Calling all INSEAD MBA Applicants: (Sept 2018 Intake) Class of 2019!!

The silence in this thread is deafening and the wait for the final decision is absolutely brutal! The road to 24/11/2017 is certainly a long one (especially, if you are done with your interviews - I completed mine on the 28th of October and on the 3rd of November) - 17 days, 408 hrs, 24480 mins until the Deadline! I just read the entire Sept 2017 Intake thread - What an absolute roller coaster! A few pointers (probably all cliches but I am going to write them down anyway):

1) They start calling 4 days prior to deadline day
2) If you get an email, without a call, don't fret! It might just be your ticket of acceptance to INSEAD. While they do call the majority, a fair share of applicants get their letter of acceptance emailed to them directly without a call.
3) Expect the acceptance letters to be interspersed sporadically with waitlists/dings right from Day 1. They don't necessarily hold back their dings until the deadline day.
4) The calls are done geographically. The ones who received the interview invites first can expect to receive the calls first. For instance, last year, the interview invites and the acceptance calls started with Middle East and LatAm. Extrapolating the trend to this year should see our friends in Singapore (if my memory serves right - they were the first ones to receive the interview invites) being the first ones to receive the most awaited call of the year!

Hope to hear more from you lot! There is no fun in keeping our anxieties to ourselves. Lets open the floodgates of stress/anxiety/panic/thrill/excitement!

Thank you for such an informative insight.
I have few anxieties as well.

I have applied in R2. Submitted my application on 24th Oct and video interviews on 2nd. So what I understand from your post, the interview calls start rolling 4 days before the deadline, I can expect mail around 20th?
And by saying that some get their acceptance mail without call, do you mean that some are not even interviewed?

anu8787 Firstly congratulations on reaching your first milestone.

Coming back to my earlier post, I was referring to final decision calls (not interview calls). If I remember correctly, they do not telephone you for interviews. Interview invites are by emails, mostly.
By acceptance mail I meant acceptance email. Every accepted candidate is interviewed - so interviews are mandatory. I was referring to the final decision after the interview process. INSEAD has this signature style of calling (most if not all) successful applicants to notify them of their acceptance to INSEAD. They follow up their telephone call with a formal letter of acceptance via email. What I noticed in last year's threads was that some of the candidates received the acceptance letter in their emails directly without getting the congratulatory call.

Hope that helped.

My bad.
I confused R1 with R2.
Apologies for that.
Best of luck.

Posted from my mobile device

Thank you. Good luck to you as well!

Thank you AcidXXX for that informative post.
Unfortunately, due to schedule changes of my interviewers, I have not yet finished any of the interviews.
I'm expecting to do them on Nov. 9 and 13.
Hoping for the best!
And good luck to you too!

crza

Good luck man. The upside to your interviews getting postponed is that you cut down on your wait for the final decision. Trust me, after the interviews, the wait can be even more excruciating as I am experiencing now!

Thanks for this useful info on expected decision timeline. While y'all wait for the decisions, it would be great if applicants share their interview experiences in this thread so that those who would be reading this discussion in future would benefit from our interview debriefs.

great post @AcidXXX first round for the January batch Singapore applicants were first notified for final decisions.

MBA Prep Coach

As with many of you I'm now in that awkward limbo of waiting to see what happens having finished my interviews last Wednesday! Nothing to do now but wait and hope!

I'd like to think both went quite well and were certainly more along the informal chat line than a formal interview. Both were in my home town with alumni which was an excellent opportunity for me to get to know their feelings about INSEAD as well as to probe both of them on their (majorly) significant career pivots. Typical questions around my background as well as my motivations for completing an MBA, with a particular emphasis on why now.

I've applied for Singapore - would be curious to know if anyone else out there is the same or has everyone else prioritized Fontainebleau?

Interview one done.

Went pretty well. Was with an Alumni who works in the O&G sector.
* Asked me to take him through my CV and my life story. Asked a few questions about details of projects highlighted on the CV. Dug a bit deeper to see how I had coped with some difficult situations, etc.
* Got the 3 classic questions; why an MBA, why now, why INSEAD.
* What do you wanna do, what's your plan after the MBA; why do you think you need an MBA to get there.

After that, it was pretty much conversational; me asking him several questions, etc.
Quite an interesting and insightful experience.

Now unto the second one coming up tomorrow.

Are you applying for France or Singapore? Tying to work out if I'll be on my own over there given everyone I've spoken to has applied for France as their number 1!

