Interview Questions From Intern Employers

The Interview Questions Asked by Top Internship Companies

Here you are. Shoes shined. Pants pressed. Smile sheened. This is the big moment. Sure, it was a big deal to be accepted into business school. But this interview is for a summer internship. And you know what’s at stake. Getting into the right company is the hard part.

Once you’re hired, you just need to be yourself and perform…no different than what you did before business school. At your internship, you network with the right people, ask good questions, show passion, and produce some results and you’re in. It’s no secret: companies prefer to hire from their intern pool. They’re proven commodities. An internship is just a two month job interview. Land an offer in August and you’re set for second year.

Before that, you need to answer a few questions. And they may not be what you prepared for. Chances are, you read an employer’s press clippings and career section on the web. You’ve probably networked with some employees. If you’re really ambitious, you may have run through a mock interview with career services. Thanks to your business school application, you can rattle off several stories and quantifiable accomplishments. But an internship interview covers far more than ‘what have you done’ and ‘what do you bring.’ They also test how you’d approach problems and why you’d make certain decisions. In other words, they simulate real world situations. And what’s a best practice in one culture is a faux pas in another.

So what types of questions can you expect? As part of its annual internship survey, Vault compiled a list of 101 interview questions from students who interviewed for internships. Alas, questions can vary by industry, culture, interviewer, or role. But if you’re wondering what types of questions to expect beyond the usual fare, check out this sampling below.

If you had to describe yourself as a brand, which brand would you choose and why?

Talk about your leadership style in the past and how you lead now.

What quality do you most like to see in a team member?

If you had a problem with a coworker, how would you solve it?

Describe a time where you had to correct someone’s actions by showing them howto do a task in a better way.

Walk me through how a client meeting should go.

Tell me about a time when everyone on the team was against your opinion as a leader and how you handled it.

Tell me about a time you failed, what you learned from it, and how you would act differently if you encountered something similar again.

Talk about a time when you went against policy to do what you felt was morally right. 

Talk about a time you had to settle a dispute between two people.

What would you do if a PowerPoint presentation you or your team was giving included a mistake, but you didn’t know until the last minute?

Tell me about a time you had to break a promise. What was the situation and how did you handle it?

If you found yourself sitting at a desk, bored, what would you do?

What gets you up in the mornings?

Where do you think our industry is going? What are the general trends within it?

What is the biggest problem our firm is facing?

When were you most creative?

Please describe your perfect work environment.

Describe a past experience where you met a whole new group of people and how you bonded with them.

Tell me a joke.

If you could choose just one, what would your superpower be?

To read the full list, click on the Vault link below.

DON’T MISS: MBA INTERNSHIP ADVICE FROM THE EXPERTS

Source: Vault

Thriving in Virtual and Activity-Based Interviews

You probably picture an adcom interview as two people, face-to-face, on opposite sides of the desk. In this environment, you can read their body language, make eye contact, and command their full attention. But what if a school tweaks this tried-and-true formula? What if you could only speak to someone through a camera? And what if your interview was actually a group activity with other prospective applicants?

Those are two strategies being employed in place of telephone or in-person interviews. One is the virtual interview, where you spend 30-40 minutes talking to an adcom through a camera. Another is the team-based discussion (TBD) – a hallmark of Wharton and Ross – where applicants collaborate virtually to prepare a timed solution and presentation. So why aren’t schools leaving well enough alone?

Let’s start with the virtual interview. In a column for Clear Admit, Shelly Heinrich, Director of MBA Admissions at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, contends that a virtual interview can reduce costs and risk for students. For example, between travel, lodging, and meals, a trip from Chicago to Washington D.C. could cost $2,000 or more, a hefty sum for an interview and a campus tour. What’s more, weather can wreak havoc on travel plans. In a virtual interview, the adcom and candidate can still closely interact. To make that time productive, candidates should be prepared and aware of their surroundings.

And nothing conveys who candidates are more than what’s behind them, Heinrich argues. To send the right message, she urges applicants to keep objects to a minimum. “Create a clean, professional backdrop,” she contends. “You want the interviewer to focus on you without any distractions, including background noises.”

