Good essays are structured around detailed examples. The same can be said for good interviews. You can spend five minutes telling your interviewer repeatedly that you are a leader, or you can show it in one minute with a good example. With many interviews limited to about 30 minutes, the best choice is clear.

However, many MBA applicants (particularly international or non-native English speakers) have difficulty addressing concisely standard interview topics like leadership, teamwork, failures and personal accomplishments. They often resort to word-for-word recitations of their essays, which are guaranteed to be too long and reflect poorly on their real-time communication skills. In journalistic terms, these applicants can’t “kill their babies”, i.e., they can’t imagine telling their beloved stories in a different way. I’m here to tell you that you have to be merciless in shortening your stories in order to have an effective interview. The following will hopefully give you some ideas for how to do so.

Journalists do it every day, when they write the first sentence in a breaking news story. Done well, that sentence should convey the importance and broad outline of an entire story, to be then filled in with supporting details. Transferring this technique to the world of MBA interviews, one-sentence stories can look like this:

“During a recent M&A transaction between two leading snack food companies, I successfully managed my overly-demanding client while fostering my subordinates’ growth by giving them unusual responsibilities, leading to a successful deal worth $100,000,000.”

“For ethical reasons, I gave up an enormous deal that could have been worth $1 Bln. because I knew the aircraft could not be delivered to the client on time.”

“After our merger, I had to rescue our technology integration talks through strong diplomacy, creative negotiations, and confident decision-making.”

“I had always been a lead rower on my college crew team, but after my injury I still wanted to contribute so I became a team manager, which taught me the difficulties and joys of playing a supporting role.”

These one-sentence stories should leave the interviewer hungry to know more, like a good movie preview. As an interviewee, you can have confidence that you’ve expressed your main points, before adding a few important details to round out your answer.

Even if you can’t squeeze an entire story into one sentence, the ability to pare it down to its key elements is an essential communication skill for the interview, in business, and in life. To find these essential elements, try asking yourself:

1) What is the heart of the story?

2) What actions did I take to solve the biggest problems?

3) What were the results?

The more you can master this technique, the more prepared you will be for all aspects of the interview. With some practice, you can even apply the one-sentence technique to your self-introduction and to your goals.

If you are interested in my interview training service, please see here for more details before contacting me.

Hi, Everyone.

I just finalized my travel information and other plans, including for a 説明会/orientation session for new applicants, as well as a fantastic 送別会/farewell party for my Japan clients leaving soon for their MBAs and other degrees. Please read all the way through since there are a lot of details.

MY SCHEDULE

Arriving: Wednesday April 7, 2010 afternoon

Departing: Tuesday April 13, 2010 afternoon

Contact in Japan: 050 5532 5956 or 090-9965-4974

Staying at: The Conrad Hotel in Shimbashi

FOR 2010-2011 APPLICANTS

説明会/Orientation Session

Time: Sunday, April 11, 2-4 pm

Place: The Conrad Hotel in Shimbashi

Please come to hear more about my counseling approach, philosophy, and services, and to ask any questions about me, how I work, or about the application process in general. To register, please use the form below and I will send you all the details.

I’m also meeting individually with potential clients for this year’s application season. If you’re interested in working with me, then I’m interested in speaking with you. Please contact me to arrange an appointment.

Applicants for this year are also welcome to attend the party events below. It’s a great networking opportunity with some world-class people who are now experts in the MBA admissions process. We will be leaving directly from the orientation session for the boat, so please join us!

PARTY!

On to the fun stuff. Every year we try to do something a bit different for my clients before they leave for their respective MBAs and other graduate programs. And this year, thanks to the great efforts of some of those same clients, we have a big night planned.

1. Sunset Yakata-bune Party

Time: 5-7:30 pm (please meet at 4:45 pm at the boat)

Cost: Y5,000 (includes trip, dinner and nomihoudai/all-you-can-drink)

Contact: 090-9965-4974

Place: 芝浦/shibaura, http://www.funatabi.jp/

http://www.funatabi.jp/info/access.html



2. Bowling at Shinagawa Prince Hotel Bowling Center

Time: 8-10 pm

Cost: @Y2,500 (with shoe rental)

Contact: 090-9965-4974

Transportation: We’ve arranged a free ride from the yakata-bune to the bowling alley. Otherwise meet at the Shinagawa Prince Bowling Center.