Fontainebleau as well. Don't worry both campuses will be full anyways. :p. I mean we're really not many on this forum anyways

Sent from my Moto G (4) using GMAT Club Forum mobile app

Hi everyone,

Both the interviews done a few days ago. I was lucky to schedule both my interviews on the same day and both took place in coffee shop in London. Both alums did their MBA more than 10 years ago but were still able to recall their memories.

Interview 1:
The alumni is working in Ecom - the same sector where I am from. It was nice conversation mostly around walk me through your resume, why MBA, Why INSEAD and why now?
Then she asked me about a time when I worked in multi-cultural team, how I resolve a conflict, a project where I succeeded, team I led etc. She also asked what I fear the most about studying at INSEAD. What other schools I applied to and how will I take the final decision if selected in all. I felt I could have done much better by being more structured but what's done is done.

Interview 2:
The venue was 45 minutes away from 1st interview place and I was scared to be late- even though I had good one and a half hour to cover that distance. Luckily I reached before time . The interviewer was prepared and I could feel that he studied my application before meeting. He created a timeline of my entire professional career and switches that I made and asked specific questions to me why I did what I did. This was followed by usual Why MBA, why INSEAD and why now. What is my goal post MBA goal and if I'll chose to start my own venture instead of going to my dream job post MBA.
Surprisingly, he asked me to tell about my family, where I come from to understand me better, if my husband will quit his job to join me at INSEAD. Once the interview was over, we had a conversation for more than 15 minutes about his country and his first international experience etc.

Overall, both the interviews were good and conversational. My advice will be to be yourself and enjoy the conversation. Moreover, try to be short, concise and structured. Now waiting impatiently for the results - fingers crossed. Best wishes to everyone who's in the same boat as me.

@sharp05 extremely helpful! Thanks for including so much info. Best of luck to you.

https://MBAPrepCoach.COM

Good morning folk,

So I had my second interview on Friday. It went OK in my opinion. The alumni graduated in 2013 and was very chilled. He actually send me a mail the day before confirming the venue saying "See you tomorrow. And relax, no #pressure..". So I traded my suit for a more laid back chinos and shirt with a tie.

He had prepared the interview quite well. We went through my CV and I presented myself and he inquired about the different career choices I made, the motivations, etc. He asked the classic Why MBA, Why now and Why INSEAD. We spoke about my career objectives post MBA. All this lastest for 45 mins. Then I asked him quite a few questions about the INSEAD experience, what he does now, etc. All in all, we spoke for 1h45 mins. It was a very interesting exchange.

Now fingers crossed while I wait for the call.

Cheers and goodluck to everyone.

Nche

It's also a wrap for me guys! Less than 2 weeks before the decisions come out.

As per my interviews, both were held at the alumni's office and I would say they were quite relaxed.

First one was with a Japanese alumna who is a bit on the older side. She asked me the usual why INSEAD, why now, and which other schools was I applying for. She also probed my goals a bit, asking me why I need to transition to consulting in the short-term post-MBA instead of going straight to pursuing my real passion, social entrepreneurship. I just answered honestly and cited financial reasons, to which she laughed because she apparently did the same! Overall, it was a very fruitful experience. She was just checking my fit in the program. At the end of the interview, she told me that my personality and goals are a perfect fit for INSEAD. :D
PS: It seems that INSEAD used to have this creative question, "Would you want to sit beside this person for 2 hours on a plane?", but she told me they scratched it out this year.

The second one was with a Singaporean alumnus living in Tokyo and a fairly recent graduate. He came prepared with notes about my resume and job description essay. He was asking a lot of questions about the achievements I wrote on my resume, specifically on the scope of my contribution. I made the rookie mistake of not reviewing one tiny detail of my resume: I have close to zero recollection of a paper I published 10 years ago for an NGO I volunteered with for 4 months. Well, it was just 1 question and I think I did well on others so I'm hoping for the best. He also asked the usual why INSEAD. At the end of the interview, I asked him some questions about his INSEAD experience and recommendations on classes/professors to take.

That's it for me.
I wish everyone the best of luck!
How do we kill time for the following days, someone recommend please!

Congrats to all on completing your interviews (guessing 14th Nov was the interview deadline for all - Last year, 18th Nov was most likely the cut off day for the interviews). So, last year's admission decision deadline was on 25th Nov (Friday) and they started calling 22nd onwards (Tuesday). With this year's decision deadline being on the 24th of Nov (also a Friday), I am almost willing to place a wager that they will start sending out the decisions 21st onwards (i.e. NEXT TUESDAY

Guess we are all gearing up for the meltdown to begin. Meanwhile, does anyone know if "The Decision Gods" start assessing the files as and when the interview reports are submitted by the interviewers or do "They" meet once and for all to assess all our files together after the interview deadlines?