With its focus on diversity and ethical leadership, IESE is at the top of the list for an increasing number of applicants who seek to pursue (or continue pursuing) a high-impact, global career.
Despite this fact, many applicants dedicate countless hours to writing essays and then rush through the video essay component.
This is a huge mistake.
In addition to giving the admissions committee the chance to “put a face with a name,” the video essay is an essential part of the IESE application, as it allows committee members to determine if your communication style and values are a good fit with the IESE community.
In fact, in our experience helping our IESE applicants secure a place at the school, we have noticed that the video essay can be as influential in an applicant’s admissions decision as the admissions interview.
That’s why we’ve prepared this guide to help you understand how the IESE video essay works and have shared a list of IESE video essay questions to ensure you put your best foot forward!
Why does IESE require a video essay?
The IESE video essay is an essential part of the application process because it gives the admissions committee the chance to truly “meet” candidates — as well as identify red flags in potential members of the IESE community.
With that in mind, it’s extremely important to make sure you fully understand this component of the application.
How does the IESE Video essay work?
The way the video essay works is very simple.
After submitting your application, you will receive an email from a company called Kira Talent within 24 hours of submission. This email will contain a link that allows you to access the video essay platform.
After signing in and starting the session, you will get three IESE video essay questions in total, one at a time. After receiving the questions, you will have 15 seconds to think and then 20 seconds to answer the first question. For the second and third questions, you will have 1 minute to prepare and 1.5 minutes to answer. There are no opportunities to redo the question, and you only get one chance to speak and provide your answer.
The format
If you’ve taken the TOEFL exam, you’ve already practiced for the type of format you can expect in the IESE video essay!
After signing in and “starting” the session, a video will appear on the screen. The video will present the questions to you one by one. Once the question has been read, a clock showing your preparation time will start counting down.
After the preparation time runs out, the clock to answer will start, and you will need to give your answer during this period of time. Remember: you cannot redo any of the questions.
After you answer the question, the system will upload your answer to the server (depending on your connection this can take a while) and will present you with the next question.
DO NOT leave your computer during the upload time, even if it’s taking a while. You cannot pause the process, and you may end up missing questions!
Technical requirements
Given past applicants’ issues with iPad and mobile versions of the application, we strongly suggest you record your answer on a computer.
If you do end up experiencing technical issues, access the support page here.
Deadlines
Regardless of when you submit your application, you need to submit your video essay response by the application deadline. It’s important to keep in mind that the link from Kira Talent may take up to 24 hours to arrive after submitting your application and that the link will only be valid for 48 hours. So make sure you plan your time wisely!
Find IESE’s current application deadlines here.
If you submit your application early, you can submit your responses to IESE’s video essay questions at any time, as long as you make the final deadline.
Which types of questions are asked?
The IESE video essay questions are grouped into three different categories, each with a different focus.
Question 1: Your Name
“Please tell us how we should pronounce your name.”
The first question IESE will ask you is how to pronounce your name. You will have 15 seconds to prepare and 20 seconds to answer.
Since this is a very straightforward question, don’t overthink it. Instead, make sure you clearly articulate the pronunciation of your name. If you find you have a little extra time and want to share the meaning behind your name, you can. But only if you can keep it super short!
Question 2: Introduce Yourself
The second question IESE asks gives you the chance to share who you are beyond your CV and admissions essays.
“Please introduce yourself to the IESE MBA Admissions Team.”
Consider this your opportunity to highlight your unique attributes and capabilities and show the IESE admissions team what makes you YOU!
Despite the innocent-seeming question, be careful about what you choose to show here.
Keep in mind that IESE prefers community-focused, globally-minded leaders, so don’t miss an opportunity to reinforce your personal brand and your fit with the school’s values. You should also focus on reinforcing elements of your profile that you might not have had a chance to explain elsewhere, such as volunteer work or a special skill you possess.
You do not need to speak about your goals or why you want to attend IESE. You’ve already written an essay on this topic, so there is no need to cover it again here.
Instead, make sure you focus on sharing an introduction that really helps you stand out!
Question 3: Randomized Question
For this question, there won’t be a specific prompt you can answer in advance. Instead, you’re going to receive a random behavioral-based question. This question may be focused on your characteristics, or it may allow you to share a professional example that highlights your personality traits.
The best advice for this section is to think about what it’s asking you and what you can show about yourself, your achievements, and your values.
If the question asks about your favorite book, the admissions committee will get a certain impression of you based on what you choose. If you choose a book that’s all about adventure, we’ll assume that’s important to you. If you choose a book about economics, we’ll assume that’s a key part of your life.
So think about how you want the admissions committee to learn about you beyond what you’ve already shared in your application.
