My interview was off-campus, so I was provided a list of alumni in my area that are able to do interviews. I reviewed the list and looked up people on Linked In to identify someone with a similar background / interests, hoping that we might just naturally hit it off. I ended up finding someone a friend of mine knew through work, so I knew a little about my interviewer going into the meeting.
We met at a coffee shop after work, and it was very informal. The interview was blind; she had a copy of my resume and had reviewed suggested questions from the school, but that was it. It was very conversational in nature – for every answer I gave, she expanded upon it and suggested ways McCombs could meet my needs or gave examples of other classes / extracurriculars that would interest me. It was clear she loved her experience at McCombs and was excited to share information about the school, which has been my experience with pretty much every alum I’ve met from there.
Questions
(1) Walk me through your resume. Why pursue an MBA? Why McCombs? Why now? I ended up answering all these boiler plate interview questions just through the course of our conversation; she did not point blank ask each one.
(2) When have you been in a situation outside your comfort zone and how did you handle it?
(3) How would you describe a “good leader”?
(4) What qualities do you look for in choosing a teammate?
(5) What are you most proud of, professionally and personally?
(6) Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 10?
(7) What is the strongest / weakest part of your application?
We finished the interview with some questions I had, and she offered to connect me with other alumni should I have any more questions. The whole thing was about an hour long.
