Waiting on Round 2 Decisions? Train for INTERVIEWS Now

By EMPOWERgmat on January 25, 2022

It's 11:40 at night. You've refreshed your inbox nine times since dinner. You've checked the forum where strangers post their Round 2 updates. You've reread your own essays and found two lines you'd change. None of that has moved your application one inch.

Here's my verdict: waiting is NOT a plan. The one part of your application you can still change is the interview, and most people don't start training for it until the invite shows up. THAT is a terrible idea. The good news is that it's fixable, and you can start tonight.

An interview is a test, and you already know how to train for a test

You spent months getting ready for the GMAT. You learned that it's predictable. The same question types show up again and again, so you can train for every one of them. An MBA interview works the same way. The exact wording changes, but the questions come from a short list you could write down right now:

Walk me through your resume.
Why an MBA, and why now?
Why this school?
Tell me about a time you led a team.
Tell me about a time you failed.
What will you do after you graduate?

Stop reading and look at that list. I'll bet you could answer every one of those in your head right now. I'll also bet that if you said the answers out loud, with a timer running, at least half of them would ramble, repeat themselves, or end with "so, yeah." Knowing your answer and DELIVERING your answer are two different skills. Only one of them gets trained by staring at an inbox.

One person slumped in the dark staring at a glowing laptop, next to a second person standing in a lit room practicing out loud to an empty chair. — Same week, same wait. Only one of them is getting better.

Every good interview story is an argument

Here's where your GMAT training pays off a second time. On the Verbal section, Critical Reasoning questions (CR for short) hand you a short argument and ask you to pick it apart. An argument has a conclusion (the point), premises (the facts that back it up), and an assumption (a gap the author never says out loud but needs to be true). Find the gap and you've found the answer.

Every story you tell in an interview is an argument too. Your conclusion is "admit me." Your premises are the things you did. A sharp interviewer is hunting for the gap, exactly the way you hunt for it on a CR question. Try this one the way you would on Test Day: notes on paper, not in your head.

Try it

A candidate for a team lead job says: "I should lead the new product team. In my last job, the product team I worked on grew its sales faster than any other team in the company."

The candidate's argument depends on which of the following assumptions?

The new product team will sell the same kinds of products as the candidate's last team.
The candidate's own work was a major reason the last team's sales grew so fast.
No other candidate for the job has ever worked on a product team.
Sales growth is the only fair way to measure how well a team is doing.
The candidate's last company was larger than the company that is hiring now.

Show the answer

Step 1: Take notes. On your pad, write two lines. C: I should lead the new team. P: my old team's sales grew fastest. Now look at the jump. The premise is about the TEAM. The conclusion is about ME. That shift from "team" to "me" is where the gap lives.

Step 2: Test the answers with the negation test. An assumption is something the argument NEEDS. So flip each answer into its opposite. If the flipped version wrecks the argument, you've found the assumption.

(B) flipped: "The candidate's work was NOT a major reason sales grew." The argument collapses. If someone else drove that growth, the fast sales tell us nothing about this candidate. That's our answer, but check the rest so you're sure.

(A) flipped: the new team sells different products. That hurts a little, but a strong leader could still lead a team selling something new. The argument survives.

(C) flipped: some other candidate has worked on a product team. So what? The argument never claimed to be the only one with that background.

(D) flipped: sales growth is not the only fair measure. The argument still stands. Fast sales can be good evidence without being the ONLY evidence.

(E) is about company size, which the argument never touches.

The trap: D. It sounds smart, and it feels like a weak spot. But the word "only" makes it far stronger than the argument needs. Negate it and the argument keeps breathing. Answer: B.

Now look at that candidate again. That's YOU, in an interview, saying "we grew sales faster than anyone." And that's the exact gap the interviewer will poke with one question: "What did YOU do?" If your story doesn't fill gap B before they ask, you've handed them the weakest link in your own argument.

A wooden footbridge over a river with one plank missing in the middle, and a person on one side holding the missing plank. — Your story has a gap. You're the one holding the plank.

6 mistakes I watch people make while they wait

Waiting for the invite to start. The invite comes with a date attached, and suddenly you're trying to build, polish and rehearse everything in a few days. That's cramming, and you already know how cramming went for the GMAT.
INSTEAD: Build a story bank now. Six to eight stories from work, school or your life, each one strong enough to answer more than one question on that list. A good failure story can also be a good teamwork story.
Memorizing a script word for word. You'll sound like you're reading off a card, and the first oddly worded question will knock you off your track.
INSTEAD: Memorize the notes, not the sentences. Three short lines per story: what was happening, what YOU did, what changed. It's the same idea as breaking a Quant question into pieces on your pad. You carry the pieces; the sentences come fresh each time.
Telling "we" stories. You just saw why in the CR question. "We" is a gap.
INSTEAD: In every story, name the thing YOU did with a plain verb. "I called the client." "I rebuilt the schedule." "I told my boss the plan was wrong." Credit your team, then show your part.
Practicing in your head. This is the same pride that makes people skip notes on the GMAT. "I know what I'd say" is not the same as saying it well.
INSTEAD: Say it out loud, with a timer, and record it on your phone. Then listen back. Yes, it's painful to hear yourself. Do it anyway. Pain now is cheaper than pain in the room.
Obsessing over the weird questions. People spend hours on "what if they ask me something strange?" and then fumble "walk me through your resume." It's the GMAT all over again: the points you lose are on the gettable questions, not the monsters.
INSTEAD: Nail the basics first. Your resume walk, why an MBA, why this school. These are the ones you can count on hearing in some form, so they get the most reps.
Cramming five mock interviews the night before. A mock interview is a measuring device, just like a practice test. It shows you where you stand. It doesn't make you better by itself.
INSTEAD: One mock a week with someone who will be honest with you. In between, train the specific weak spots that mock exposed. Then measure again.

What about the GMAT?

Some of you are also wondering whether to retake the GMAT, for a Round 3 school or a shot at more scholarship money. That's a real choice, so make it on purpose. What do you want MORE right now: a few extra points on a score schools already have, or a sharp interview at a school that's already reading your file? If an invite could land any week, the interview wins your evenings.

If you do decide to retake, know the test you're walking into. Verbal is 36 questions in 65 minutes, Quant is 31 questions in 62 minutes, and the whole exam runs about 3 hours 7 minutes plus two optional 8 minute breaks, as laid out on GMAC's exam format page. If Verbal is what's holding you back, read why your trouble there is really a probability problem. If you run out of time, start by defining your pacing problem before you touch the clock. And if Reading Comp drags, work on reading at the right pace. For how a new score gets to schools, GMAC explains it on its scores page.

Just don't let a retake become a hiding place from the harder, scarier work of talking about yourself.

Your move, tonight

Before you refresh anything, grab a pad. Write five stories, three lines each: what was happening, what YOU did, what changed. Then stand up, start a timer and tell each one out loud. Every time you hear yourself say "we" without saying what you did, put a circle next to that story. Tomorrow, fix the circles. The inbox will still be there.