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Increasingly,
schools use the interview as a part of the admissions process.
The policies differ from school to school:
- Obligatory for all applicants (eg: Kellogg)
- On invitation: after studying the applications, the
school invites some applicants to interview (eg: Harvard,
Columbia, and now Wharton)
- No interview in the admissions process, which is done
only by written application (eg; Stanford).
Interviews
last between 30 minutes and one hour The majority of schools
offer the possibility of having the interview conducted by a
member of the admissions committee (at the school or at
presentation tours organized by the schools in the principal
cities across the world) or with former students specially
selected for this purpose.
There are
numerous reasons to explain the growing importance of
interviews in the admissions process. First of all, it's an
excellent opportunity to test your 'soft skills', which are
becoming more and more important in the business world.
These 'soft skills' consist of your aptitude to communicate,
your charisma and your strength of character. In your
application, these elements appear only implicitly; in an
interview, on the other hand, these qualities become more
evident.
Another
reason for the expanding use of interviews lies in the fact
that the schools are seeking more and more to sell
themselves to certain applicants. Each school seeks to
attract the best applicants because it is they who will
later carry the reputation of the school. Competition is
therefore intense and the schools use the interview to show
themselves in the best light to the best applicants.
GENERAL ADVICE FOR THE INTERVIEW
This book brings together a tremendous amount of advice
on the interview: in the chapters on the various schools
(Harvard, MIT, Stanford, NYU, Kellogg, Columbia,
Wharton, INSEAD, Berkeley, Chicago and LBS), their
authors will give you some great advice for successfully
passing the interview. Their advice has been tested and
proven, because each of these authors was admitted!
However, there are four key pieces of advice to really
underline:
1. Set your communication objectives
Like a politician or an advertising professional, you
should define, prior to the interview, pertinent
communication objectives. We mean by this that these
communication objectives must enrich the overall
positioning that you have developed for your application
(cf section on general strategy for the application).
You will also have to adapt these objectives depending
on the school with which you have an interview, as each
one has different buttons to press.
For example, the communication objectives of a Harvard
colleague were:
- that he is a self-made man with a sense of initiative
- his openmindedness and international perspective
- his human qualities
Another of my fellow students had as his objectives
- his academic excellence
- his hi-tech expertise, in particular the internet
- his team spirit
You must not only take the time to pinpoint these
objectives, but also to specify personal experiences
which will illustrate the qualities on which you wish to
place special emphasis.
2. Prepare your interviews until you are blue in the
face
The key to success is not only to think about the
answers to standard questions, but also to train
yourself in getting these replies across. The secret of
success is none other than doing 'mock' interviews. Try
to get interviews from former MBA students or, failing
that, with office colleagues or friends. One of the
best-known professors at Harvard describes the three
degrees of an applicant's preparation as the following:
- The sputterer: the applicant has very vaguely
prepared the contents and the shape of what he's
going to say. The only advantage of this level is
that the applicant is spontaneous!
- The record: the applicant has adequately
prepared the contents -- but not enough to avoid
giving the impression that it sounds overly
prepared.
- The actor: the applicant has so well prepared
the contents and the shape that he has the
opportunity of concentrating on interacting
skillfully with his interviewer. The latter will
therefore not realize that the whole thing was
prepared!
Studies have shown that the worst thing that can
happen to you is that you fall into category 2 and
that the best situation is to be 'the actor'
(category 3). For once the best option is not the
enemy of perfection, so you can give full rein to
mock interviews until you feel that your mind is no
longer busy rummaging around in the pigeon holes of
your memory, but rather interacting with your
environment.
3. Plead your case with eloquence!
We recommend that you be eloquent in the way you
express yourself because one of the primary
objectives of the interview is to see if you are a
communicator. On the one hand, this means that you
prepare answers for each of the questions (cf
above). On the other hand, you must put passion into
what you're saying because it will give you that
extra something to make you stand out from the rest.
In the first year at Harvard, one of the courses
studies the origin of the charisma of certain great
business leaders. It emerges that the most
charismatic leaders are those who feel a true
passion for their work. This of course shines
through in what they say.., passion is contagious
and an impassioned speaker speech arouses far more
interest from an audience. So give full voice to
your deepest desire to do an MBA and to your career
plans.
4. At no point should you lower your guard
Interviews with former students can become
particularly friendly (one of my school friends told
me that he had his interview in a former student's
winter chalet). One of the greatest mistakes to make
is to lower your guard because the friendly
atmosphere can make you feel like admitting to and
sharing certain doubts. Don't let yourself go right
up to the end of the interview. If you are still
wondering whether the MBA corresponds to your
personality and objectives, this is certainly not
the place to discuss it.
Next:
MBA Interview Questions and Answers
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