If you’ve got an MBA interview invitation for Stanford GSB, you’re in the top 10-15% of applicants. Congratulations!
However, your chances of admission are still under 50%, so you’ll need khổng lồ give a great interview.
To help you, we’ve put together this complete guide lớn the Stanford GSB interview: how it works, typical questions & how khổng lồ answer them, and how to prepare.
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Here’s our first tip: use a repeatable answer framework to lớn prepare for the bulk of the interview.
What we’ll cover:
Ready? Let’s get started.
1. Interview process
Before we dive into the types of questions you’ll face and how to lớn answer them, let’s see an overview of how the interview process works at Stanford GSB.
1.1 Interview rate
Between 10-15% of Stanford MBA applicants are invited to interview, according to lớn Kirsten Moss, assistant dean of MBA admissions at Stanford GSB. That means that if 7.5K people apply (as they did in 2021), they’ll interview around 1,000 candidates.
Given that the class of 2023 has 426 students, that adds up to lớn a little over two candidates interviewed for every available spot.
1.2 Invitations
As outlined on the Stanford GSB website, interviews take place during the following periods:
Round 1: early October khổng lồ late NovemberRound 2: late January lớn mid-MarchRound 3: late April khổng lồ mid-MayInvitations are sent out on a rolling basis during these times. That’s lớn say, if you applied in Round 1 you could receive your interview invitation in early October, or you could be kept waiting until mid-November.
There is always a lot of speculation on sites lượt thích Reddit as lớn whether being invited early or late in the window is indicative of your chances of admission. As far as we can gather, it isn’t. It’s just logistics.
1.3 How it works
You’ll be invited lớn interview with one of the following:
An MBA admissions officer from Stanford GSBA trained Stanford GSB alumnusAgain, who you interview with depends on logistics, not likelihood of admission. Stanford will try and match you with somebody from your country and/or your industry, so that they can have a deeper understanding of your background và the context of your achievements.
If your interviewer is an alumnus, they will have been through Stanford’s interview training program & will have a standardized set of questions lớn choose from. They will have seen your resume (you’ll have been asked to thư điện tử it khổng lồ them), but not the rest of your application.
Interviews may be in person or remote, depending on how feasible it is for Stanford khổng lồ send an interviewer to lớn your location. There are no on-campus interviews & no official interview locations, so if your interview is in person, it could be at any place that’s convenient for the both of you.
1.4 What lớn expect
You can expect the interview to last 45-60 minutes. The tone is usually friendly, but many candidates report interviewers being quite direct and diving into tricky questions without spending much time breaking the ice.
If your interviewer is an alumnus, then they’ll be doing it voluntarily, as part of a desire to participate in the Stanford GSB alumni network. This is important - we’ll explain why in section 2.
1.5 What to lớn wear
If you’ve been invited lớn an interview with Stanford GSB, you should wear “business attire.” For men this means a dark navy, black or gray suit with a button-down shirt, belt, and black or brown shoes. For women, this means a conservative skirt suit, trouser suit (pantsuit), or similar.
The exception lớn this is if you ask your interviewer beforehand about the dress code và they tell you khổng lồ come casually dressed.
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If this is the case, we recommend you dress “smart-casual.” You don’t know what your interviewer"s idea of “casual” is, & it’s not ideal lớn arrive looking lượt thích you’ve made less effort than they have.
If you need more specifics about how lớn dress in “business attire,” kiểm tra out the guide we wrote for candidates at consulting interviews (for which the same dress code applies).
Now we’ve laid out how the interview process works, let’s take a look at what questions you can expect to lớn face.
2. Questions
Your Stanford MBA interview will likely contain three types of questions.
Getting lớn know you questions Behavioral questions Your own questionsLet’s take a closer look at these question categories, và how to answer them.
2.1 Getting lớn know you questions
These may be asked at the beginning of the interview khổng lồ break the ice and to get a sense of your personality, although some interviewers may be more direct & skip straight khổng lồ the behavioral questions.
Try to lớn use these khổng lồ give the interviewer a real sense of who you are và the motivations that really drive you. Show that you have a real desire to lớn make a positive change through your work.
You should also try to convey a clear sense of progression - that you’re somebody who is going somewhere. Talk about your long-term goals and the experiences that have helped you shape them.
If you can get them lớn be inspired by your journey, or at least give them an insight into what really inspires you, they’ll be more likely to lớn mark you highly in the rest of the interview.
Let’s take a look at the most typical getting to lớn know you questions asked in Stanford MBA interviews.
1. Tell me about yourselfThe most obvious way lớn answer this would be to lớn chart a brief chronological path of your professional life, from college khổng lồ present day. However, there are more powerful ways khổng lồ answer this question.
One approach we lượt thích is khổng lồ describe yourself as a certain type of person & then back this description up with specific examples from your past.
