Calling all IMD applicants: (Jan 2018 Entry) class of Dec 2018!

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Photo blog – Easter Activities!

After the exams came a welcome long weekend for the Easter break, launched by lunch on campus with partners and families as well as an Easter Egg hunt for the children. Suzy

My Assessment Day experience from Round 1 for January 2018 Admissions

My affair with IMD started one Saturday afternoon when I was discussing my MBA plans with a friend. He introduced me to IMD saying it is one of the best general management MBA in the world and it would be a great fit for you given your background and experience! Only problem is that it is quite difficult to crack given the class size, student accomplishments and a very very rigorous admission procedure. This really piqued my interest and I poured all my energy over the next couple of weeks to know IMD better through more research over good old internet, IMD website and finding out any common links/acquaintances who could provide more information about the school than what was publicly available.

After months of hard work for first GMAT and then the application, I finally got a chance to meet my interest first hand when I got an invite for the assessment day(21st March). IMD is situated on the banks of Lake Geneva and that sight itself took my breath away! I reached Laussane two nights before to give myself enough time to rest and prepare for the big day. Usually IMD invites about 7-8 prospective candidates each assessment day from different walks of life and my group was no different – it was a bunch of extremely talented and diverse group of individuals! Thanks to the admissions committee and initiative of one of the group members, we had already formed a https://gmatclub.com/chat group almost 3 weeks in advance and were already exchanging notes, sharing pictures even before we met. Just getting to know them better through all our interactions gave me a very good glimpse of what I could expect if I got in! We met a day before the Assessment Day to know each other better and get comfortable given the importance of group dynamics and collaboration on the D-day!

The Assessment day started sharp at 7:50 AM with Antonio from the Admissions Committee and then we were given a tour of the lovely campus! During the tour, I realized the importance of time when Antonio told us that if you are late by even a minute, you’re not allowed to enter the class!!!! Talk about Swiss precision! We also got a chance to peek into the class, celebrating a birthday over Salsa) and what we saw made us realize that it is not all work but some play too

After the tour, we gathered in a conference room where we were joined by the other admissions committee members. The day then started off with a brief introduction of the schedule of the day. The Assessment Day at IMD is almost a day long affair and nothing like any other MBA school’s interview. Each one of us had a separate schedule with a mix of individual and group activities lined up throughout the day.

For me, it started with a personal interview with an Admissions Committee Member. It was a pleasant discussion and was more like a conversation than a very formal interview. The questions mostly revolved around my career progression so far, how particular skills have changed over time, why MBA, my most significant achievement/ challenge in that particular project, my strengths, weaknesses, some oddball questions about my past company, what do I do in my free time, what does my boss has to say about me, what does my husband has to say about me , how do I plan to finance my MBA etc. Towards the end, she also gave me time to ask my questions. I was a bit nervous perhaps but I think I did well and was able to answer most questions as best as I could.

While I and a couple of others were interviewing, rest were working on the impromptu presentation.

Post the interview, I came to the conference room and it was time for the impromptu presentation. I had gone through several case study frameworks and sample cases courtesy the material provided by one of the alumni to help prepare. The case was related to a German steel & engineering conglomerate and we had to identify the reasons which led to its failure in US & Brazil. We had been provided with A4 sheets, markers, pens, rough notes etc to put together a presentation in 35 minutes. I spent approx. 10 minutes in reading the case and making some quick notes, next 15 minutes in making a draft version of slides with points etc on a rough sheet and next ten minutes in making the final slides on the A4 sheets for a 4 minute presentation. At the end of the 35 minutes, all the material was taken away including the case itself. So unless if you have a fantastic memory, chances are that you may not remember what you decided to present when you have to do it later in the day A trick: make your notes in a rough sheets provided at the beginning of the day and not on the case pages as I did, so that you can use them for revision later.