Prizes!

3. Drinks at Shinagawa Prince Hotel Bar

Time: 10 pm – ???

I can’t wait to celebrate all of your great success in this toughest of competitions and toast your future success!

One question I ask my interview clients a lot is, “Are you a better leader or team player?” Most everyone says they are both, depending on the circumstances (good answer!), at which point I ask them for an example of both. Explaining leadership is never a problem. It seems hardwired into MBA applicants. Teamwork, however, seems much more difficult to explain.

While there is certainly overlap between the two and both leadership and teamwork examples should end in a “win”, the challenges of the former are often external (e.g., persuading a boss, client or partner to take a chance), while those of the latter are internal. By that, I mean the impediments to success in a teamwork example are often your own team – poor communication, lack of clear goals, leadership, or organization, selfishness or ego, personality clashes, wavering commitment, etc. (Interestingly, I’ve found that bad teams are uniquely bad, while good teams are usually good for the same reasons.)

So, one approach is to describe:

1)    How you fixed a broken team
2)    How you established a good team from the beginning

Hopefully you have such a story among your essays, but if not, a very simple outline might look like this:

1)    Explain the team project or situation
2)    Explain the internal problems the team was facing
3)    Explain in detail the steps you took to reduce or eliminate the problems, and how doing so contributed significantly to success
4)    Explain the universal teamwork lessons from the experience. For bonus points, explain how those lessons will make you a great team player at your MBA.

Some interview questions that might lead to this kind of example (remember, you should provide an example whenever possible):

1)    Describe your role on a team
2)    How do you contribute to your teams?
3)    Are you a better leader or team player?
4)    How would your teammates describe your leadership and/or teamwork ability?
5)    What’s the best/worst team you’ve ever been on? What role did you play on it?
6)    What is your secret for building a good team?
7)    Describe an impact you had on a team when you were not the leader.

Regarding 7) above, another approach would be to describe a supporting role you played on a team, something important to the successful outcome, but not necessarily the pivotal role that is usually part of a leadership example.

If you are interested in my interview training service, please see here for more details before contacting me.

Most interviewers will give you time at the end of an interview to ask questions. You should. After all, you are the consumer, an MBA is an expensive and life-changing experience, and you have many choices. Not asking questions might make a negative impression. As a guideline, I think 3-5 questions is sufficient.

I also like to think of questions as falling into 3 categories:

1) Questions about program content to see how well the MBA fits your needs

Example: “Regarding your international study trips, could you explain specifically how they help prepare students for doing business abroad?”

These kinds of questions are basic and necessary.

2) Questions designed to reveal your potential contributions

Example: “I understand you have a soccer club. I love soccer. Is it possible for me to arrange a tournament with another MBA program?”

I personally don’t like these kinds of questions. The answer will obviously be “yes” (MBA programs love this initiative), and the question itself is a transparent effort to reveal a potential contribution. If you feel you can make a contribution, just say so.

3) Questions designed to start a conversation

Example: “Why did you choose School X?” or “What was your best/worst experience at school X?” (if the interviewer is an alumnus)

Example: “Would you describe your program’s culture as more collaborative or more competitive?” or “Are you making any changes to the curriculum, especially in finance, in response to the current global recession? If so, what are they?” (if the interviewer is an adcom rep)

These are my favorite types of questions because they can break through the “question-answer-question-answer” mold that so many interviews take. They can also contribute to not just a good interview, but to a relationship between you and the interviewer that may be helpful later on; for example, if you are placed on a waiting list and need advice from an alum. One of my clients was able to get very helpful feedback from his interviewer after being denied admission because they established good rapport during the interview.

Additional interview tips:
1) Don’t ask questions you should know the answer to or that you can research by yourself. These are also known as “stupid questions.”

Example: “Do you offer consulting projects?”

2) Don’t over-explain your questions. Just ask them. The best questions are short and to-the-point.

3) Ask open-ended questions to get the most thoughtful responses. (An open-ended question cannot be answered with a “yes” or “no.”)

