application « My ESADE MBA

Posts Tagged ‘application’

My ESADE MBA Admission Interview

January 18, 2010

Many people have contacted me regarding the Admissions process and my interview. Therefore I decided that it would be easier to just post the information to everybody.

My interview was conducted during the Open Day on the ESADE Campus on January 31st, 2009. After a general roundtable discussion with Mary Granger and around 5-6 other candidates I was fetched by my interviewer Xenia Jarque shortly after.

At first I had to work on a case study about Starbucks. The founder was made CEO again and was coming to Europe. I had to recommend him what to do with Starbucks in Europe to improve the operations and increase the turnover. I had to draw a Powerpoint Presentation on a piece of paper on what I would recommend him.

The case study was followed by the interview about my resume and in particular my application essays. We had a discussion about post-MBA plans, asperations, motivations, etc. Then we discussed some scenarios and I was asked how I would react:

What will I bring to ESADE?
How I would behave in a team when they are cultural differences among two team members?
If my team member is not working to his potential, what would I do?
What would I do if I observed another guest at a conference taking my bag and walking away with it?
Which all other institutes I have applied for and why?

Considering that my interview was almost a year ago the questions might not be the exact questions but that is what I remember. Your questions would most likely be similar but probably not the same and therefore should only serve as a guideline. I hope that this helps you a little in your preparation and best of luck with your applications.

Tags:application, case study, ESADE, interview, mary granger, post-mba, questions
Posted in Admissions, ESADE | Leave a Comment »

ESADE’s IT Improvement Projects

December 28, 2009

With the ever-growing needs for a better IT infrastructure, ESADE figured it is time to use the Christmas holidays to work on the IT. This is great news as it seems that our IT improvement roundtable in November is bearing fruits.

In the month of November the staff members who are related to the IT as well as 8 students (4 with IT background and 4 without) sat together and held an IT improvement workshop. We raised all the pressing issues, prioritised them and started working on them.

Throughout the month of December on of the most pressing issues of wifi signal strength have already been attacked and new, stronger wifi routers have been set-up all over the campus. Hopefully this will have effect as of next January, as there was no noticeable improvement as of December 16th, the last time I was on campus.

In addition the printing services have been upgraded. Now the student ID, which can be topped-up with money, replaces the printing cards and simultaneously makes the log-in process to the print jobs more efficient. (Insider information: soon there will be a major push for using the student ID for paying in the canteens instead of using cash. That makes the serving a lot faster and therefore everbody should have the caffein level boosted much faster in the morning. There will also be top-up facilities outside the canteens, as I have heard from reliable sources ;)

The internal social network NEXUS has been launched in the recent days, which also indicates new ways of communication and networking among the students, professors and alumni. This is a great move and hopefully the communication becomes easier and does not need to be hosted on external networking services such as LinkedIn and Facebook. Tip: Nexus could also become a better meeting place for ESADE candidates, newly-recruits and applicants with current students.

Apparently there is major work being undertaken on the Intranet, as the new Intranet “Moodle” is undergoing maintenance as I write. Hopefully the ergonomy of the Intranet improves and the Moodle replaces the old Intranet in total.

As I am part of the think-tank I can assure you that there are many more issues being improved on and that ESADE is working hard on making student life easier from an IT point.

Insider information: there is a good chance that the ESADE application process will improve and that soon there will be an online submission facility of the recommendation letters. This would make the applications a lot easier. It seems that the ESADE is one of the last MBA schools that still has the paper-based only system but that hopefully should change in the coming months.

Tags:admission, alumni, applicants, application, ESADE, improvement, infrastructure, IT, moodle, nexus, printing, Social Networking
Posted in Admissions, ESADE, Event, Facilities, MBA Preparation, news, Social Activities | Leave a Comment »

Potential Park – Top Employer Web Benchmark 2010

October 27, 2009

As we are currntly in the midst of the ESADE Career Week and the recruitment process we are very well aware of the quality and usability of online recruitment platforms and procedures.

Through my own experience however I have been stunned by some of the career and application pages of the corporate websites. Sometimes I wonder how oblivious some MNC are to modern day recruitment processes and what image the company website can project on the company itself. My Friend Andreu A. works for Potential Park, a consultancy specialised on the optimisation of corporate recruitment websites. A lot of the ideal optimisation standards were identified through applicant feedback and surveys and therefore I would like to ask for your support as we are all experts on that now. Hereto below you find their survey explanation and links. Hopefully soon the application procedures on corporate websites will improve!!!

Source: PotentialPark

To search for a career can be time-consuming and frustrating. We want to change that, and therefore we ask for your opinion.

Help us to shape the recruitment of tomorrow. Tell us how companies can improve their career websites, application tools, events and offers. At the same time, gain state of the art insights that might be useful for your own career.

About this survey:

We will share the results with you, if you like.
The results will be published in media.
It’s anonymous, independent and not sponsored by any company or organization.
Takes approximately 15 minutes.
You can win one out of 7 fun high tech prizes: a PlayStation 3 Slim, a Sony Ebook Reader or an iPod Touch
Or you can win one out of 20 vouchers for Amazon or iTunes.
A jury will pick the winners out of the best free text answers (remember this during the survey…).

Click here for the survey.

Tags:application, career week, HR, jobs, potential park, process, recruitment
Posted in Careers | 2 Comments »

MBA Career Portals

October 16, 2009

As we are all currently in the midst of job applications I thought I might be useful to post a list of career websites that are targeted at MBA students all around the world. Most of these websites have relationships to ESADE and therefore there are ESADE specific entry codes, which you can find on the ESADE Careerportal with more detailed information. Have a look at the websites and see whether there is anything of interest to you and when you need anything further consult your the Careerportal. The credits for this list go to the Career Services. Enjoy!

Network MBA UK

Global Workplace

MBA-Direct

Vault MBA offers (mainly USA)

1) Top 100 MBA Recruiters GLOBAL (2009)
2) Top 100 Global IT (2008)
3) Top 100 Biotech-pharma companies in UK
4) Top 100 Maritime Shipping, Brokerage and Finance Companies ( 2006)
5) Top 100 Management Consulting Companies (2006)
6) Top 100 Companies in ASIA (2009)
7) Global FTSE 100 Companies – GLOBAL (2004)
8) FTSE Euro 100 – Europe (2006)
9) FTSE 100 Companies – UK (2004)
MBA Opportunities in USA companies (November 2007)
TOP MBA Recuiters 2004
Top BW 50 performers 2005 recruiting MBA