What’s good, y’all. I hope you’re all enjoying your Saturday so far. This weekend, I’ve got family in town visiting me and I’m looking forward to a couple of days of foolishness and laughs. Unfortunately, I was too busy with work this week to plan anything out, but one of the great things about Chicago is that there’s a lot to do during the summer weekends. So, I’m just going to wing it and hope they have a good time with whatever I can come up with.
The email below is the kind that pains me to receive because it’s from someone in need of my advice who had a time constraint. I received this email at the beginning of May and, at the time, the reader had just been invited to do an admissions interview with Stanford GSB. The GSB invites few people to interview, so this was kind of a big deal for this kid. He wrote to me seeking advice on how to prepare for this interview, but, unfortunately, he was so far down in my Inbox queue that I’m just now getting a chance to respond to him. In his email, he understood that I probably wouldn’t be able to get to him in time, but he wanted me to type something up anyway on the off chance that it might help one of my other readers out…I like when people look out for other folks in their requests to me
After sending my response to him, I was pleasantly surprised to hear back that he was actually admitted to the GSB and will be starting classes in September…guess he didn’t really need my advice after all
Before I go, I want to give a shout out to the founder and 2009 participants in the MBA Jumpstart program. MBA Jumpstart is a three-day event that exposes incoming MBA1 students to Consulting and Finance careers to give them a foundation upon which to build their job search strategies. The following is some text about the program from its website:
“MBA JumpStart is a targeted, prematriculation forum through which consulting and financial services firms can identify, educate and recruit diverse talent at top-tier MBA programs. MBA JumpStart was created to address the lack of diversity and under representation of minorities and women in the consulting and financial services industries. The program strives to bridge the gap between diverse talent entering top business schools and firms actively seeking to increase representation.”
I’ve written about the program on here before, but I’m giving them a special shout out now because this year’s session took place this past weekend and I participated on a couple of their panels. I met many of the attendees and they were a great group of kids. Desipte the down economy, the soon-to-be students were incredibly optimistic about their job prospects and looking forward to diving into the Consulting/Finance job search process. Plus, they were a fun group and I had a great last night out at the club with them before they all left the city. I wish all of them the best of luck as they start their first-year courses in a few weeks…I’m really jealous of the experience they’re about to begin. The founders of MBA Jumpstart are doing a HUGE thing for incoming MBA students by exposing them to Consulting and Finance insights, experiences, and professionals and I hope to have a chance to participate in it again in the future.
——-
SS wrote:
“Dear Marquis
I was googling today and found your blog. I am really thrilled that i have found such a resource. Thanks man… I have applied to Stanford MBA in the third round for the Fall 2009 session. I have just got the invitation for an interview from Stanford. I am excited as well as terrified. How should I prepare myself? I was searching through your blog for any advice that you have given related to this issue as i didn’t want to bother you with my query as you are a very busy person. But I could not find any. I know that with the large que of mails, probably by the time you will get to it….i would have faced my D-Day…..nonetheless, i can always take my chance, can’t I? Thanks in advance…..
SS
P.S. – please extend your advice about the interview to all….if not for me, it can be helpful for some fellow friends like me……”
——-
My response:
SS,
I hope this message finds you doing well. Thanks for thinking of me as a resource for your question about how to prepare for your Stanford GSB admissions interview. I know it’s been a couple of months since you first emailed me, but, due to my backlog of messages, I’m just now getting to your email. I’m sorry about the delay in responding to you, but, from the sound of your email, I get the sense that you would understand the reasons for this delay. I know that this message is likely arriving too late to be of any help to you, but, as you said in the P.S. of your email, this response could be helpful to others, so I decided to write it anyway.
If I’d been able to send you a response back in May when you originally sent your message, I would have given you the following advice:
- Get to know the GSB as well as you can: By now, you should know the GSB well from the research done to prepare for filling out your application. Now, you should redo this research in hopes of reinforcing your existing knowledge and, hopefully, finding out new things. You’d want your interviewer to KNOW that you want to be a student at the GSB and the best way to demonstrate that is to show that you know the school. I won’t go into details about how to do this research, but I’ll just say that this should be the first step of your interview prep.