Post the impromptu presentation prep, we all gathered together in the conference room for the group case study discussion. The case had already been sent to us 2 weeks in advance. It was based on a Chinese multinational consumer electronics organization and how it transformed to one of the largest players in the world with its very innovative and disruptive management policies. I had spent a lot of time understanding the case, preparing my own notes, and putting it in a SWOT framework. The discussion was led by Professor Jennifer and it started with a quick round of introduction and short description of what has surprised us at IMD so far and anything different that we would want to share about ourselves with the group. We were then divided into two teams and asked to work on three questions. The ad-com members are always present and they observe our ability to work in a group as that’s a very important aspect of IMD life. At the end of 20 minutes, we all collected again and the case discussion started – it lasted for about an hour or so. The entire discussion was extremely enriching and stimulating and gave a very good peek into what kind of learning I could look forward to if I was granted admission. What is very important in any group activity and was literally hammered into my brain by every alumni and current student I spoke to was, don’t cut people, let others speak, interject at right times, be receptive to other’s ideas, put your point across but never overshadow any discussion as we Indians in general are supposed to be very competitive and find it hard to just actively listen. This could have been a bit worrisome, but the fact that we gelled together as a group and were quite respectful and mature did not lead to any such situation.

It was almost lunch time and we were introduced to our lunch buddies. They are usually paired basis country or industry. I already knew my lunch buddy and she took me to the cafeteria and true to its reputation, it did seem like a five star buffet. I was even told lot of students complain of weight gain after coming to IMD. Lunch swas an extremely informative and friendly session and I used that time to get to know the school better from a current student’s perspective. I also got a lot of useful advice on career etc.

As difficult as it was after such a sumptuous lunch, it was time to gear up again for the rest of the day. We immediately got into the role play preparation. A situation was handed out and we had to write how we will handle it. It was based on conflict management situation with a high performing employee. After that, we had to enact the situation(actual role play) with another member of the ad-com as the disgruntled employee for 3 minutes. It was actually fun and years of experience of handling difficult team members came in handy After each of us finished our individual assessment activities, we were back together for the impromptu presentations. As I mentioned earlier, each one of us was given 4 minutes to present with a signal at 3 to indicate time. I strongly felt good communication skills, confidence and ability to finish the presentation within the stipulated time was really the key to nail this segment. My suggestion would be to practice giving a presentation if one doesn’t have a lot of exposure to it at work or otherwise.

At the end of the individual presentations, we were now asked to present in a group and were given a specific question to answer. We discussed and decided to divide the presentation in three parts with few points. Instead of assigning one person, we all decided to talk about few points each. On hindsight, I think it was like a race and as we all were in a hurry to finish it and pass it on to the next person to make sure we finish it within the allotted 5 minutes.

At the end of the impromptu presentations, there was a Q&A session with all the ad-com members and then we were taken to a class to see for ourselves how a lecture would be at IMD. It was an entrepreneurship class by Professor Benoit. We had been given the case study which was being discussed in advance so as to familiarize ourselves. What made it more special was that the person who started the company that was being discussed was attending the lecture and gave her inputs and made notes of some of the suggestions provided by the students on the next stage of her venture. Attending that class, seeing the potential tangible impact live suddenly made it all so real for me and instantly made me realize that IMD is really the place where I want to be if I get through.

With that we ended the assessment day. I interacted a bit more with the current students at the end of the class and also got a tour of the famous dungeons.

I was glad I got a chance to visit the school in person to see what I could expect and was totally blown off. Despite eight strenuous hours and a previous night of sleeplessness I was still fully charged and was absolutely ready for more. What helped me survive the eight hours and put my best foot forward was a combination of good preparation, positive attitude and knowing well my reasons for pursuing this career path and school. My advice is prepare, prepare & prepare and don’t leave things to chance unless you handle cases, give presentations and interviews on a regular basis. I had spoken to quite a few alumni and current students with the risk of even antagonizing them by asking too many questions. But I realized, how close knit the entire community is and how forth coming they were with sharing their experiences and providing guidance. Every advise given to me around potential fit, what to expect during the assessment day, the importance of casual conversations whether at the water cool, in between activities or at the end of the assessment day with students and ad-com members, do’s and don’ts helped me to be at my best behavior at all times.

Now that my interest has reciprocated, I’m looking forward to spending a year knowing it deeply and developing a lifelong relationship.

Congrats Neharika!! and Thanks for sharing your experience.

