Calling Chicago (Booth) Applicants for 2009

Walker, 100 percent agree. Let's keep living

Had my interview today on campus. It was very conversational, very friendly, and I felt much more comfortable than I did during my Kellogg interview. My interviewer was an adcom member, and not a student, and I found the entire exchange to be very interactive, and freely flowing.

I'm quite happy about the experience, and I am hopeful that I will get in. Booth displays such a high level of professionalism in everything it does, and is so straightforward with the process, that even if it doesn't work out, I have nothing but positive things to say about the experience.

Good luck to all of you still interviewing, time for me to get those transcripts and test scores in!

I agree with everything you said - I feel exactly the same way and had the same experience at both schools.

i agree with you too.
so far my best appln experience have been with Booth, starting from the campus visit and the care they showed to us prospective students...
let's hope it all works out for everyone here

My on campus interview was with an alum.. 30 mins is definitely not enough time to touch on everything Booth. I felt it was a little rushed. Sigh.

After Booth live and on-campus interview I am now emotionally attached - never a good sign.

Good Luck!

Interviewed On-Campus with an Alum on Super-Saturday (21st-Feb).

The experience was similar to what everybody else reported...Same conversational tone and lots of discussion around career, my experiences, why MBA, why Booth. Few additional questions were
1. Tell me something that you don't like about Booth
2. How did you arrive at your list of B-Schools you applied. You dont have to tell me the names of the schools
3. Then a follow up question was "How does Booth compares against your list of Selected schools

thats it...it was about 35 minutes in total....

On the side note, I sent a Thank-You note to the interviewer but he has not responded back...does it mean, he didnt like me and I am screwed

Rhyme, I am so sorry if i kept you waiting on Friday. I was having a bad headache so decided to leave early to take some rest.

I NEVER, EVER had a reply to a thank-you email I sent out after an interview.

Therefore, stop freaking out over it.

that's lil comforting... Thanks nink...

I actually got a reply from my interviewer from Booth on Monday. I was very surprised, but tried not to read too much into it.
Oddly enough, I didn't have a single one of the questions in my interview that pursuirttowardsmba did. This is what I liked about my interview, in that the interviewer dynamically responded and followed up on the things I was saying - everything flowed well, it didnt even feel like she had a list of questions.

I sure hope I'm not misreading it, because I have very little interview experience. I think the variability amongst interview experiences really makes it a difficult component to the application. I remember Booth saying at a GSB Live that they are almost never as bad as people think they are, so I take their word for it when they say "it's just another data point."

However, I comfort myself by setting option on my email so that when they read my email (not receiving my email in their inbox, READ), I get a notification....

Did your interviewer took notes?? Mine was extremely cool dude just asking the questions as things followed...but didn't took any notes at all. He just had my resume on the table, and had noted down few things on the resume which he did cover.

Yes she took a ton of notes in notebook and then on a form. Barely even talked about my resume. It was much more about where I want to go than where I have been. Amazing how different these are. I am due to talk to a friend tonight who is interviewing next week, but with interviews this different, I don't know how much advice I can give!

Manbehindthecurtain & pursuit, my experience was somewhere in the middle!

I had some questions, but he kept it very conversational. I almost forced answers to ‘Why Booth’ and ‘How would you contribute to Booth’ because he wouldn’t ask them!
He did take notes behind my resume. There was a two sheet form attached to my resume – I think that’s probably the ‘report’ they fill out.
These Super Saturday interviews with alums are harder to judge. They probably went through more than 10 interviews that day – I bet they lose details by the time they sit to write out ‘reports’

Here are the questions I got -
• Have you had a chance to sit in a Booth class yet?
• What did you think about the class? The prof?
• Tell me about yourself... the MBA… (yes, both questions at once!!)
• Why couldn't a masters in xxx do the same for you? Why do you think you need an MBA to solve the problem?
• Do you think the mentors you have had in life were more just mentors or leaders?
• What do you do for fun?
• What is the best constructive criticism you have ever received?
• How long ago was this?