Example (closed-ended): “Are students allowed to assist in the admissions process?”

Example (open-ended): “In what ways can students assist in the admissions process?”

*************************
A few thoughts about “Killer” questions:

In a recent interview training, a client told me she had been advised to ask “killer” questions during her upcoming interview. She didn’t know what constituted a killer question and, to be honest, neither did I, though I’ve heard this mantra many times before. If I had to guess, I would say that a killer question is designed to show how clever or provocative an applicant is, or even to put the interviewer on the defensive. The hope is to stand out in a crowded information session or interview.

With that definition, then, a “killer” question to an adcom rep might look like the following:

Example: “Your ranking fell last year. What did you do wrong?”

or

Example: “With your renowned financial curriculum and many alumni in the financial industry, do you feel responsible for the current global financial meltdown?”

These are certainly tough questions, and there are good points somewhere behind them. I would imagine that anyone asking them would stand out, but not necessarily in a positive way since the questions are calculated to provoke, not elicit helpful information. Ultimately, asking such a question might backfire.
Does this mean you have to lob baby questions in order to ingratiate yourself? Definitely not. An MBA is a life-changing experience that requires a huge investment of time and money, so you should be asking hard questions. My advice, however, is to begin by asking sincere questions respectfully about things you are truly interested in. Those are the real killer questions.

If you are interested in my interview training service, please see here for more details before contacting me.

Many thanks for sharing the insightful report…

————————

1 hour, alumni

Questions

Please walk me through your resume. Very brief. He interrupted me a lot to ask questions.
Career goals after MBA?/Why MBA?
Why Tuck?

My answers were clear and genuine. This part lasted 30 minutes. Then we had a very long conversation on the program and life in Hanover. The guy really loved his school. His eyes shone when he was speaking about his experience out there. He made a very strong impression. He was interested in 1) checking if I would be a good fit (Tuck has a very specific culture) 2) I would really go if accepted.

Advice: know the school/be clear why Tuck is a natural pick for you. Don’t be arrogant and do not appear like a young “metro sexual”/party guy. He told me that if I had told him that I was interested in having beers and going to the movies with friends every night, he would have told me to go to Columbia and not Tuck.

So I guess that for Tuck, it is really about knowing the school and displaying a genuine interest in the program and location. I would really recommend visiting the school before the interview if possible, but do the interview only after being invited because the interviewer knows you are good and will treat you like a potential student/alumnus and not like a “lambda” applicant.


A really thoughtful client asked me some good questions a while back, and I’m just now getting around to answering them. His questions got to the heart of some of my core counseling philosophies, practices and approaches, so I wanted to post them here too. Bit long in places, but hopefully not boring.

I have some questions. Please see them as completely genuine questions. I am only interested in your work and what is important to you. Actually, if my native language was business schools official language, I think I would enjoy doing your work!

How do you get your clients (you work on referencing your website? Lot of word of mouth? Groups and forums?…)

About 70% of my clients come from referrals, and the rest find me through my website. The balance is shifting more towards the latter as I add more and better content to my website. I just switched to this website format (WordPress) last year and I really love it because it allows me to provide the tools and information that my clients and I reference repeatedly in a friendly format, while also allowing new clients to find me through the search engines. I try to provide what I consider the most useful information, so I don’t have a lot of “MBA porn” on my site. I believe that 90-95% of the application process is internal, so if the information isn’t something that will immediately help my clients with their resumes, essays, LOR or interviews, I don’t usually include it. That focus allows me to do what I do best, which is utilize my journalism and storytelling background to help my clients find and express the details of their stories that will make their essays “echo” in the minds of adcoms.

Do you pick your clients? (ie do your prefer working with 750 GMAT in non-profit or 640 GMAT marketing professionals facing a true challenge or 26 yo Mckinsey with 800 GMAT who do not really need you but improve your “stats”)

I do pick my clients, but only in the sense of 1) will I be able to help this person? and 2) will I enjoy working with this person? If someone is unrealistic about this process or if they have no self-awareness, then I can’t help them – nobody can really – and I don’t want to take their money. I almost always enjoy working with my clients and I treat our relationship with great respect. I understand how important an MBA is to my clients, and how closely it is tied into their future plans and dreams, both personal and professional. (In my own case, I have two masters degrees and was a Fulbright Fellow, and each of those experiences took my life in a new direction and opened up opportunities that might have otherwise remained hidden.) For that reason, I work with 95% of my clients according to some kind of flat-rate package, so that we can concentrate on producing the best materials, and not on counting minutes or sessions. Sometimes I get burned doing that, but most everyone I work with is highly professional and motivated, and we have a very positive experience.

