Thankee, Rhyme!
OK, here’s my short interview debrief. As some of you might remember, I, being one of the last ones invited to an interview by the GSB (Oh, the joy!
), experienced certain problems with scheduling an alumni interview in my city/country. Despite the impressive local alumni base, all the interview slots were taken. The AdCom suggested me two options: another location and phone interview. After consulting with a couple of friends I decided to go for an interview in the capital of a neighboring country. The feedback about the (only) alumni interviewer there was very favorable. I contacted the alumnus and… what happened next can be expressed in three words (two words and an acronym): The GSB Spirit!
The alumnus called me and said that he was impressed with my commitment to travel for an interview. He contacted his classmate living in my city and got his agreement to meet with me. Then, he called the AdCom and got confirmation for the change of an interviewer and location for me! The local alumnus called me as soon as the confirmation was received and scheduled a meeting with me. During the whole process all I had to do was to sit back, wide-eyed, and be amazed at the speed and efficiency of the alumni interactions.
And then, the day came… We agreed to meet in a café, since my interviewer was in the process of changing jobs (next Monday he will start as a CFO for a major IT-company). I arrived half an hour in advance and he arrived precisely at the agreed time. He was dressed casually, while I was in business formal (suit – plain navy blue, shirt – light blue, tie – blue, w/o pattern
). We made introductions and chit-chatted for several minutes while he was making an order. Than he explained to me how the interview will go – 30 min for a formal part, in English, then he will be available for some time to answer any questions for me.
The formal part was pretty straightforward:
- Walk me through you resume.
- Tell me, what exactly do you do in function X?
- What is one major quality that a manager must have to be successful in function X?
- Your career looks successful, why do you want to interrupt it and go for MBA? (I explained my career changing reasons)
- Why Chicago? Why not Harvard? Wharton? Kellogg? (I gave specific reasons why GSB is a better fit for me than any of those)
- Where else did you apply?
- Do you have a back-up career plan?
- What about your family, do they join you?
- The GSB students traditionally had a nerdy reputation. The school wants to change that, and the way to change it – to admit another type of students. How will you contribute to creation the “fun” image of the GSB student community? (That was the only difficult question for me!
but I think I managed it OK)
- What do you do for fun outside of work? What is the book you currently read? Other books? (He was very well-read and able to discuss literally any book I named. I was impressed. He then asked a specific question about what was written in one of the books I read lately. I answered; he nodded, but did not look completely satisfied. Then I said what
was not written in that book and he smiled and nodded approval.)
He set back and announced that the formal part was over. Now we have some time to just talk, he said. I asked him a question:
- So many years after graduation, do you still find use for the academic knowledge you got in the GSB?
He answered and after that our discussion flowed naturally and we talked about various topics varying from housing in Chicago to employment prospects in my current company. He also gave me very practical advice on how to prepare for recruitment in consulting.
The whole meeting lasted over an hour, but I felt relaxed throughout and really enjoyed our conversation. It was clearly a fit interview, without any grilling.