HKUST 2013- Calling All Applicants

If anybody would like to know about the school or the admit process and relevant information, feel free to talk to me. I am curently enrolled at the program and it had been a very good experience so far.

Hey aviroop
Thanks for the info!
Can you share some interview experiences in HKUST?

Interviews will be carried out by admissions office, especially Sherring Ng. She will be going to US, Europe and Asia on tours, so if you get a chance to speak to her, you definitely should.
A lot of emphasis is placed on interviews. The school is looking for fit and for well rounded applicants. This year, our batch profile has been exceptionally strong, with an averge of 6 years work experience and an average gmat score of 650 plus.
If you are called for an interview, do talk about why HKUST. The admissions office will judge to see how well you have researched the program and why you want to study in Asia. The interviewers are friendly but at the same time they will ask you some challening questions.

From your end, demonstrate your enthusiasm and research done for the program. Also if possible, highlight your international work experience and diversity. This is a big plus point for the school. We have 109 students in the current batch but they come from 27 different countries and only 3-4 students are local HK

Hi, aviroop, thanks for sharing your experience. I see that you have strong GMAT and GPA. In my case they are not so brilliant but are compensated with work experience (almost 6 years by the MBA start date), asian exposure (even if I am Spanish, I worked in Korean and Chinese multinationals, and spent 1 year of internship living in Japan) and some academic & professional awards. Do you think that admissions office has these points in consideration as well? How important are scores vs. CV?

Javier82,
Dont be concerned with grades or gmat score. They are part of your application, but you have international experience and you have worked in Asia. Definitely emphasize on your experience with the Chinese firm and talk about what you have learned from that experience.

There are two students from spain in my batch. Also HKUST offers a scholarship for Spanish students.
As I mentioned before, you have to be well rounded. There are talented students in my program with low GMAT scores. So once again, dont be focused too much on grades or scores.

Hi Aviroop,

I submitted my application a few days before deadline and recently got an interview invitation for the week of November 25. The interview will be via Skype. Did you interview this way also? I have never done a Skype interview so I just wanted to know if you have any tips on how to handle it as opposed to a regular face-to-face interview.

If you don't mind, can you share a few questions that you recall were asked during your interview? I just want to get an idea of how to prepare. Also, would you say the interviews are more general regarding your background and personality? Or do they lean more technical, product knowledge within your field etc?

Thanks for your help!

blueram,
Treat the skype interview as a regular face to face interview. Make sure your webcam works, you are dressed in business professional attire (including wearing pants and shoes - in some cases, students were asked to get up and turns out some did not wear pants.....another story for another time).

The interview will be very relaxing - it will be very conversational..

things to remember

1 Read your CV and remember all bullet points you have listed - anything is fair game and if you cannot explain things on your CV then too bad
2. Read your essays and remember them well - adcom will ask you questions regarding your work experience, or handling conflict, challenges, team leadership from the stuff you have written in your essays.
3. talk about international experience, diversity, why MBA, why now, why at HKUST.
4. ask questions about the program - do some research on the program and do come up with some good questions - not generic types
5. interviews will be on background and personality - adcom is not going to ask what sort of exotic derivatives you structured if you were a trader at a bank. As I have said before, the interview is all about fit.

good luck with the interview.

Hi aviroop,

Could you please describe your overall experience and its curriculum? and do many students get scholarship? (partial or full)
I currently working for Li&Fung, HK based company (not sure if you know this company but I think they are quite famous in HK) in my country for 3 years and I'm lookin hkust as one of my option

Thanks,

The overall experience has been very good. The course load is very intensive but its not tough. You will be swamped with work, networking activities, club events and academic from day 1. For curriculum - we have total course credits of 52, out of which 22 are electives and 30 are core courses. However, if you have taken any similar courses in your undergrad final year or in post graduate courses, you can take exemption from the core course and take an elective instead. There are 4 career specializations - finance, consulting, marketing and china business
I am mostly taking electives in finance. The electives are very good and are taught by industry specialists. Currently I am taking 2 electives on Debt markets and equity markets and took one on regulatory structure in previous semester all of which were taught by bulge bracket ex bankers.

Li & Fung comes to the MBA program for hiring, so try to see if you know anyone in your company who graduated from HKUST MBA.

for scholarships - there is the merit scholarship which the school automatically gives you without you having to apply - its about 75000 HKD. There is an Asians with international experience scholarship which offers 125000 HKD and one leader scholarship that is 300,000 HKD

There is no full ride scholarship at HKUST.
Hope this helps

Thanks aviroop for your reply, this actually helps a lot

The admission team will come to my country for QS MBA tour, so I might as well check them out

Thanks Aviroop! I will definitely keep those in mind for the interview next week!

Hi aviroop,
I was in MBA tour hoping to see HKust but they didn't come. However, I got to talk to admission director from University of Hongkong and it was interesting

what do you think about both universities comparing to each other?

thanks,

I would choose hkust any day over hku. Better brand recognition in terms of an MBA, a far superior program, diversity of class is better. HKU is a good school but it does not deliver the bang for the buck that hkust does.

Just to give you an idea - Citi held their MBA career trek at HK. There were 35 students and career services people from HKUST. From HKU, barely 5 students showed up. I attended other career events organized by companies and seldom came across HKU candidates. JP Morgan held a networking event for their markets and research program. The event was for both undergrads and MBA students. Out of the 30 odd students that were invited, there were 10 HKUST MBA students and 20 undergrads from HKU, CUHK and HKUST.

I am biased towards HKUST..

Have any Indian candidates received calls for interview yet?

I am anxiously waiting, submitted my app on 10th Nov.

Adcom has just started reviewing applications. Expect to hear the first batch of invites to start coming out in the next 1 -2 weeks.

Any suggestions for the interview. A website? What do they ask? which is the hardest question?

Please do a search on previous year's thread and you will find interview discussions. As for website - I am not sure what you mean other than the hkust mba site.