Clothing also delivers a strong message in Heinrich’s experience. “…You should dress for a virtual interview in the same way you would for an in-person interview. Proper interview attire includes a jacket and tie for men and a suit or professional dress for women. Dressing the part will psychologically prepare you for this important component of the application process.” She also encourages applicants to dry clean and press their clothes. “Believe it or not, you can see wrinkles through the web camera.”

What’s another virtual faux pas that can torpedo a candidacy? How about wasting time mastering the technology during the interview? You can check every box in the interview checklist, but wasting time at the outset fiddling with headphones, microphones, and speakers reflects sloppiness at best and disrespectfulness at worst. “I have had countless people tell me in the first few minutes of interviews that it was the first time they had used this virtual technology,” Heinrich sighs, “only to have interviewees then waste valuable time that would have been better spent in conversation.” Camera angles and internet connections are other potential hazards according to Heinrich.

Finally, Heinrich notes that body language is just as critical to the virtual interview as the in-person one. “…Look and speak to the web camera, not the screen and interviewer, so that it appears as if you are making eye contact.” She also discourages movements like rocking, bouncing or heavy gestures. Most important: Avoid following a script. “Interviewers can tell when you are reading and referring to notes—it is distracting.”

The real wild card, however, is the team interview. Here, applicants must work together to solve a problem before a short one-on-one with an adcom. Here is how Accepted ‘s Cindy Tokumitsu describes the virtual team process applied at Ross:

In a group of 4-6 members, “the team is given 2 words, and they first prepare individual presentations connecting these words (10 minutes for this portion). Then the group receives additional random words, and they have 20 minutes to prepare a team presentation that uses the words to address a problem and articulate a solution. The individuals in the team, not the team as a whole, are evaluated either by second-year students or adcom members, who also interview them separately afterward.”

In other words, applicants are assessed on “how” they accomplish a task, as much as “what” they achieve. To Tokumitsu, the benefit is that applicants can more easily “showcase [their] interpersonal, team, and leadership skills” in an activity. The drawback? Well, sometimes people can bring out the worst in others. What’s more, Tokumitsu argues that it takes time to grow into a team-based dynamic with new people.

The key to success, in Tokumitsu’s experience, is self-awareness. “Think about your inclinations, behaviors, feelings, and approaches when working in a team or group setting,” she writes. “And also ask a colleague or two for some objective feedback. You shouldn’t change your natural approach, but you can certainly play to your strengths and minimize negative tendencies.”

As part of that, Tokumitsu also advises applicants to sublimate their egos during the exercise. “Make your goal the team’s success and ability to complete the assigned task, not its adoption of your idea.”

DON’T MISS: HOW NOT TO BLOW YOUR HARVARD ADMISSIONS INTERVIEW

Sources: Accepted, Clear Admit

Why the Internet Won’t Kill B-School Classrooms

“The end is near. Repent!”

“What, me worry?”

Those are the distinct reactions among business schools to MOOCs (Massive Open Online Courses). For some, MOOCs are another tool that can enrich the learning experience. For others, they are academia’s reckoning, a disruptive force destined to level the conceit and complacency of privileged academics.

This month, each side made its case in the pages of Fortune and The Financial Times. On one side, Glenn Hubbard, Dean of Columbia Business School, compared the advent of MOOCs to music videos moving into the radio space. Thirty years later, MTV has been replaced by YouTube and Apple, with 90 percent of American still listening to the radio. In other words, music became more popular, though its delivery grew more segmented – and Hubbard expects a similar dynamic in business education.

On the other side, you’ll find Wharton professor Christian Terwiesch and Karl Ulrich. They compare the relationship between MOOCs and business schools to Amazon and book stores – with the former disrupting the market and putting many established players out of business. And that’s one scenario that they envision for the coming years with MOOCs.