I’m concerned about test scores, but only as a metric of how realistic someone is. For example, if someone has finished up taking the GMAT with a 520 and insists on applying only to top tier schools with only average work experience and not much of a personal life, then they are doomed. If someone is applying with a realistic plan, then I’m almost always happy to work with them. Some of my most enjoyable client relationships have been with “humble geniuses”, who might not have had the best scores, but who knew themselves inside and out. This self-awareness is the one ingredient that the most successful candidates share. At the same time, I love helping “high fliers” and “thoroughbreds” navigate the process and get into the schools that they should get into.

I do know counselors that will only work with people who have 700 GMATs and 105 TOEFLS, but when I hear that, I feel that counselor might not be ready to work hard for their clients. A good, conscientious counselor should aim to help clients gain admission to schools that are beyond their reach because of their test scores or other application weaknesses. Don’t get me wrong. I love it when my strongest clients get into HBS or Stanford or any other top school, but I feel most satisfied when someone on the margin gets into a school they thought was impossible. In addition, I love the variety that comes from working with a diverse range of people in terms of scores, personal backgrounds, professions, geographic location or goals.

Regarding success statistics, I understand that they are important, but I also know they don’t tell the whole story. My process leads to success about 95% of the time. But more importantly, my clients are almost always extremely happy with my service, and they gladly recommend their friends and colleagues. Even in this highly wired world, that word of mouth is priceless and still the best marketing.

Do you consider yourself “conflicted” sometimes? I mean, in my case for instance, would you work with someone who also has my profile? Some of your clients obviously compete against each other (which could lower your stats and impact word of mouth) unless you manage to pick people interested in different programs or with different backgrounds.

Nope. I never consider it. For one thing, applicants change their plans all the time, so even though they say they are going to apply to a certain set of schools, the reality is often different, usually due to an unexpected (either better or worse) GMAT score. More importantly, my job is to help each individual distinguish themself from others through the specific details of their stories, which reveal unique ways of thinking or problem solving. So even though you might share a surface profile with someone, underneath, I’m always looking for the things that make you unique. More often than not, I can find them.

I’ve been doing a lot of “walk me through your resume” interview training with my clients, and the more I do them, the more I’m convinced that they are one of the best interview practices because they:

1. force you to be proactive while also giving you lots of control
2. force you to be concise while also providing value-added information
3. allow you to expand your interview answer pool beyond what you’ve written in your essays
4. allow you to explain connections between different parts of your life, thereby showing self-awareness and giving you the chance to tell the bigger picture of who you are

However, this type of interview can be more difficult than a straightforward Q&A type exactly because of the freedom it provides. Therefore, I tell my clients to keep the following points in mind:

1. Obviously, make sure you have extra copies of your resume for both you and the interviewer to review. You never know what type of interview you’ll have.
2. Decide the starting point (e.g., current job, first job, education, even additional information if appropriate) and direction (chronological or reverse chronological) and stick to it. I think most people find chronological easier, starting with either their college education or their first job. There are always exceptions though.
3. Don’t skip around. Guide your interviewer. Tell them where you are in the resume so they don’t get lost.
4. Don’t just read each bullet point word for word. Your interviewer can do that for herself. Provide value-added context to each individual accomplishment (e.g., why it was important, or what was especially difficult), explain how accomplishments relate to each other, and what the accomplishments say about your strengths, weaknesses, thoughts, values, etc. You should also explain how different sections of your resume (i.e., educational, professional, personal) relate to each other. To do this effectively, it helps to have a strategy before the interview begins. If certain accomplishments relate directly to your goals, take the opportunity to introduce your goals. If it seems appropriate, you can go even further to include “Why MBA?”, “Why School X?”, etc.
5. Be concise. Aim for 1 to 2 minutes for each bullet point. If you need help developing your bullet points, see here.
6. If you have lots of similar accomplishments, just focus on the highlights.

