The following Harvard MBA Admissions Interview summary was provided by a recent applicant:
I had my interview with an AdCom committee member and one observer on campus. The interview was 30 minutes long and was a very good conversation rather than an interview in a strict sense. The interview member comes to fetch you and then told me that there are no right answers and its just a conversation to get to know me better. We dove right in and was asked a lot of questions
Quick background : I work for a technology company and want to start my own company post MBA
1. Explain what your role means and what you do
2. What has this become so important for your company (the specific department I work in)
3. There are many companies which do this very well and in fact pitch this in their marketing material to generate more revenue. Do you see your company doing the same?
4. [In response to my answer] Can you explain more about how you plan to do this?
5. Do you segment your customers into different buckets based on demographics etc. to be able to provide a particular type of service? (I was surprised by this level of detail)
6. What is the biggest threat to your company and what is your strategy to mitigate it?
7. Working for your company is considered very cool, do you agree?
8. Do you think your company will be cool in the years to come, what are they doing to keep it so?
9. If I talk to your team mates ( I lead a team), what kind of a leader will they tell me you are?
10. [In response to my answer] Why will they say that?
11. What is your plan for the company you plan to launch — as in will you launch right after your MBA or work somewhere else before?
12. How will your company make money?
13. Will it be like [Company A] or [Company B]? (Mentioned 2 companies and asked if my company would follow which business model)
14. What will be the challenges to launching your company?
15. Is there anything you wanted me to ask you?
Overall the interview was fun and very fast paced. Did not realize how quickly the 30 minutes went by.
For more Harvard MBA admissions interview questions, check out the Harvard Interview Reports Archive.