Hubbard can appreciate why doomsayers are pointing to MOOCs as one of the four horsemen of the educational apocalypse (Coupled with increasing costs, expectations, and disconnect with employers). MOOCs are easy to access, requiring just an internet connection. In their efforts to entice a wider swath of students with MOOCs, educational institutions are potentially cannibalizing their existing offerings.

However, Hubbard points to a disruptive force from nearly a hundred years ago – textbooks – to bolster his point. While prospective students could absorb a majority of course content by reading the book, they still spend tens-of-thousands of dollars to attend class. Sure, the ultimate reward – a degree – doesn’t hurt schools’ pitch. But why didn’t yesteryear’s students just read the book?

Hubbard has an answer: the classroom environment itself. “Clearly, being physically in a classroom, interacting with a professor and other students, is an irreplaceable component of effective learning,” Hubbard writes. “Professors can better assess a student’s learning in person, and adapt their in-class strategies based on immediate, non-verbal feedback. They can also create a comfortable but challenging environment where students will make the leaps that lead to intellectual breakthroughs.”

MOOCs are also a healthy disruption, in Hubbard’s view, by providing the technology (and a kick in the pants) for professors to freshen up their approach to teaching. Hubbard lists the flipped classroom as an example. “Until recently, classroom time could be used to provide a lecture meant to elucidate the readings students would have done beforehand. With the ability to upload that same lecture to the Internet for pre-class viewing, the question of how to use classroom time is forcing faculty members to engage in a deep examination of pedagogy. The trend is toward allowing the classroom to be a space for collaboration.”

In short, MOOCs will ultimately serve as a differentiator, with schools relying more heavily on teaching quality (bye, bye TAs), student body quality, and one-on-one interaction with instructors to draw students.

Terwiesch and Ulrich aren’t so optimistic. Their argument is grounded in the high cost of an elite b-school education. “A top full-time two-year MBA programme costs about $120,000…With overheads, a professor costs his or her business school about $300,000 per year. If we allocate half of their time to teaching and assume a typical teaching load of three courses per year, instruction alone costs about $50,000 per course, or $1,250 for each of, say, 40 students enrolled.” The duo also cited the high cost of research, including a Wharton study showing a published scholarly article can cost a school up to $400,000.

Now, compare that to MOOCs. “In our role as Wharton school professors,” they write, “we have each created among the first business school Moocs, which have enrolled hundreds of thousands of students. At this scale, Wharton spends just pennies to register a new student in a Mooc and a few dollars for every student who successfully completes all the required work for the course.”

To quote the immortal Joey Lawrence: “Whoa!”

Alas, this duo fails to recognize the obvious: MOOCs are riding the coattails of a successful enterprise. Diminish their source’s funding and they’ll quickly dissipate, no different than a parasite deteriorates after its host passes. That’s particularly true of school-sponsored MOOCs, which often rely on the brand to attract students.

Like Hubbard, Terwiesch and Ulrich view MOOC technology as a potential boon “by boosting student learning and leveraging faculty and other expensive assets.” However, they also believe the video content – which they call “SuperText” – could replace many classroom instructors someday.

As a result, they anticipate MOOCs driving business education into three potential scenarios. First, the future plays out as Hubbard projects, with MOOCs simply delivering content and freeing up class time for dialogue and remediation. Second, MOOCs will drive local and lesser performers out of the business education market. Finally, the business school model could collapse, as “SuperText eliminates the need for students to be in the same location at the same time, it enables students to learn on demand where and when they wish.”

Who’s right? Personally, I’d side with Hubbard. Chances are, some incubator is already formulating a new model or technology that’ll make MOOCs look like Atari in five years. And the same debate will rage on. 

DON’T MISS: THE MOOC REVOLUTION: HOW TO EARN AN ELITE MBA FOR FREE

Sources: Fortune, Financial Times

How Part-Time Students Can Find Networking Opportunities

Let me get this straight…You expect me to work-full time, take classes, raise a family, be good citizen – and then network on top of all that?

Yeah, that’s pretty much the expectation for part-time, online, and even executive MBA students. You see, a network is like insurance. You hem and haw about paying the premium…until you lose your job or need expertise. Then, it is the best investment you’ll ever make.