Even if you are not asked to “walk me through your resume”, I encourage all my clients to know and be ready to speak about any item on their resumes, since it is often the only information an interviewer has about you. In addition, a resume represents a manageable amount of information to master, as opposed to trying to memorize answers to massive lists of questions found online, an approach that, in my experience, merely increases anxiety and decreases performance. Of course question lists can be helpful, but I recommend using them to test your ability to adapt and express the information you should already know well from your essays and resume.

If you are interested in my interview training service, please see here for more details before contacting me.

I truly appreciate all my clients’ testimonials, but this one was especially meaningful to both me and the client so I wanted to feature it here. The client was accepted at Wharton with a partial scholarship, along with Fuqua, and was waitlisted at Kellogg. The client was invited to interview at other programs but withdrew from them. It was translated from Japanese. You can read the Japanese version here.

*********************

23:06 PM, Friday, December 18, 2009

I will never forget that moment – a big barrier in my path finally opened up and I could see a brilliant future. The woman who had interviewed me said clearly over the phone, “Before you go to bed, I really wanted to let you know that you were accepted. We were very impressed by your wonderful application. You received a scholarship, too. You are very much welcome at Wharton. ”

As soon as I hung up the phone, my family, who had taken care of me closely, said, “Wow, Bryan is such a great counselor! You were lucky to find him.” Those were the first words that came from them. Only through Bryan’s support was I able to get through this hard, solitary MBA process while having fun and without losing myself. Without having met Bryan, I am sure I would not have been able to apply to all my top choice schools in the first round and been accepted by multiple schools since my test scores were marginal at best.

It would be endless if I explained every tiny detail about Bryan’s wonderful service. However, I will try to introduce some outstanding points because I can compare Bryan with other MBA counselors since I have a lot of friends applying for their MBA who work/had worked with other counselors. (30 of them were accepted last year, and more than 50 of them are applicants this year.) I am also on multiple MBA mailing lists to exchange information and I heard opinions directly from those applicants as well, so I will use them here as a reference.

The real meaning of “FLAT RATE”, “All INCLUSIVE SYSTEM”

There are so many counselors out there who advocate “flat rate” services, but I can draw a clear line between Bryan and them, and say that his flat rate is real and great. I had continuous, basic consulting twice a week. However, if Bryan thought he needed to give me more time, before deadlines and interviews, he consulted me three – four times a week. Bryan supported me with e-mail as well, so including that, I had contact with Bryan almost every day since April, when I asked him for help for the first time. I did not need to worry about the budget since I had no idea how long and how much it was going to take. There are so many cases in which MBA counselors who advocate a “flat rate” set a limit on the number of consultations and interviews. So, Bryan’s flat rate is authentic and outstanding.

FAIR TO ALL HIS CLIENTS

My GMAT and TOEFL scores were on the edge, however, I never lost confidence in being supported to write quality essays. I sometimes heard some of my friends working with other MBA counselors complain, “They treat clients who have high scores differently.” I saw that their priority was those clients who have more possibilities to get accepted, while Bryan never does that to his clients. My scores were not high, so I was thinking to wait for the second round. Bryan said, “It will be fine. Your great essays will make up for the scores.” It was Bryan who even encouraged me to finish completing essays for the first round. I felt this showed his confidence and outstanding ability in what he did, and also his performance came from his strong feelings of caring and helping me compensate for my weak scores as much as he could. I relied on Bryan and felt I would be fine if I followed his advice, and I was able to raise my test scores to the necessary level while I wrote essays.

OUTSTANDING EDITING ABILITY

One of Bryan’s great abilities is to condense original, rough essays written by clients after a bunch of brainstorming into something authentic without losing the essence. I often heard some of my friends working with other MBA counselors say, “My essays became something which did not reflect myself at all”, “There are some phrases that are not in my vocabulary, so I am worried when I am invited to interview.” The worst thing someone said was, “My counselor wants to write whatever he wants, even the content. I am not happy about my essays because I cannot write what I want to express.” Bryan never does that. I expressed my background and personality honestly in my essays. As a result, I am very happy that I was accepted. If I got accepted without expressing myself, I would not have been happy. An MBA application is not just for getting a diploma. It is an important process to look back at yourself, tell your life stories and develop yourself. I am very proud to have told adcoms who I really am with Bryan’s wonderful editing ability.

