When clients answer questions about projects during F1GMAT's Mock Interview Service, the first drafts of the answers have several explanations that look generic and could be used for any industry or function. The trick to avoiding generalization is two things:
1) Quoting a Trend
Whenever you talk about an industry that has matured, there will be cliches around growth, technology, and strategies. One way to keep the interviewer's attention on the narrative is by quoting a recent trend. For example, the VC industry had one of the worst years in 2023. Now, if you are from the industry, you could explain the trends that led to this position. It could be the optimism around digital platforms during the pandemic and excessive investments in alternative money like cryptocurrencies or alternative mediums like VR that led to the misallocation of funds. By using numbers, you force the listener to pay attention. Be ready with an interesting metric.
2) Avoid Causal Relationship Between Events
Any trend could emerge from multiple factors. The approach of using one factor is easy to narrate for an interview, but it could turn into a caricature if the trend is complex and the interviewer is from the industry. There are scenarios where the outcome of a trend is driven by decades of systemic risk that finally caves in when two to three factors play at the same time. Explaining the complexity of the system with its nuances is often a better narrative than a simplistic, A-caused B and B-caused C narrative. One of the big banks was acquired recently after nearly going bankrupt. I asked the client who worked with the bank why such a reputable institution went down. His answer was around policy and incentives. The incentives dictated the policy, and the policy didn't consider system risk at all. He explained beautifully how any escalation of risk around deals was often neglected because it affected the bottom line of the company. The system and policy were all designed around the brokers' incentives. And everything else was just a show.
The whole narrative was so engaging that any interviewer would be curious to know about the client's struggles in communicating risks in a trade.
You must work on presenting even the most complex industry developments and practices in a story format with a beginning, middle, and end.