This is the case study they sent: “At a recent offsite, we broke into small groups of 2-3 people each and imagined ourselves as the leadership team of another marketplace company with somewhat different dynamics. We want to do the same thing with you, because this is our best idea for giving you the most truthful and realistic simulation of what it's like to work together. We love this stuff, and relish the opportunity and responsibility that comes with being stewards of a large marketplace that thousands depend on. For the purpose of this exercise, let’s focus on Uber: What’s the output operating metric or financial metric that’s most important to move? What’s the input metric that is the most powerful one to move, to move that output metric? What are the best 2-3 ideas of initiatives to move that input metric? You should feel free to delve into any of their businesses: mobility, eats, and freight. But, your job is to figure out exactly what to do so you can actually do it. The fun is in the details. We hope to talk about (and we recommend but don’t require that you do a quick writeup) exactly how to implement your initiative, success criteria, and if it doesn’t work the most likely reason why (a pre-mortem). Finally, you should predict the effect size of each initiative on the input metric & parent output metric(s) tracing as far up into the P&L or operating metrics as possible. Essentially, if yours were the only new initiatives the company was undertaking, what’s expected financial impact next quarter or year? What guidance are you giving to the public markets? (We are well on our way to being a public company, so we think this is useful for high-impact roles to be thinking about).