I am concerned that most MBA counselors in Japan try to overpower their clients. With Bryan, there was no such thing. I was always straight with him about what I wanted to express. I demanded so much, but he was also clear about what he could not do, so I was not concerned about anything at all. I really appreciate that Bryan understands Japanese people, and is always the one who I can comfortably tell anything.

I was also shocked to know some of my friends were told by their MBA counselors, “You cannot apply to XXX school with such low scores,” “You cannot apply to multiple schools in a month,” and “You should wait until the second round because your scores are not high enough yet.” I can’t help wishing there were more counselors like Bryan in the MBA counseling industry who are always on the side of clients.

I decided to work with Bryan because some of my respected senior friends recommended him, and I also recognized his great personality and professionalism. It’s their advice as well, but you have to secure your seat because Bryan is very popular. Some of my friends who met Bryan but chose someone else to work with were not happy with those services. Then they decided to ask Bryan to help, however, it was too late and Bryan had already filled up his spaces. Bryan is not fake friendly, which we Japanese expect of American people unconsciously. I do respect the high quality of his humanity, services, swift work, moral standard and passion to sacrifice himself for his clients. Bryan did not take even a day off whether it was Christmas or New Years, so I feel Bryan’s wife took care of us as well. While Bryan was in Japan for face to face counseling, he gave us some group interview trainings. I met his other clients there for the first time, and we all seriously agreed that Bryan was such a great counselor.

In the end, I have been looking forward to writing this testimonial for so long. The long journey to an MBA acceptance finally ends when I finish writing this. Without Bryan, I could not have been accepted by Wharton with a scholarship in this competitive year. Throughout the MBA process, I appreciate that I rediscovered what was important to me. I will move towards the future I picture in my mind to exploit as much as I can this great chance that I won with Bryan.

Bryan, I am savoring the joy of “passing”, as well as sad to end our counseling time, which almost became my custom every day. I am thankful for the miracle of finding you for the MBA application process and I also hope we will keep in touch as a mentor and a student.

Thank you very much for leading me to an MBA acceptance.

NOTE: This is a re-post from last year.

As I covered in my last post, a good strategy is vital because it allows you to approach the MBA interview pro-actively. If you know the topics you want to cover, you can look for or create opportunities to tell your best stories. Also, a checklist of “must-tell” stories serves as a “scorecard” to judge your performance and make improvements for future interviews.

Executing that strategy begins when you introduce yourself, which is often the first thing an interviewer will ask of you. Most applicants don’t take full advantage of the opportunity. They often give a bland recitation of some school, some work, and some hobby that goes little beyond what’s written on their resume. Your interviewers can read that for themselves. What interviewers need is a way to understand how all the bullet points match up and relate to each other. This is the value-added “verbal resume” you should be providing when you introduce yourself.

From that perspective, the self-introduction is a chance to create a framework for the entire interview, including your reasons for pursuing an MBA and the major accomplishments/strengths you want the interviewer to know about. Since I stress integration and consistency with my clients, many of them have strong themes that run throughout their essays. The self-introduction is a perfect time to introduce those as well. As one of my clients recently and beautifully expressed it, you need to “seed” the self-introduction as a way to move it in the direction you want it to go.

Here is what I consider a strong self-introduction, based on recent interview trainings I’ve conducted.

Me: “Please introduce yourself.”

Client: “Thank you. I would love to. The most important thing to understand about my background is how important international experience has been to both my personal and professional development. I’ve always known that I wanted to work internationally, which is why I enrolled at a university with a strong international focus and why I went overseas during college to conduct research for my thesis on manufacturing in the developing world. It was an amazing experience that led me to volunteer with an international NGO, something I would like to talk more about later.

After graduation, I joined my company where I started in an engineering role, developing hundreds of programs for my company’s leading software product. I also had the rare opportunity as a young staff to lead many software development teams, during which I was able to refine my interpersonal skills.