Yea but in the past when people have done that to me at work, I've always seen a notification saying "Sender requests Read Receipt, Allow/Deny?" or whatever... which means that I can deny the read receipt anyway (so theres no point in sending it in the first place) and second, I've always found it irritating because the only reason people do that (in a work setting) is to be able to say 'Yea, we told your team. So and so got the email. I know you read it cause ....'

I had my interview recently and thought I'd post my debrief for the benefit of others.

This was my second trip to the Booth campus. My interview was in the afternoon. I got into Chicago the night before and stayed at a friend's place in a suburb which was about 40 miles from campus. This was not a good idea since it took me almost two hours the next day to get to Booth by car - I-90 was packed bumper to bumper. So although I left at 6:30 AM, it was 8:30 AM by the time I got to campus. Parking at that time is a nightmare. Fortunately, I had enough time on my hands, but I would strongly recommend staying close to the campus. Once there, I attended a class, took a tour and grabbed a bite to eat.

I got to the waiting room in the admissions office about 15 minutes before my scheduled time. A couple of other applicants who had chosen the same slot were waiting there already. I think the adcom folks had arranged for some first year students to come and speak to us as we waited. That was awesome. It really helped relax and gave me a chance to get a current student's perspective.

At the allotted time, my interviewer came to get me from the waiting room. She gave me some background on the interviewing process and some information on to expect. Then we dove right into the interview. Some questions that I can remember were:

1. Why do you want to get an MBA?
2. Why do you want to get into the field of your choosing?
3. Why do you think you'd be good there?
4. Why not a different degree?
5. Why Booth?
6. What do you like to do outside of work?

Pretty standard for the most part. I'm sure I answered more questions based on my earlier answers but I can't remember them now. After she was done in 20 minutes, she gave me 10 minutes to ask her questions. I already had some prepared and brought those up.

Overall, I think I did alright. My interviewer was very friendly and professional. Had I not known that she was a second year student, I would have easily thought she was a member of the adcom. She took notes the whole time which she had said she would do in the very beginning. That was good since I'm sure she interviewed many applicants that day and this allowed her to capture my specific details. After the interview, I sent her a thank you note later that day to which she promptly replied back. I took that as a positive sign. I figure at least I did not totally come across as a total moron. If I get in, it won't be without her recommendation. So she'll be one of the first people I'll let know that I got in.

Another cool thing from this trip - I met with rhyme. I had an awesome conversation with him about Booth and his honest take on its offerings, the student life and some activities he's involved in there. Couldn't meet kwam due to a scheduling conflict.

I would really love to go to Booth. On both my campus visits, I got a very positive vibe from all the students and the environment. After the visit, I feel very comfortable about going there, making best use of so many resources, and fitting in. Keeping my fingers crossed and hoping for the best.

I just finished my interview and feel very good. Not sure if it is because my last interview is done or because I did well in the interview. I believe it is the latter.

This was an alum interview at a local starbucks. I was there ~10 minutes before and the alum was a few steps ahead of me in the line waiting to order his breakfast and coffee. I recognized him since I saw his picture on facebook. I ordered mine, waited for him to add sugar etc and introduced myself.

I had reserved a corner table by the window and he went there. I took my coffee and started the conversation about an event invite I sent him last week. He couldnt attend but he said his friends attended. He asked about my company and the macro economic conditions affecting my company since he read about it. I gave a short analysis on the cash position based on a finance course I credited last year. He liked it.

He asked my resume since he didnt have one but reviewed it before. I gave him a copy and the interview began.

The usual stuff... He asked me to go through my career progression, motivation for an MBA etc. I talked about my career progress to date for 4-5 minutes. He asked me few questions in between related to what I had said. I learnt a foreign language and he asked me how long I learnt it for etc. I also launched international teams in Asia and he asked me what role the teams played etc. It was good since it wasnt a monologue.

I then went to why MBA and discussed about it in detail but made it brief and to the point. He then asked me about my goals and I started by giving a background that led to my goals and then followed it with my goals. He asked me why I needed a full time program as opposed to a part time or exec MBA. I have significant work exp and I outlined the reasons. I was a little nervous but towards then end he said that my reasons for the full time versus PT or Exec MBA were good and reasonable.