- Re-read your application and be consistent with your MBA story: I don’t know if the GSB alumni interviewer will have access to your application essays, but I’d still recommend that you refresh your memory about the MBA positioning used in your application. You’ll want to make sure that your story is consistent between what you wrote and submitted to the school and what you say in your responses to the interviewer’s questions. The last thing you want is for the interviewer to mention something in his/her report back to the Admissions office that conflicts with something from your application. At this point, you’ve done so much to establish yourself as a candidate with a certain background story, so the last thing you’d want is to undo it by not having that background story tight enough all the way through the process.
- Generate a set of stories about your successes and failures: I might be wrong, but I’d guess that just about any B-school interviewer would ask you to give some examples of times that you’ve been successful and others when you’ve failed. And, if the interviewer is about his/her business, then he/she will ask you lots of probing questions to find out more about each of the stories. It’s imperative that you develop a good list of stories to use. These stories should be 100% true and you should know those stories inside-and-out because you don’t want to get tripped up by one of those probing questions. I’d recommend developing a template for each of the stories that would include a high-level headline for the story, a list of the key role players, a bulleted list of the story details, and some ideas about what you would have done differently. Fill out the template for each of your stories and you’ll be in great shape.
- Be yourself and try to be as relaxed as possible during the interview: This is probably the most important of the advice I’ll give about the interview, but it’s also the most difficult because of the pressure you’ll probably feel. The last thing you’d want is to sabotage yourself and drive your interview performance into the ground. If you’d like an example of how letting your nerves and make you crash and burn during an interview, check out my entry describing my HBS interview back in 2003 (http://marquisweblog.blogspot.com/2003/12/my-harvard-business-school-interview.html). It’s hilarious as I look back on it all these years later, but it’s still a cautionary tale about how badly one can perform if his/her head isn’t in the game.
Since you’ve already completed your interview, I hope you used some of the above tactics to prepare for it. Again, I apologize for taking so long to respond to your message. I hope everything worked out for you to gain admissions to the GSB. If not, I wish you the best of luck on whatever your next steps end up being. Take care.
Marquis
The email below is the kind that pains me to receive because it’s from someone in need of my advice who had a time constraint. I received this email at the beginning of May and, at the time, the reader had just been invited to do an admissions interview with Stanford GSB. The GSB invites few people to interview, so this was kind of a big deal for this kid. He wrote to me seeking advice on how to prepare for this interview, but, unfortunately, he was so far down in my Inbox queue that I’m just now getting a chance to respond to him. In his email, he understood that I probably wouldn’t be able to get to him in time, but he wanted me to type something up anyway on the off chance that it might help one of my other readers out…I like when people look out for other folks in their requests to me
After sending my response to him, I was pleasantly surprised to hear back that he was actually admitted to the GSB and will be starting classes in September…guess he didn’t really need my advice after all Before I go, I want to give a shout out to the founder and 2009 participants in the MBA Jumpstart program. MBA Jumpstart is a three-day event that exposes incoming MBA1 students to Consulting and Finance careers to give them a foundation upon which to build their job search strategies. The following is some text about the program from its website:
“MBA JumpStart is a targeted, prematriculation forum through which consulting and financial services firms can identify, educate and recruit diverse talent at top-tier MBA programs. MBA JumpStart was created to address the lack of diversity and under representation of minorities and women in the consulting and financial services industries. The program strives to bridge the gap between diverse talent entering top business schools and firms actively seeking to increase representation.”
I’ve written about the program on here before, but I’m giving them a special shout out now because this year’s session took place this past weekend and I participated on a couple of their panels. I met many of the attendees and they were a great group of kids. Desipte the down economy, the soon-to-be students were incredibly optimistic about their job prospects and looking forward to diving into the Consulting/Finance job search process. Plus, they were a fun group and I had a great last night out at the club with them before they all left the city. I wish all of them the best of luck as they start their first-year courses in a few weeks…I’m really jealous of the experience they’re about to begin. The founders of MBA Jumpstart are doing a HUGE thing for incoming MBA students by exposing them to Consulting and Finance insights, experiences, and professionals and I hope to have a chance to participate in it again in the future.