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: The adventurous rollercoaster called ‘startup’

Today’s guest entry is by Silke Musa from Germany who worked on the SteriLux startup project with her team members: Junsuke Arita (Japanese/American), Claude Dufour (Swiss/French), Sergiu Geamanu (Canadian/Romanian), Liqun He (Chinese), and Ji’an Zheng (Chinese). What does it take to convince some of us to spend the largest part of our waking life and endless sleepless hours on an idea or project? The answer is as simple as it is philosophical. It is an inner force and the conviction that we are about to make a dent in space-time or at the very least provide a significant contribution to a yet unsolved problem. What does a person look like that is under this spell? Quite normal, to be honest, and a bit restless. Nothing hinted at his almost obsessive inner worlds when we first met Marc Spaltenstein, CEO of SteriLux. He was a sharp-minded, soft-spoken and rather serious young entrepreneur, who together with two other life science and engineering students from EPFL, Lucas Meyer and Michael Stettler, had decided to start their own business venture in August 2014. The idea was born following Marc’s internship at a large medical device company in Neuchâtel. Marc had to develop an effective system to sterilize surgical equipment ‘off-road’. The result was the portable SteriBox, the first of eventually nine prototypes which should take Marc and his team on an adventurous rollercoaster called ‘startup’. Sterilization of surgical instruments using boiling water or steam goes back nearly 150 years. Yet, still today infections due to insufficient hygiene in hospitals and lacking sterility of surgical instruments can cause many deaths, especially in regions that lack proper health infrastructure due to economic and political reasons, warfare or natural disaster. Marc and his team envisioned a cost-efficient solution that would help alleviate some of this burden by offering a medical equipment that can be easily transported to remote areas and provide safe and reliable sterilization even in case of electricity and water shortages. Marc introduced himself with a well-polished presentation showcasing the equipment with all its technical intricacies, a business plan indicating projected revenues and profits for the next five years, brochures and, most importantly, a candid and open demeanor suggesting that he trusted us. He answered any of our many questions very patiently. But what was it that he needed from us? Obviously, the startup had come a long way since its first prototype. Field trips to Indian hospitals were especially important to focus the product design towards its envisioned end application. Without a clear understanding of the end user needs, the product would end up in limbo, a place where failure is almost certain. In 2016, the startup successfully raised CHF 500.000 from Swiss investors and also had solid financial prospects moving forward. Further backed by two pending patent applications, an ongoing process for CE marking approval, and a reasonable manufacturing plan, SteriLux targeted product launch by end 2017. The laundry list of things to do was exhaustive and failure was lurking around every corner. It takes a particular mindset to see through the fog and avoid derailment under such circumstances. Marc’s mandate for the IMD team was clear from the onset. He needed our help to identify potential customers and develop an actionable communication plan to effectively reach out to and engage new customers within the next six months. Eager to get started, we organized a visit to SteriLux at Y-PARK, a technology park in Yverdon-les-Bains, where Marc’s demonstration of the SteriLux equipment was impressive. Here, we could clearly see his passion shine through. The SteriLux technology employs UV light to convert water into ozone, which destroys even the most resistant microorganisms and thus renders surgical instruments sterile. The system is portable and requires considerably less energy, water, and consumables compared to alternative sterilization methods. It can moreover operate on one battery charging for up to 100 cycles, which can save lives in case of power outages. We burned the midnight oil (and plenty of tangerines and bananas) leveraging our own network and that of IMD faculty to reach out to potential customers in different time zones. While not without considerable risk and uncertainty especially for a small startup, our final analysis suggested that Kenya is a promising first market to enter. Our research also led us to a Belgian organization for emergency and disaster relive operations, which was very interested to test the SteriLux system and assess its potential for future use in field hospitals. Coming back to the initial question: What does it take to convince some of us to spend the largest part of our waking life and endless sleepless hours on an idea or project? We believe that a strong force is the sense of being in the driver’s seat, of being able to advance one’s own idea from nothing to something in a relatively short period of time. It has been an exciting and insightful joyride embarking on the SteriLux rollercoaster and joining this exciting startup for a few weeks. We wish Marc and his team a lot of success and hope that our findings and tools will help them speed up pace over the next six months. Silke

Guys, finally received much awaited invitation to assessment day at Singapore on 25th May'17. Anyone attending, please pm me.

