I interviewed with a second year student on campus. My answers were not flawless and I would definitely answer the teamwork and leadership questions stronger next time, but all things considered, I’m pleased. The experience was anticlimactic, and now I wait anxiously for the March decision release.
My interviewer was friendly and professional. She was from the Bay Area and we started by talking about how I had come from San Francisco for the interview, and we talking briefly about the snow, and I mentioned that I had lived in Tahoe and missed the snow. I made the mistake of saying that I had gotten in yesterday, which prompted her to ask me if I had done any class visits yesterday. I said no that I was not able to steal away from working all day since I have two consulting jobs to manage now. But I wished that I had made it sound like I had just flown in, or was able to describe something I did on campus yesterday.
She stated by saying she would be taking notes and that we would stop 5 minutes before the end so that I could ask her questions.
We started right in:
- walk me through your resume
- short term goals
- why now
- why Wharton
- how will you get involved in Wharton.
Then she asked me two tougher questions:
- “give me three adjectives to describe your leadership style.” This threw me a little bc I had prepared anecdotes and descriptions, but had trouble trying to come up with one-word adjectives. So I started w a two-word description and then proceeded right into my anecdote to describe and then ended the story with single adjectives to summarize.
- She asked me about how I have dealt with a difficult team member on my current project, and this was by far my weakest response. I didn’t like where my anecdote was going so I quickly ended and then she asked me two follow up questions. I wasn’t really able to end strong, so I tried to hurry the topic along.
- Then she asked me one adjective to describe a weakness. This was also tough for me bc my response wanted to be four words. So I asked her if I could give her 2 words, and again went straight to my example, and ended with a one word adjective summary.
I think there was one more question next, but I can’t remember. But she stopped 5 minutes before our 30 minutes to allow me to ask questions. We talked for about 10 more minutes. I had one strong question for her, which she spend a lot of time answering. Then I tried to ask more personal questions like “do you plan to return to the Bay Area?” I wished I had had more than 1 killer question in my back pocket bc I realized what a great opportunity it was to tell her anything else important about me that we missed.
Overall the interview was successful in me being able to tell her my story, and I do feel that I was able to paint the picture about myself that I had wanted.
I would do two things differently: 1) better difficult team member example and 2) more questions to ask her at the end.
