IMD has one of the best designed and most rigorous MBA interview exercises in the world. IMD MBA Admissions Committee carefully reviews every application before inviting candidates for Assessment day. The Assessment day typically starts at 8 a.m. and finishes around 5 p.m. This includes different activities depending on the location of your Assessment Day.
IMD Assessment day is divided into the following phases:
- One to one Interview (45 mins) It starts with a personal interview with the Admissions Committee Member. It is a normal pleasant discussion and more like a conversation than a very formal interview. The interview questions mostly revolve around career progression so far, how particular skills have changed you over time, why MBA, most significant achievements/challenges in that particular project, strengths and weaknesses, some questions about past company, what do you do in your free time, what does your boss has to say about you, how do you plan to finance your MBA etc.
- Individual Assignment (no prior preparation needed) For the individual assignment, you will be required to prepare a short presentation on a given topic, giving you the opportunity to demonstrate, amongst other things, your communication and presentation skills.
- Team Impromptu Presentation (no prior preparation needed) – Shortlisted candidates must go through several case study frameworks and sample cases courtesy the material provided by the alumni help or previous year’s cases. You will be provided with A4 sheets, markers, pens, rough notes etc to put together a presentation in 35 minutes. So unless you have a fantastic memory, chances are that you may not remember what you decided to present when you have to do it later in the day 🙁
A tip from an Alumni: make your notes in rough sheets provided at the beginning of the day and not on the case pages as I did, so that you can use them for revision later).
- Group Discussion– Post the impromptu presentation, candidates gather together in one place like a conference room for the group case study discussion. Candidates are then divided into teams and asked to work on questions. The ad-com members are always present, and they observe the potential of each candidate to work in a group as that’s a very important aspect of IMD life. The case discussion lasts for about an hour. The entire discussion will give an extremely enriching and stimulating experience and give a very good peek into what you could look forward to at IMD.
All material needed as well as your exact schedule will be provided to you on the day.
Experience 1 –
I am Vamshi Lingampalli, availed General Education’s application and interview service for IMD. I would like to share my IMD assessment day interview experience with you all.
The day starts with…
IMD has a unique assessment process. They also invite the prospective applicants along with the current year students. A group of generally 7-8 prospective applicants come together and they selects the candidates from diverse background. They use the holistic approach while selecting the candidate rather than just going through their profile in a professional way. A group of prospective applicants with different background and profile attends the interview e.g. from marketing, advertising, doctors, lawyers from different countries and a group of good quality students as well.
You will be given a schedule for the assessment day and the interview starts with one on one person with the admission officers. Generally admission officers ask you questions related to your profile, that you have written about yourself in your essays. Through this interview they just try to understand you as a person if you can fit in the class. And they try to understand how and what you can contribute to the class.
The class size of IMD is 90 students and the duration of course is 10-11 months. Through interview IMD tests the emotional intelligence of the candidate and not just the IQ. This is quite distinct feature of IMD.
Then comes the presentation. Before calling the candidate for the Interview they send the case study, which you can prepare and presented with your team, the first expects and the second expects is just impromptus to presentations,
IMD access three important things:
- Your thoughts process, how you process information in 30mins, and come across with reasonable recommendation, backup with assumptions or facts that case study provides.
- Assimilating the information that you get, how do you process that.
- How effectively you communicate your point of view to a group people in a room and how do you present yourself. The Case study is very short case study not more than 3 or 4 paragraphs
Group Presentation:
So, here the case study is already sent to the candidates. Candidate has to read it and figure it out and get as much facts as possible before going for assessment day. IMD splits the interviewee’s into 2 groups, and in each room there is always a committee members sitting in the room. They try to asses you as the team member. So initially the first one is all about you and how you approach, how do you present a particular problem and how do you handle the situation. The second is how do you behave in a team, how do you collaborate with the team, how do you response to certain views & opinions that others provide you. If you disagree, how you approach that disagreement, how you can present your team. It’s a team role and how do you perform in a team.
And, IMD also look for leadership qualities here. As we know, not everyone is a born leader, but there is nothing bad or good about it. And the key thing is how one approach conflux, also they try to see people who are just very loud and don’t listen to anyone else, and they think that their point of view is always right but also there are some people who are just very mild and don’t say anything. IMD looks for the balanced candidates, and looks who is the right fit for school.
At the end, I would like to say that just be yourself.