My IMD Interview Experience Review for an On Campus interview. Rating:*****

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Transition and Reflections

“Spring is the time of plans and projects” said Tolstoy in Anna Kareina and this reflects so aptly in our time at IMD. The first block of the program is done, exams seem long gone and we are trying to get back to the rhythm of life in school post Easter.  The chatter about finding Company Engagement Projects (CEP) is getting louder while classes are picking up pace. This phase marks a transition in many ways: From our startup groups to the new ones, from Accounting and Finance to just Finance and from the academic rigour to thinking about our careers. From an academic perspective, we just wrapped up a course on Negotiations and started Strategy too. All in all many new things are coming up.  And while there are new beginnings, this phase also marks the end of courses such as Entrepreneurship which I have thoroughly enjoyed. I can’t think of any place else where I could have learnt to dissect a VC term sheet so well! All credit to Prof Benoit Leleux. The individual learning definitely matters but after having attended over 500 hours of classes, the beauty for me lies in tying it all together and fitting it like the blocks of a jigsaw puzzle. Talking about transition, writing this post felt very difficult. A lot has been happening post the break and yet I am finding it hard to put my finger onto something specific. A part of the difficulty in writing this post is also attributed to all the assignments (write-ups) that were due or announced just after we got back from Easter.  As I wrestle to get out of catch-up mode, I have been using the very limited time left to think about my career options post IMD. Having always worked in a bank, trying to do something completely different for my CEP has been playing on my mind. After all there seems to be no better way to experiment and learn! A lot of my classmates are in a similar frame of mind and with so many of us coming from different industries and backgrounds, talking and exchanging ideas is definitely helping! Our life here is in transition but so is the weather. Spring has brought some sunny and beautiful days to Lausanne and there seems to be no better way to make use of this time than getting out of the dungeons.  All work and no play for sure makes Jack a dull boy  So on a very bright and a lovely Saturday afternoon we gathered together to celebrate Abeer and Sophie’s daughters’ Viola and Chloe’s birthday! Sunday was amazing too as many of the IMDers participated in the Lausanne 10km and 20 km run while others cheered! It’s hard to imagine how close we have all gotten in the last 4 months. Writing this post has also made me realize that time has been flying. Almost a year ago at this very time I was here for my assessment day. This is a very different May and at this pace December would be knocking on our doors faster than I could imagine! But that is still some time away and till then we are all here as a batch to welcome the transition into summer and autumn..

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Getting to know the Faculty

Today’s guest entry is written by one of our newer Faculty members, Jennifer Jordan. Jennifer is a social psychologist and is Professor of Leadership and Organizational Behavior at IMD. This year she is teaching part of the MBA Leadership stream along with Professor Anand Narasimhan. After almost 11 months at IMD, I can look back with some fondness – as well as struggles. The greatest parts of being part of this institution is the cool experiences you get to have and the great people you get to develop relationships with. In a relatively short period of time, I have visited several countries for the first time – including Indonesia, Japan, Singapore and Denmark. But I have also been fortunate to start this wonderful journey with four other awesome colleagues and professors – Jay, Knut, Ina, and Stéphane. As probably all the MBAs can relate to, it is SO MUCH EASIER AND MORE FUN to go through challenging experiences with others. And each of my new colleagues brings something different to the group and my appreciation for them. Jay and I have a similar background in social psychology, so we “speak the same language” when it comes to leadership. And as a true whipper-snapper in negotiations, I also have so much to learn from Jay in this area (not to mention that he is just a super duper fellow!). With a background as partner at BCG, Knut has been such a valuable colleague in terms of learning about client engagement and adding value for the client. We have also started putting together some material to stretch his strategy concept on Exploration-Exploitation into the personal leadership domain. As for Ina, I am so grateful to have her as a colleague. Not only is she extremely smart and competent at what she does (I learn so much from her!) – but she is just an overall great person. We have become true friends, which is priceless to me. And last but not least Stephan. Coming from such a cool background – both professionally and personally (French and Italian origins!), I have really learned a lot about the luxury industry from him and was reminded of his strategic expertise and insight during a recent client visit with him to Italy. While the pace of this place is completely insane and often times tests my patience and resolve, the great experiences and people I have met in my last 11 months make all the struggles truly worth it. My philosophy around teaching MBAs is really to just engage in a guided dialog. I have learned that as long as you constantly keep in mind the overall objectives that you want to convey during the session, letting the audience guide the discussion can often lead to the richest take-aways for the group – as the outcomes are most meaningful for them. And I truly love to teach, which I hope comes through in my work! I have included a photo of one of my favorite memories with my fellow IMD newbies. The five of us got to spend an evening and day at beautiful Chateauform in Champery. Jennifer

