The interview took place at the alumnus’ office in Paris. We had an appointment in the morning and I arrived slightly ahead of schedule. To arrange this appointment, we had exchanged emails and finally phone calls. The interview started on time.
I had done my research on the WEB and find out that he was a partner at a big consultancy firm, responsible for the practice on energy sector. I therefore had prepared myself intensively, meeting with friends who were working in this sector to polish my knowhow on this topic, since I had mentioned in my application form that I wanted to move to this sector after graduation. Interestingly enough, he didn’t want me to send him my essays, saying this was private information and that he would only look at the profile and CV part. As a result, the interview was very much like a job interview.
Some of the interview questions are listed below (this part in English): – Walk me through your resume – Why an MBA – Why now – Why INSEAD
This lasted for about half an hour and then it was my turn to ask questions. This second part was conducted in French. As for interview 1, I had come with my printed list of questions and this was a good basis for further discussion. We discussed about various topics such as life at INSEAD, his job, the energy sector and this was the opportunity to use what I had learnt: I could pitch the Stern report about climate change, the Mc Kinsey report about energy productivity and some other points.
Overall the interview lasted for about 1,5 hours and at the end, I decided to wrap-up as I had the feeling it could last even longer but I didn’t want to take too much of his time. It seemed for him the right time to break as well as he told me that, as I might have felt, he would recommend me.
As for interview 1, I shared the decision with him and he also replied quickly with very kind words.
