Resume Walk
Your resume walk allows an interviewer to become familiar with your background and allows you to highlight your successes. It is essentially a chronological journey through your relevant experience. This often leads to further discussion and interview questions.
Practice, practice, practice! A bad resume walk can end the interview for you before you even receive a behavioral question!
The interviewer will normally start the interview with an opening-type question such as:
1) Tell me about yourself.
2) Why did you decide to get your MBA?
3) I’d like for you to walk me through your resume.
These questions or any variants should prompt you to begin your resume walk.
Resume Walk Pointers
1. Write an outline for your resume walk. It should be between two and 2.5 minutes long, and should not sound rehearsed.
2. Your resume walk should be a story. Make sure to pay special attention to how you transition from one professional or personal experience to the next - each and every step in your career should seem purposeful.
3. Do not be concerned if an interviewer stops you during your resume walk to ask follow-up questions about your work experience.
4. Give the interviewer just enough detail to be interested in your experience, but let the interviewer probe for more information. Don’t give away all of your good stories in the first two minutes!
5. Identify two or three key things you learned/accomplished at each job
6. Finish with why you came back to business school and Kenan-Flagler, and why you're sitting at the table with that particular company.
7. Look for places where you can drop in points about why you fit with the company’s culture and why you would be a good fit for the position for which you are interviewing.
Example Resume Walk
I decided to attend Vanderbilt University after being awarded a Presidential Scholarship, a full scholarship based on academic performance and test scores. My professional aspirations were shaped both by my degree in economics and four semesters of internships at financial institutions in Nashville. I knew from these experiences that I wanted to pursue a job in banking upon graduation.
I was selected to participate in a leadership program at Bank of America and started with 30 other undergraduate students. As part of this program, I had one of my most significant team experiences to date. I was assigned to a branch location in Atlanta, and worked with a team of five people to improve the branch’s operations. As a part of this experience, my branch was recognized as the top performing branch in the Southeast though our doubling of the current lending customers and improving our customer service scores by 70%.
After this position, I was given the opportunity to manage a small branch in Greensboro, North Carolina. As a branch manager, I supervised 15 staff members and improved services to our more than 2,000 customers. During my time managing the Greensboro branch I began contemplating my return to school to get my MBA.
I decided to attend Kenan-Flagler after visiting the school during my interview. I met with students and faculty in the Finance Department – all of whom I found impressive and extremely helpful. Kenan-Flagler’s highly regarded finance department and a team-focused curriculum heavily influenced my decision to come here.
I became interested in finance while studying economics at Vanderbilt. Although I began my career in the commercial banking industry, I am interested in pursuing corporate finance at your company because I want to work on finance projects that will allow me to drive the strategic direction of the firm.
Practice, practice, practice! A bad resume walk can end the interview for you before you even receive a behavioral question!
The interviewer will normally start the interview with an opening-type question such as:
1) Tell me about yourself.
2) Why did you decide to get your MBA?
3) I’d like for you to walk me through your resume.
These questions or any variants should prompt you to begin your resume walk.
Resume Walk Pointers
1. Write an outline for your resume walk. It should be between two and 2.5 minutes long, and should not sound rehearsed.
2. Your resume walk should be a story. Make sure to pay special attention to how you transition from one professional or personal experience to the next - each and every step in your career should seem purposeful.
3. Do not be concerned if an interviewer stops you during your resume walk to ask follow-up questions about your work experience.
4. Give the interviewer just enough detail to be interested in your experience, but let the interviewer probe for more information. Don’t give away all of your good stories in the first two minutes!
5. Identify two or three key things you learned/accomplished at each job
- Your accomplishments should match the skills of a manager in the function for which you are interviewing (leadership, analytical skills, creativity, strategic thinking, and teamwork).
- Don’t regurgitate what’s on your resume.
- Quantify your accomplishments when possible.
6. Finish with why you came back to business school and Kenan-Flagler, and why you're sitting at the table with that particular company.
7. Look for places where you can drop in points about why you fit with the company’s culture and why you would be a good fit for the position for which you are interviewing.
Example Resume Walk
I decided to attend Vanderbilt University after being awarded a Presidential Scholarship, a full scholarship based on academic performance and test scores. My professional aspirations were shaped both by my degree in economics and four semesters of internships at financial institutions in Nashville. I knew from these experiences that I wanted to pursue a job in banking upon graduation.
I was selected to participate in a leadership program at Bank of America and started with 30 other undergraduate students. As part of this program, I had one of my most significant team experiences to date. I was assigned to a branch location in Atlanta, and worked with a team of five people to improve the branch’s operations. As a part of this experience, my branch was recognized as the top performing branch in the Southeast though our doubling of the current lending customers and improving our customer service scores by 70%.
After this position, I was given the opportunity to manage a small branch in Greensboro, North Carolina. As a branch manager, I supervised 15 staff members and improved services to our more than 2,000 customers. During my time managing the Greensboro branch I began contemplating my return to school to get my MBA.
I decided to attend Kenan-Flagler after visiting the school during my interview. I met with students and faculty in the Finance Department – all of whom I found impressive and extremely helpful. Kenan-Flagler’s highly regarded finance department and a team-focused curriculum heavily influenced my decision to come here.
I became interested in finance while studying economics at Vanderbilt. Although I began my career in the commercial banking industry, I am interested in pursuing corporate finance at your company because I want to work on finance projects that will allow me to drive the strategic direction of the firm.