My IMD MBA Program Review by 1-st year student. Rating:*****

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: IMD MBAs immersed in innovation

Professor Cyril Bouquet leads the MBA class through an intense week for the Debiopharm-Inartis Challenge. Over the course of last week, the MBAs gathered information, created new ideas, protoyped, pitched and much more. They spent time in Renens at the innovation incubator UniverCité and visited a number of healthcare sites in Vaud and Geneva as part of their challenge to improve the lives of patients. The great projects they conceptualized will be entered into a real call for innovative projects: the Debiopharm-Inartis challenge whose winners will be chosen later in May and for which prizes include up to CHF 50,000 in cash and more in kind. Let’s wish the teams luck! A big thanks to our friends at Debiopharm, the Inartis foundation, and our associates, business model specialists Alexander Osterwalder and Greg Bernarda, as well as Greg Serikoff and the rest of the Codesign-it! team in Paris, Christian Saclier, Head of Industrial Design at Nestlé, and many others who helped make the week a great success. To find out more about what went on: IMD News Story: IMD MBAs immersed in innovation Video:Introducing the Debiopharm-Inartis challenge at IMD Video: Day 1 Video: Day 2 Video: IMD’s MBAs Prototyping Ideas in the Makerspace Media coverage: Tout un Monde from Swiss Radio RTS on IMD improving innovation with Design Thinking (in French)

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: What got you here will not get you there

It has been over 4 months since we started here at IMD. We are done with first term exams and the results have started to trickle down. Before you know it, next term is on us. Four more weeks and we will have our second term exams. A lot of exciting things to come after the second term exams – Navigating the future conferences, Company engagement projects, International consulting projects and above all the intense phase of career talks. Stay tuned! There are two oft-repeated slides by almost all professors. One with the iceberg and another with some form of “what got you here will not get you there”. They are kinda interlinked. For me personally, the last four months have been intense and also emotional to some extent. In a matter of few weeks, IMD has this way of breaking you down completely. Within weeks, I started doubting all my hard and soft skills. The leadership experiential simulated a tough environment  and showed me how I react under extreme pressure. The startup project put me in a diverse group of very opinionated people and tested my people skills. All our projects and tight deadlines put me under a lot of pressure in a short span of time. IMD promised a pressure cooker and boy, did it deliver! I look back at my career so far and I often try to put these 4 months into perspective. Like the other 89 students in my class, I had a decent international experience. I also had modest success in my career. Looking back, I think there were few skills that I had that had helped me in my career. What is amazing is, those skills have not been particularly useful! Now, this is both good and bad. Good because I am adding more skills and difficult experiences to my toolkit. Bad because it makes the journey a lot harder. Why is this the case? It is almost as if, IMD predicted that students will go through this brooding period this year and added the leadership coach and the Personal development elective in the program. I spend a lot of my time talking to these experienced professionals and psycho-analysts about why I do what I do. I also talk about why others do what they do and how I am knowingly and unknowingly influencing them. To me, these discussions have been pretty eye-opening. I certainly hope I take these learning back to whichever company I end up working for. This is why I think the iceberg makes an excellent example. Our actions and reactions to things in life usually have the visible component and the invisible component. IMD is constantly showing us we need to be aware of the invisible component. This is why I think what got me here will not get me there. The world is full of challenges ahead. Dealing with ambiguity in life and in career is common place. The companies we all hope to work for after MBA and roles we hope to get will be more challenging than we did before MBA. If anything the pressure will be higher than it is now. No one can be prepared for every challenge and every opportunity, but it is possible to pick up the fundamentals that can be applied to analyse problems. I believe that is what I am learning here and I am extremely grateful for this opportunity to look at daily occurrences in life in a different way. From conversations with classmates, almost all of them are going through something similar this year. Career services update: Our IMD CV version is now officially done. We were told the CV books have been published to the recruiters. Our calendar for June is full of career talks by companies. As early as June we will begin mock interviews and case preparation etc. The next 7 months of the program looks as action-packed as the last 4. Keep calm and carry on. Sathappan