Unlike insurance, networking requires time. And that’s a luxury for these students. So how can they build a network on the sly?

That was the topic of a new U.S. News and World Report column. Ask any master networker and he or she will tell you that networking requires discipline, consistency and grit. For example, Penni Hurst, a mother of three who’s enrolled in the executive MBA student in the Coles College of Business at Kennesaw State University, holds 7:00 a.m. networking meetings at Starbucks before heading work. For her, networking is part of a consistent routine, no different than eating or exercising.

Of course, the advent of Linkedin has made networking seem like a social enterprise, where you can connect with people from a distance and occasionally exchange emails at your convenience. But fostering deep and personal relationships take time – and a face-to-face connection. And social media, in the end, is just a conversation starter.

That’s why campus professional organizations – and extracurricular activities – are a must. For example, the Belk College of Business’ Graduate Business Association recently partnered with Habitat for Humanity to build a house, an excellent opportunity for students to get coveted face time. Another strategy? Work the registration table at group events. “You’ll meet everybody that’s coming in there,” says Dirk Duran Smith, the assistant director of MBA career management at the Coles College of Business. And that doesn’t include national networking events, such as the annual National Black MBA Conference.

Faculty is another overlooked resource who can connect part-time students to potential mentors and employers, says Corinne Snell, the assistant dean of student professional development at Temple University’s Fox School of Business and Management. Most important, networking can happen anywhere, Smith observes. “Networking can be in the store, standing in line, waiting to pay for something. You never know who people are and what they bring to the table.”

DON’T MISS: THE BEST B-SCHOOL ALUMNI NETWORKS

Source: U.S. News and World Report

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Blast from the Past

Many times, people tie schools to a particular industry. If you attend Wharton or Booth, you’re probably a finance person. Kellogg? Say hello to the next crop of brand managers. Columbia and NYU…well, the big banks are just a cab ride away.
No doubt, reputation (and location) makes a difference. In business schools, stereotypes are the natural by-product of excellence. Make no mistake: If you’re talented and serious, recruiters will find you…even out in Gainesville, Madison, and Provo. That said, it’s still easier to get noticed in Cambridge, Palo Alto, and Durham.

Data doesn’t lie, even if it doesn’t always reveal context and variables. Last winter, Poets & Quants did some data crunching of our own. After combing through Linkedin, we produced a listing of where MBAs from the Top 25 schools work in the leading consulting and financial services firms.  In which bank does Texas McCombs outpoint Wharton? And which top consulting firm prefers Indiana Kelley over Harvard? Click on the links below to learn more.

Sources: Poets & Quants (Finance), Poets & Quants (Consulting)

Video of the Week

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One Liners

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How the Irish MBA market is set to expand

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Court Denies Woman Denied Additional Alimony Because She’s an MBA

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Peter Thiel is Wrong About MBAs

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An Interview with an Ernst & Young’s Recruiting Head

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Feedback from McKinsey and Accenture Recruiters

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The Best Doctor of Business Programs

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MBA Humor

How many executives does it take to change a light bulb?
*  A roomful – they have to hold a meeting to discuss all the ramifications of the change.
*  None, they like to keep employees in the dark.
*  “This topic was resumed from last week’s discussion, but is incomplete pending resolution of some action items. It will be continued next week. Meanwhile…”
*  “We’ve formed a task-force to study the problem of why light bulbs burn out, and to figure out what, exactly, we as supervisors can do to make the bulbs work smarter, not harder.”
* How many managers does it take to change a light bulb?
* “I want a detailed memo about this issue till tomorrow’s morning.”
* “You were supposed to have changed that light bulb last week!”
* “We haven’t got a policy on that”.
* “I am on my way to a very important meeting, so we’ll discuss it some other time.”
* Three. Two to find out if it needs changing, and one to tell an employee to change it.

Source: Work Joke

Tweet of the Week

Zach Wolfrey ‏@ZachWolfrey
If my grade in stats isn’t good enough to get into the business school I will switch my major. I’m never taking this class again