——-
SS wrote:
“Dear Marquis
I was googling today and found your blog. I am really thrilled that i have found such a resource. Thanks man… I have applied to Stanford MBA in the third round for the Fall 2009 session. I have just got the invitation for an interview from Stanford. I am excited as well as terrified. How should I prepare myself? I was searching through your blog for any advice that you have given related to this issue as i didn’t want to bother you with my query as you are a very busy person. But I could not find any. I know that with the large que of mails, probably by the time you will get to it….i would have faced my D-Day…..nonetheless, i can always take my chance, can’t I? Thanks in advance…..
SS
P.S. – please extend your advice about the interview to all….if not for me, it can be helpful for some fellow friends like me……”
——-
My response:
SS,
I hope this message finds you doing well. Thanks for thinking of me as a resource for your question about how to prepare for your Stanford GSB admissions interview. I know it’s been a couple of months since you first emailed me, but, due to my backlog of messages, I’m just now getting to your email. I’m sorry about the delay in responding to you, but, from the sound of your email, I get the sense that you would understand the reasons for this delay. I know that this message is likely arriving too late to be of any help to you, but, as you said in the P.S. of your email, this response could be helpful to others, so I decided to write it anyway.
If I’d been able to send you a response back in May when you originally sent your message, I would have given you the following advice:
- Get to know the GSB as well as you can: By now, you should know the GSB well from the research done to prepare for filling out your application. Now, you should redo this research in hopes of reinforcing your existing knowledge and, hopefully, finding out new things. You’d want your interviewer to KNOW that you want to be a student at the GSB and the best way to demonstrate that is to show that you know the school. I won’t go into details about how to do this research, but I’ll just say that this should be the first step of your interview prep.
- Re-read your application and be consistent with your MBA story: I don’t know if the GSB alumni interviewer will have access to your application essays, but I’d still recommend that you refresh your memory about the MBA positioning used in your application. You’ll want to make sure that your story is consistent between what you wrote and submitted to the school and what you say in your responses to the interviewer’s questions. The last thing you want is for the interviewer to mention something in his/her report back to the Admissions office that conflicts with something from your application. At this point, you’ve done so much to establish yourself as a candidate with a certain background story, so the last thing you’d want is to undo it by not having that background story tight enough all the way through the process.
- Generate a set of stories about your successes and failures: I might be wrong, but I’d guess that just about any B-school interviewer would ask you to give some examples of times that you’ve been successful and others when you’ve failed. And, if the interviewer is about his/her business, then he/she will ask you lots of probing questions to find out more about each of the stories. It’s imperative that you develop a good list of stories to use. These stories should be 100% true and you should know those stories inside-and-out because you don’t want to get tripped up by one of those probing questions. I’d recommend developing a template for each of the stories that would include a high-level headline for the story, a list of the key role players, a bulleted list of the story details, and some ideas about what you would have done differently. Fill out the template for each of your stories and you’ll be in great shape.
- Be yourself and try to be as relaxed as possible during the interview: This is probably the most important of the advice I’ll give about the interview, but it’s also the most difficult because of the pressure you’ll probably feel. The last thing you’d want is to sabotage yourself and drive your interview performance into the ground. If you’d like an example of how letting your nerves and make you crash and burn during an interview, check out my entry describing my HBS interview back in 2003 (http://marquisweblog.blogspot.com/2003/12/my-harvard-business-school-interview.html). It’s hilarious as I look back on it all these years later, but it’s still a cautionary tale about how badly one can perform if his/her head isn’t in the game.
Since you’ve already completed your interview, I hope you used some of the above tactics to prepare for it. Again, I apologize for taking so long to respond to your message. I hope everything worked out for you to gain admissions to the GSB. If not, I wish you the best of luck on whatever your next steps end up being. Take care.
Marquis
