{"id":26765,"date":"2014-12-18T11:00:03","date_gmt":"2014-12-18T18:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/2014\/12\/what-to-expect-from-your-mba-interview\/"},"modified":"2014-12-18T11:00:03","modified_gmt":"2014-12-18T18:00:03","slug":"what-to-expect-from-your-mba-interview","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/what-to-expect-from-your-mba-interview\/","title":{"rendered":"What to Expect from Your MBA Interview"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"MBA<\/a>With MBA interview invitations continuing to arrive this time of year, we thought now would be an appropriate time to discuss some challenging interview situations. Most business school interviews are straightforward opportunities for an interviewer to learn more about a candidate\u2019s personal and professional backgrounds, goals, reasons for selecting a specific school, and leadership\/team experiences, yet interviews can vary dramatically from school to school and sometimes include a few peculiarities. So, what constitutes a \u201ctough\u201d interview, and how can you best navigate one?<\/p>\n

Stoic interviewer<\/strong>: Some interviewers can be unemotional, refusing to give you any indication as to whether you are making a positive impression or not. And amid the intense pressure of an interview, you may perceive this lack of clear positive response as a sign of actual disapproval. The key in managing such a situation is to tune out the interviewer\u2019s lack of emotion. Focus on your answers and do your best to not be distracted by anything about the interviewer, ignoring everything except the questions he\/she is posing. \u201cReading\u201d the interviewer in real time can be challenging, so you should instead concentrate on showcasing your strengths.<\/p>\n

Philosophical questions<\/strong>: Most candidates are ready to discuss their experiences and accomplishments, but many are\u00a0not<\/em>\u00a0prepared to discuss their values and philosophy on life. Harvard Business School in particular likes to understand applicants\u2019 motivations and will ask questions like \u201cWhat is your motivation to succeed?,\u201d \u201cWhat drives you?,\u201d and \u201cWhat gives you purpose in life?\u201d The key to answering these sorts of questions is pretty simple: expect and prepare for them in advance (after all, you are being warned right now). You cannot assume that all the questions you will receive during your interview will be experiential.<\/p>\n

Persistent questioning<\/strong>: Sometimes a tough interviewer will continuously delve deeper into a subject, such as by repeatedly asking, \u201cCan you be more specific about [the topic under discussion]?\u201d after posing an initial question. These kinds of unusual pressure tactics can be disconcerting, but the key is to simply stay on topic. No matter how persistent he\/she is, the interviewer is always essentially asking you about a subject that you know quite well\u2014you! So again, by avoiding the distraction of the tactic and sticking to your agenda, you should be fine.<\/p>\n

mbaMission offers even more interview advice in our\u00a0Interview Guides<\/a>, as well as through targeted one-on-onemock interview sessions<\/a>\u00a0 and group\u00a0Wharton team-based discussion simulations<\/a>, so check out these resources to see if they might be helpful in your application efforts.<\/p>\n

The post What to Expect from Your MBA Interview<\/a> appeared first on Kaplan GMAT Blog<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With MBA interview invitations continuing to arrive this time of year, we thought now would be an appropriate time to discuss some challenging interview situations. Most business school interviews are…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,558,243,940],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26765","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gmat","category-kaplan-blog","category-blog","category-gmat-prep-gmat","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26765"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26765\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gmatclub.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}