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It’s been a while since I last posted an update on my bschool app process. The reason for the long layoff is that I’m quite burned out from thinking about bschool. I knew going into the app season that it would be a long and arduous road. All the introspecting, studying, writing, doubting, re-writing and pondering has left me wanting to take a break from it all. And I only applied to three schools (so far).
Thankfully I’m at the tail end of the entire app process. I’m completely done with Owen and Smith and only have the interview with Broad left. After that, I’ll just be sitting around, crossing my fingers, pulling my hair out as I wait for my decisions to roll in .
Interview with Smith
On Tuesday, I had my interview with Smith at the Palomar Hotel in Westwood. With all the biblical amounts of rain that was coming down this week, I left work about two hours before the interview to avoid being stuck in traffic. 405 + rush hour + rain = disaster. The extra precaution, however, wasn’t necessary because it seemed like god was looking out for me that day. The sun actually came out for the 15 minute drive from my apt to Westwood. And the most amazing part: there was absolutely NO TRAFFIC. I ended up getting to the hotel about an hour early. Thank you God.
My interview was with Sam Kang. I spoke to him a couple of times via email regarding questions about the school and about California (he went to UCB, UCD, worked at Stanford and UCI). Since I was early and he wasn’t doing anything, we started the interview ahead of schedule. I’m not going to go into the details of the interview because I don’t want to jinx anything, but I came out of the interview feeling good about my chances at Smith. I’d say 40% of the questions were the typical MBA interview questions. About 20% of the questions were questions that I had read about from Accepted and pagalguy. The remainder of the questions were team based questions. Thankfully I had enough stories to use because there were a lot of those types of questions. I guess that is just a reflection of Smith’s team based culture.
I’m eventually going to do a lessons learned post after all this is done, but here’s a preview of a nugget that helped me out during the interview: research the hell out of the school you are applying to. This includes visiting the school, scouring the schools website, and talking to the students. During my interview, I was able to talk about things that really connected with my interviewer. Concrete example later.
Next Up
After Tuesday, it felt weird that I had nothing bschool related to do. It seems like a lot of other applicants are going through some form of bschool application withdrawal and rediscovering their normal lives. It’s nice not having to study or write essays but I’ve got to find something to do. Right now I’ve been filling my time with playing Uncharted on the PS3 and cracking open TL’s dusty business books. Whatever happens with my decisions from school, ultimately I’ve got to find the next big challenge to occupy my time. Until then, it’s all about finding Drake’s treasure and reading about market analysis.