The next question was why Chicago and I explained it and in between he asked me a few questions. He nodded for some of the courses, faculty I mentioned as part of the answer. I also weaved in some of my past exp and future requirement and how I could get it at chicago. He asked me if I visited the school and the course that I attended and I mentioned these.

He said he was done with my interview. I added what clubs I would like to be a part of and explained 1 or 2 more points that I wanted to convey. I later asked him a few questions about his exp at Chicago and he explained it at length including the clubs, academics, co-curricular, networking etc. He really took time to explain what he got from his MBA in terms of networking. I asked him a few other questions and he took time to answer them in detail.

Looking back at this interview, I feel very positive especially when I compare it with Chicago and Wharton interviews last year and again with Wharton this year - and in all the three, I couldnt get in. I feel positive about Chicago this time and I hope I cross the next barrier and get selected this year.

All the best for others who are yet to interview.

I'm an R2 applicant to Booth as well. I submitted my application on the last day 01/07, got an interview invite on 01/22 and interviewed on-campus on 02/09. Could someone please add me to the first page? - thanks

Since I'm a local I don't have much to add about the getting into Chicago and the city, hotel experiences that other posters have mentioned in their debriefs. I live on the far northside of the city so it indeed is a pain for me to get to Hyde Park every time. If I do end up getting into Booth, I'll definitely move somewhere in the loop (Streeterville) or South loop area in downtown.

Anyway, so my interview was at 9:45 am but I made it to the admissions office around 9:15 ish. There weren't too many other candidates in the waiting area at that time but it filled up quickly. There was a first year student there to greet everyone. He introduced himself and offered to answer any questions about the school or the city. He then asked me where I was from and after I mentioned the fact that I was a local, he smiled and said: "Well!! you'll probably don't have very many questions for me about the city but I have a few for you". He was from Atlanta and inadvertently we started talking about the weather and the city life etc. The area by now had begun to fill up and interestingly everyone interviewing was from NYC with mostly finance backgrounds. I was the only local and the only non-finance person in the group of about 15 odd interviewees which I found to be rather interesting. Another first year greeter showed up whom I remembered from one of the many Live events (three in total) I had attended. She and I had a nice conversation before I got called in for an interview. Unfortunately, all the good parts about this visit pretty much ended here as the interview experience was a bit weird and different than other schools I interviewed at.

Firstly, the interviewer (2nd year MBA) was very business like which was fine by me. He mentioned at the beginning of the interview that he had quite a few interviews that day and didn't want to run late but what annoyed me the most was that he glanced at his watch and the wall clock in the room every 10 secs which made me feel very uncomfortable and I felt like rushing through all my answers and obviously forgot half the stuff I wanted to talk about. Also the entire interview felt like a monologue and we barely had any eye contact as he put his head down and scribbled notes while I spoke. The questions he asked were pretty standard though:

- Tell me about your career to date and the choices you have made?
- Sounds like you have done well in the Hi-Tech sector, why do you think you need an MBA?
- Looks like you have been to the Chicago Booth campus a few times but you must have also looked and researched other schools. What is it about Chicago Booth that made you apply here?
- What would you do outside of the classroom at Booth?
- It seems like you have quite some experience in managing teams. Could you a give an example of a time where you had to manage a difficult team?
- Any questions for me?

I asked him one question and since he was visibly in a hurry to get me out of there anyway and the fact that I never felt welcomed during the entire 22 minutes, I had no motivation to stay and ask him any further questions. We shook hands and he gave me his card. I instantly emailed him a thank you note while sitting in the winter garden and as expected never heard back from him. The thing that really stood out for me was that during the interview when I mentioned the people at Chicago and how everyone was so nice...he interrupted me and said: "Well! Not everyone but most people I suppose....". One of the rare occasions during the monologue that he added something and it was this.... SERIOUSLY!! I have never seen anyone diss his own school especially as an interviewer.

Anyway, I had lunch with a few first year friends and headed back to work where everyone asked me how my dentist appointment went -:).

I am still very enthusiastic about Chicago Booth but I wish I had a better interview experience.