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Let’s see what we’re made of!

As the intense first module of the program came to a close with exams and an all too short Easter break, the second module is already making us yearn for more time off. Accounting, Operations, and Entrepreneurship classes have come to an official close as Strategy, Negotiation, Innovation, and International Political Economy have kicked off. In a way, I feel that we’re starting to move past the fundamentals and going towards the more macro-level courses that prepare us for the real world and the new skills we need in today’s job market, which is great. Highlights from the past month include our Innovation week where we were split up into groups and tasked with designing a prototype to improve patient quality of life using design-thinking principles, which Suzy touched on in a blog post below. Immediately following the Innovation week, we had our IPE (International Political Economy) week during which we had dozens of speakers covering various issues ranging from migration to sustainability. On top of this, we had a number of very high-profile C-level guest speakers from leading companies such as Novartis, Nestle, Tag Heuer, and IBM. I would definitely say the guest speakers were the highlight of the past month. I felt that it was a testament to IMD’s clout in the business world that such senior corporate leaders were taking the time to speak with us and it is definitely a much-appreciated part of the program. As job hunting season is starting, we are also starting to go through several Career Services sessions covering topics including salary negotiations and interviews. Many of us are now working hard to secure our Company Engagement Projects (summer internships) and some are even starting to interview for full-time roles after graduation. All of this has been happening on top of our regular class schedule and all the projects and assignments that come with it. Looking ahead, there’s no sign of it letting up before exams as several 12-14 hour days are coming up this week in the form of more class simulations and integrative exercises. Needless to say, I have definitely been feeling extremely time-poor as I struggle to have a semblance of a social life outside of IMD’s walls and keep up with basic errands without feeling guilty about falling behind on schoolwork. Fitting in the time to write this already delinquent blog post was not easy and trying to find the energy to tackle the job hunt in a systematic way early on is tough. As I look around, I can definitely sense that the overall class energy levels have drained significantly compared to the first couple of months. That being said, we are all surviving and I am definitely learning a lot about how to manage energy levels with this much going on. At the end of the day, we are all going through the same thing together and the solidarity that comes from the tight knit 90-person class is keeping us all sane. My next post will be after exams so hope to have a bit more of my positive energy and vibes by then! Til next time!   Mo

What if one of the recommenders is using a gmail account. Does IMD carryout a verification later so that gmail account user can offer himself for further scrutiny? Will using non official mailer affect credebility?

Dear Vikasgulia,

Admission Committee will ask the recommender to send a copy of their ID card, in the exceptional cases, where the recommender cannot write from his professional address.

Hope it helps!

Thanks for the pointers.

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Second round exams approach

As Mo mentioned in his last blog, the pace doesn’t let up for the MBAs, and the pressure is now on as they prepare for their second round of exams and wrap up classes such as Finance with Professor Nuno Fernandes and Strategy with Professor Misiek Piskorski. Here are a couple of pictures, taken as per tradition on the last day of these classes. Finance   Strategy Suzy

FROM IMD Admissions Blog: Alumni story – Remembering the first IMD MBA class

Two prominent alumni revisit their experience of a lifetime during a recent visit back to the IMD campus. Finnish entrepreneur, Jan M Koivurinta and Australian Private Equity guru, Greg Minton, took a trip down memory lane together, visiting friends around the world and catching up with IMD where the friendships all started in 1990 – during the first IMD MBA program after the merger of IMI and IMEDE. Read their story