Sunday, September 21, 2008

from Under-prepared to Over-prepared...

Since last Sunday, I had altogether 12 interviews with 9 organizations (focusing on Marketing or Strategy function) and it was only the first week of our On Campus Recruiting. Before that, I actually had an informal interview with an Executive Board Member of a leading industrial company based in Switzerland. It was not only informal, but also unusual. The setting was an bench at the meadow where we had outdoor lunch buffet at IMD, the weather was sunny, and the timing was after lunch. The interview was centered around my motivation & interest, or rather how have I aligned both, one of the trickiest question and the dynamics was not leading to enough "chemistry".

After the interview, I immediately contacted my career coach, an alumna graduated 10 years ago and now a seasoned Executive Coach (of course, she's assigned by our fabulous Career Service Team). She quickly responded and arranged a debriefing session with me, analyzing the interactions of the interview, giving feedback, pushing for preparations, and of course, I was under-prepared. My coach extended the session for an additional 30 mins to help me practice. I was really grateful for that and felt ready for the coming interviews.

Some companies already notified us about the results of 1st round interviews, both good & bad news. One of the rejection letter I received saying that I was a bit "over-prepared", in context of the particular company / headquarter country culture.

The lesson learned, preparation is always necessary & good, but execution has to be adapted according to the context. Look forward to the week II interviews!

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