Chicago Interview

Well, from the Kellogg interview i learnt that, one should schedule in the interview and plan in such a way that they have time to work on their essays after the interview. The interview, first of all, gives you new perspective. The interviewer might tell you about a few things that the school does not care at all so you don't have to address them in your essays . In my Kellogg interview, i was asked to re-explain my goals. Not sure what the real reason was but just to be sure, I added a couple more lines in the goals section of my essay so that i am more clear.

For the Chicago interview, I reached the Chicago campus at 3:45PM. Since this was my 4th time there, I knew where to hang out until my interview at 5. I sat in the common area where a bunch of full time students were studying together. There was a teacher who was going from table to table and was reviewing the projects they were working on. Seems like they were all taking the same class. I overheard their conversations and it seemed interesting.

The person interviewing me was a current part time student. He left work early, started my interview at 5 and had a class at 6.

He met me at the PT program office and said i wrongly checked the weekday PT program in my form instead of saturday PT. I politely disagreed w/ him and finally we found out i was correct. Phew!

Here are some of the questions he asked me in the interview:

1. What are my goals?
2. What i am most proud of (professionally and personally)
3. What do i do outside of work.
4. Since I was from a HF background he did not ask me "Why Chicago" as that is kind of obvious. That is like asking a fighter pilot, why he/she likes Top Gun.
5. He also did not ask me what i have to contribute. Most of my answer was related to leveraging my job in the HF industry and since most of their candidates are HF types, i don't think he cared about hearing the same tape. I do some "quality" voluntary work which my future classmates can participate in which was something i would have mentioned here but i did mention a part of it in #2 above.
   

The interview went average. I don't think i got enough opportunity to speak because the interview was very short (30-40 min).

One thing i have seen is that when i mention i work at a HF, it attracts a lot of attention from current students at these schools. They want me to hook them up w/ my firm for a job. Nothing wrong with that, just saying, that i like that attention. HA!

I think who the interviewer is makes a difference. At Kellogg the interviewer was the admission director who probably had an experience of interviewing thousands of candidates. She was able to see through my answers that i have the management potential and the kill that I will use and climb the management ladder of top companies and hence make Kellogg proud. Chicago's interviewer on the other hand was a current student and probably only saw how I am on paper.