Vantage Retail: a £40m second warehouse?

The prompt. Vantage Retail serves 180 stores from one distribution centre and misses the delivery window on about 12% of store orders. It is considering a £40m second facility. Is that the right move?

What clarifying questions earn you. Vehicles that leave on time arrive on time 99% of the time, so the problem is inside the DC. Volume grows about 3% a year, and management believes the building is full.

A fitting structure. Map the flow from inbound receipt through putaway, picking and loading to transport, and compare capacity with demand at each stage. Find the binding constraint first, then compare ways to relieve it, with the £40m DC as the baseline.

Two calculations. Utilisation is demand over capacity: inbound 3,100 ÷ 5,000 = 62%, putaway 3,100 ÷ 4,600 ≈ 67%, picking 3,100 ÷ 4,200 ≈ 74%. The volumes tie out too: 135 vehicles × about 23 pallets each ≈ 3,100 pallets. Every stage with a stated capacity has at least a quarter to spare.

DeloitteVantage Retail's warehouse bottleneckOperations · Medium

Vantage Retail's warehouse bottleneck

Play the rest: work out the dock's capacity, see why a nearly full stage fails, and price the alternatives.

Interviewer

Vantage Retail runs a single distribution centre serving 180 stores. They are missing delivery windows on about 12% of store orders and are considering a GBP 40m second facility. Is that the right move?

Start the caseGuided, step by step

Kingsmere Hospitals: two new operating theatres?

The prompt. Kingsmere Hospitals' waiting list for planned surgery has grown from about 6,700 to 9,600 patients in three years, and the board is about to approve £9m for two new operating theatres. What is really limiting surgical activity, and what would it take to fix it?

What clarifying questions earn you. Success means getting the list back to about 5,600 within three years. Scope is 10 elective theatres; emergency surgery has its own, but planned patients share ward beds with the rest of the hospital. The board's paper assumes the two theatres add about 2,400 operations a year.

A fitting structure. Demand against capacity, then the patient pathway stage by stage: pre-operative assessment, theatre time, a bed after surgery, discharge. Express each stage's capacity in one unit, operations a year, so you can see which one binds.

Two calculations. The case shows this as a line chart; we added the gap column. Each year's gap equals the change in the list: 13,400 - 12,000 = 1,400, and 9,600 - 8,200 = 1,400. Since 2022 the gap has swung by 1,600, from -200 to 1,400: 1,000 from more patients added (up about 8%) and 600 from fewer operations done (down about 5%). More than a third of the swing is lost output.

McKinseyKingsmere Hospitals cuts its surgery waiting listOperations · Medium

Kingsmere Hospitals cuts its surgery waiting list

Play the rest: compare theatre and bed capacity in one unit and size a fix against the £9m build.

Interviewer

Our client is Kingsmere Hospitals, a public hospital trust running two acute hospitals. Its waiting list for planned surgery has grown from about 6,700 to 9,600 patients in three years, and the board is about to approve GBP 9m for two new operating theatres. The chief executive has asked us to find out what is really limiting surgical activity and what it would take to fix it. How would you approach this?

Start the caseGuided, step by step

Three things recur in Kearney-style cases: operations vocabulary, exhibits thick with numbers, and a client who arrives with a solution already chosen.

Group and written cases. Some Kearney offices are reported to use a group case or a written case with a short presentation, particularly at graduate and intern assessment centres. The same habits apply: find the two or three numbers that matter, put the answer first, and in a group, make the team's thinking better rather than louder. Formats change, so ask the recruiter what each round contains.

Before the interview, you should be able to say yes to each of these without hesitating.

• I ask what a target is measured against, and over what period, before I structure.
• I can split any cost into fixed and variable, and say which part a closure or volume change actually removes.
• I compute utilisation for every stage before I name a bottleneck.
• I total my levers, compare them with the target and state the gap in dollars.
• I net off every cost before I quote a payback, and compare it with the client's hurdle.
• I close with an answer, the two or three numbers behind it, the main risk and the first next step.

Play each case twice: first live against the clock, then with the guided walkthrough, comparing each answer with the model. The gaps you find on the second pass are your study plan.

1. Week 1: Brennick and Vantage, live then guided. Drill clarifying questions and table reading daily.
2. Week 2: Hartwell and Kingsmere. Drill payback and utilisation maths until each takes under a minute.
3. Week 3: replay the case you scored worst on, then practise 60-second recommendations out loud.