The following Northwestern / Kellogg interview report was submitted to Clear Admit by a Round 2 applicant. Good luck to them!
I had really high expectations of the interpersonal skills of Kellogg alum based on reputation of the school but my interviewer was quite dry and robotic, the opposite of what I was expecting.
She asked me to go through my résumé position by position for the first 10 minutes, then asked about any leadership examples, why I had worked in the public sector and now wanted an MBA, I was asked to give an example of a failure or mistake at work, and list 2 weaknesses and 2 strengths. I was also asked to specifically name what clubs or student groups I would join and why and what my intended major and favorite potential classes were. The interviewer literally had about 6 pages of instructions from Kellogg that she read off of, and I could see personality questions such as “how personable is the candidate? 1-10, Rate their leadership potential 1-10, etc.” listed on the pages. I thought I gave strong answers to each of her questions, never once feeling stumped, but I never got a favorable reaction from her.
She had a blank expression throughout the entire interview. At the end of the interview I asked her about her experience at Kellogg and her experience in her current role, and got short conversation ending answers.
Overall I believe I will get a positive write-up for the interview but I definitely did not connect with the interviewer and the process dropped Kellogg down on my list of potential schools. To me, interviews are as much of the candidate selling themselves to the school as the school selling itself to the student, and in this case I was not sold on Kellogg. The interview lasted about 45 minutes and was held in the cafeteria of her office.
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