10/05/2014
THREE PRINCIPLES TO REMEMBER WHEN PREPARING FOR YOUR INTERVIEW
With the interviews coming up for R1 applicants, there are really only three main things to keep in mind in preparing for them:
1. Know the key themes: your background and upbringing, where you went to school, what you enjoy, your goals, why you love the specific b-school, your strengths and weaknesses, your proudest accomplishments, key moments when you were a leader, your mistakes/failures, and so forth. If you have stories and specifics for each of these themes, you would’ve covered just about any b-school interview question. You don’t want to get too surgical about it, or else you can come across as overly rehearsed and stiff. Remember that the interview is a conversation, not an interrogation. Since the interviewer only has your resume, a lot of the questions will come from what they’ve seen in your resume (reiterations, follow ups, clarifications, elaborations, etc).
2. Practice speaking OUT LOUD in a very organic and natural way around these key themes. Do not just sit there silently going through your notes. It may feel strange to talk to yourself, but you’ll get used to it very quickly. By talking through the key themes out loud, you’ll find that you’ll stumble through a few points in ways that you may have never uncovered had you just silently gone through it. You might even get nervous or tentative the first few times you do it, but you’ll find that the more you do it, the more comfortable you will be. Remember that thinking is not doing – and communicating is doing.
3. Do a mock interview with a colleague, spouse, friend, family member or consultant (or all of them if you can). A big part of doing well in an interview is focusing on listening and responding, and getting used to talking about your b-school profile in a conversational way (since talking about yourself in a b-school context is not exactly something you’d do everyday) so that you come across as engaged. You want to be talking *with * the interviewer and not *at * the interviewer.