I experienced a big turning point when I was assigned to lead an implementation project overseas. I managed to solve the inter-cultural issues, as well as bridge the technology and business viewpoints that were necessary for success. After that, I knew I wanted to take a more front line position in my organization so I transferred to a sales department.

In the past few years I’ve become our top salesperson, responsible for 25% of our revenues for our leading product. Now my goals are to combine these experiences to help my organization expand sales internationally, which is a brand new challenge for us. This is actually my short-term goal and I’d be happy to provide more details.

Honestly speaking, however, I don’t feel ready yet to pursue my goals. I need to develop more team management skills since I often work alone as a salesperson, as well as deepen my international business experience and networks. These are the main reasons I applied to your MBA.”

I read this out loud and it comes in under two minutes. But in under two minutes, this person has shown himself to be thoughtful and intelligent, with a firm grasp of what he wants and why he wants it. He has shown himself to be both realistic and ambitious in his career goals, while identifying specifically how an MBA can help him clear the main hurdles he faces. He has also introduced both personal and professional topics that can be developed more fully throughout the interview. Strategically, he has set himself up perfectly to move in several different directions, including expanding on his goals and reasons for an MBA, which is often the next most natural thing for an interviewer to ask.

As with all the techniques I’ll cover, this ambitious approach might not be for everyone or might not fit all interview situations. But I do believe that all applicants can find some benefit from the principles behind it.

If you are interested in my interview training service, please see here for more details before contacting me.

DEVELOP A STRATEGY

It still surprises me how many people sweat and babble through their MBA interviews without a strategy. I consider them victims, at the mercy of the interviewer. However, strategic applicants, those who know their best stories and can deploy them to maximum effect, gain control over the content and direction of the interview. A good strategy is vital because it allows you to approach the MBA interview pro-actively. If you know the topics you want to cover, you can look for or create opportunities to tell your best stories. With a good strategy, you won’t be caught unprepared when an interviewer asks, “Is there anything else you would like to tell me?” Also, a checklist of “must-tell” stories serves as a “scorecard” to judge your performance and make improvements for future interviews.

A good strategy is based on good essays; if they are developed properly, then they should already provide a comprehensive profile of you that covers the typical interview questions. By “properly” I mean that individual essays are structured and detailed enough to withstand the probing of a dubious interviewer, and that your essays are consistent and integrated as a whole.

The first step to developing a strategy then is to review your essays, along with your resume and even your LOR (depending on your access), to identify the 10-15 most important topics you want to cover. I think a good list should include the following:
1) Self-introduction
2) Short-term goals
3) Long-term goals
4) Why MBA?
5) Why School X?
6) Accomplishments
7) Personal life
Strengths
9) Weaknesses
10) Contributions
11) Questions for the interviewer
12-15) Other topics that express your unique experiences/qualities

For most of my clients, these topics have been well developed by the time of the interview, so identifying them is easy. The difficulty is presenting a topic both individually and strategically. Doing that starts with Introducing Yourself, which I will cover in my next post.

ANSWER DIRECTLY & PROVIDE AN EXAMPLE

The importance of these points will become more clear later in this series, but for now keep in mind that you never know how long an interview will last, so the first words out of your mouth should be a direct answer to whatever question you were asked. By doing so, you will signal the interviewer that you heard and understood the question, which is especially important for international applicants or other non-native English speakers. After answering, you can give the necessary background information to understand the full import of your story. Many applicants take the opposite approach, i.e., they start with a long “wind up” of background information, risking the loss of the interviewer’s attention before they arrive at the all-important “pitch”. Get the answer out of the way first. It’s just better communication practice.

You should always be thinking about examples you can introduce to support your answers. Always, always, always. Nothing is more frustrating from an interviewer’s perspective than to have someone claim they are a great leader or team player without providing proof. This is an MBA interview. Everyone says they are a great leader and team player. Only your examples will distinguish you from the crowd. The imperative of providing examples is another reason you need to develop your strategy in advance. Expressing your examples clearly and concisely will be the subject of several future posts.

If you are interested in my interview training service, please see here for more details before contacting me.