My 2nd interview was 2 days after my first one, which was incidentally on a Wednesday. This didn’t really leave me with too much time to ruminate over my bizarre 1st interview. I decided not to prepare for this one and instead go in with a relaxed attitude.
The 2nd interview was at a coffee joint at 10 AM. I had taken a half-day leave from office that day. My interviewer this time was the Marketing Director of a well-known technology company.
He arrived in a t-shirt and jeans (this is why I said suits are overkill) and his demeanor in general was extremely easy-going. For lack of a better word, I’m going to call his approach soothing. He was extremely well-spoken, polite and immediately put me at ease. We started off with my background and he asked questions whenever appropriate and had some very nice comments about my varied non-professional experience. We then spoke about my professional experience and my reasons for changing jobs and the kind of responsibilities I handle.
He then had some situational questions for me. I list them here for everyone’s consumption:
- When you’re in a gathering, what attracts your attention first?
- What makes you extremely angry/ passionate?
- What is your style of negotiation?
- How do you deal with a person who’s determined not to listen to you even though he/ she knows you are right?
- How do you deal with a boss who is not as smart as you?
Additionally, he also had the usual INSEAD questions of why now, why MBA and why INSEAD. He was particularly pleased with me when I told him that one of my biggest motivations in joining INSEAD was to actually experience different viewpoints because I believe that different cultures breed different thought processes.
We spoke for nearly an hour-and-half and then he concluded the interview.
To read the full interview, please go to OutOfMyJeans
Cheers (Result: Accepted)
