The Hindu Business Line : On personal interviews and how to crack them

The objective of conducting interview is usually to understand the ability of the candidate to develop a perspective of business and operations in the course of a reasonably long work experience.

B-schools are looking for intelligent candidates with a consistent track-record throughout their academic life, with a good awareness of the world around them.

All the management aspirants who have been reading this series regularly will remember the various preparation areas we have covered in the last few months — verbal skills, quantitative skills, reasoning skills and group discussion training. And in this concluding article of the series `Countdown to CAT 2006' we plan to cover the Dos and Don'ts of personal interviews.

What is it all about?

Let us first of all understand the PI process and what is expected of you in this stage of testing. You are made to face a panel, usually made up of 2-7 members who could either be faculty members of the institute concerned, alumni of the institute with considerable industry experience and sometimes even psychologists with a formal background in interviewing. In an interview you are asked a wide variety of questions. And the main types of questions in an interview could include

Personal Questions — These could be about facts or could probe your background, future plans and career goals, values, attitudes, beliefs, etc. These questions are meant to get a better understanding of the candidate.

Academic Questions — Typically, these questions are based on your academic background and are usually from what you are expected to have learnt in your education till date. Questions are normally not from unrelated areas. For instance, an engineering student could be asked questions pertaining to his specialisation or from basic sciences or mathematics. Remember that the panelists at the top B-Schools in India expect you to be strong in your academic fundamentals, irrespective of whether your background is relevant to management studies (for e.g., accounting) or not so relevant to management studies (for e.g., electronics engineering) In a sense, the panels use your academic strength as an indicator of the sincerity you exhibited as a student.

Questions on Work Experience (if any) — The questions would often relate to knowledge of ones own area of work, the organisation one works for, the industry one works for and its linkages. The panel's objective is usually to understand the ability of the candidate to develop a perspective of business and operations in the course of a reasonably long work experience. Candidates with work experience are usually expected to demonstrate better understanding of business requirements as well as a well thought out career objectives which includes a need for an MBA from a premier institute.

Puzzles or problems — These are sometimes used as an additional tool to observe the approach used by the candidate in resolving complex situations in the face of inadequate or unclear information.

In all these questions, one would do well to remember that there are no `correct' answers to most questions; what matters is the approach taken by the candidate in answering a question. The PI stage is when representatives from your dream college get to meet you in person and is trying to understand what kind of a person you are. They are probably trying to see beyond your CAT score and facts filled by you in the application form.

Interviews are usually conducted for each candidate separately while some institutes like the S P Jain Institute of Management Research (Mumbai) are known to conduct `Group Interviews' in which a panel faces a group of candidates and poses questions to them one at a time. Some institutes also conduct what is termed as a `Stress Interview' wherein a candidate is put under high levels of stress and a candidate's reaction to this stress is observed. In general, most interviews have an element of stress in them and it is the degree of stress that may vary between a normal interview and a stress interview.

How to prepare for an interview?

Be ready with everything you want to talk about yourself - your background, strengths, weaknesses, achievements etc. Have two or three incidents to substantiate your claims

Identify few subjects from your academic background, typically from the first two years of your graduation area, and revise thoroughly questions that could come from these subjects.

If you have work-experience, know everything about your project, company and industry.

Be very clear on your future goals and ways in which a management education fits into your ambitions and dreams. This is by far the most important question you might get to face.

Plan for questions that could arise from the answers you give and learn to defend your answers.

Last but not the least, remember the dress code - smart, neat and formal clothes. Your walking and sitting posture, body language and the language you use in the interview will all be a part of the image the panelists would be seeing while they evaluate you.

At all points in the interview, do not forget that they are looking for intelligent candidates with a consistent track-record throughout their academic and professional life, with a good awareness of the world around them, who are capable of applying the knowledge they have to practical situations, who have an ability to communicate clearly and effectively and who are capable of excelling in their chosen field. This entire interview process is a SELLING exercise! So it helps to understand what they are looking for, understand where your strengths are and put it forward in the best possible manner.

For all of you who have been with us in this series, the entire team from T.I.M.E. wishes you luck during this season and we hope many of you successfully get admissions from top B-Schools. All the very best and have a great 2007 ahead!

The writer, an alumnus of IIM Ahmedabad, is the director of T.I.M.E. Chennai centre - a training institute that helps students face competitive examinations such as CAT and GRE. She can be contacted at chennai@time4education.com.

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