If you get a question that’s more like a traditional behavioral interview question, try to draw on examples. Furthermore, make sure to show your human side and demonstrate that you genuinely care for others and want teams you join to succeed.
It can be easy to answer in a very conversational way, but doing so can often lead to an answer without a point, so make sure you use your planning time to structure the key elements of your answer.
Regardless, be careful about what you choose to show here. Keep in mind that IESE prefers globally-minded leaders who embrace diversity, so don’t miss an opportunity to reinforce your personal brand and your fit with the school’s values.
Here is a list of the types of questions you can expect.
- Tell us about a time you took a risk. What did you learn?
- If you were a team leader and you had a member who constantly under-delivered, what would you do?
- Tell us about a time you experienced a professional failure. What did you learn from it?
- Tell me about a time you worked with a dysfunctional team. How did you manage the situation?
- Tell us about a conflict you have had with your boss/with a team at work. How did you manage to resolve it?
- What accomplishment are you proudest of?
- Tell us about a time you took a risk. What did you learn?
- Tell us about an organization or activity to which you have devoted a significant amount of time. Why was it meaningful to you?
- Tell us about a situation in which you were part of a dysfunctional team. What steps did you take to improve the situation?
- What will your classmates be most surprised to learn about you?
- What is the most challenging aspect of working in an internationally diverse environment?
- What, in your opinion, is most challenging about studying in a diverse study group?
- What do you like to do in your free time?
- Tell us about a time a team member did not “pull his weight” in the team.
- Who do you respect the most and why?
- What is your favorite motto or quote, and why?
- When you have a problem, who do you approach for advice and why?
- What’s the best piece of advice you have ever received?
- If you knew you could not fail, what would you do?
- Tell us about a time you were introduced to a new culture. What did you gain from this experience?
- How would your teammates describe you?
- If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be and why?
- Why do you think you would excel working in a global environment?
- What is the importance of diversity in the workplace?
- What do you believe it takes to be a good leader?
The difference between a good and great video essay
Given the importance of the video essay in your IESE application, it’s crucial to make sure you don’t just have a good video essay, but that you have a great video essay.
Now that you’ve learned how the video essay will work, we’ve gathered our top 4 tips to ensure your video essay performance brings you one step closer to reaching your goal of attending IESE.
Tip 1: Be personable on camera
This is quite a specific skill to master, but with a bit of practice will get much easier.
My best tip for you is to practice recording yourself and time yourself as well. Go through the questions you have, take the allotted time to think and plan, and then record yourself for one minute.
If you mess up, keep going. You can’t stop and try again in the real thing, so don’t do it now. Continue your answer and fake confidence if necessary!
Then watch yourself back. Were you making eye contact with the camera? Did you smile? Did you look friendly? Bored? Annoyed? Scared?
Chances are the first few you do won’t be great but keep going.
You might also like to pretend you’re something of a TV presenter. This can help you to bring your personality forward and be more engaging. You don’t want to seem flat in the recording, so be a little bit brighter and friendlier than you think you need to be, and see how big of a difference it makes to your recordings.
Furthermore, be extremely careful with your tone of voice and body language. If you’re slumped over or look bored, the admissions committee will get the impression you’re not engaged with the task or, worse, that you’re not passionate about IESE!
This also goes for your tone of voice. Passion is contagious, but the last thing we think of when imagining a passionate person is a monotone, bored voice. So vary your tone of voice and make sure to project your passion for your interests and for IESE. If you’re not naturally good at this, you may want to seek out help from friends or record yourself multiple times until you’ve nailed the brief.
Tip 2: Be prepared to think on your feet
With the timer counting down and no option to check your interviewer’s body language for subtle clues about how well your answer is being received, video essays can be incredibly challenging.
Even more so when you receive a question you weren’t prepared for!
Yet receiving a curveball question is no reason to panic, since the best way to handle this situation is through a mix of preparation and being spontaneous.
A good way to avoid completely drawing a blank is to have a few solid examples you’re ready to speak about and adapt.
For example, let’s say you recently worked on a project in a foreign country. You experienced culture shock while trying to adapt to the new city, faced linguistic challenges both in the office and in your daily life, and also had to mix up your work style to align with local expectations. This experience would be a fantastic “stock” answer to have ready since it brings in so many different topics that you can adapt the focus based on what the question asks.
So, in addition to preparing your answers to the list of questions we’ve prepared for you below, think back on your life and career and write a list of defining moments that are broad enough to be adapted to various questions and that show your fit with the IESE community and its values.
Then, during your thinking time, take a deep breath and plan out your answer.
While delivering your answer, don’t let the admissions committee in on the little secret that you got caught off guard! Answer confidently, using your tone of voice and body language to show off your winning personality and you’ll have successfully overcome the challenge!
TOP TIP: The admissions committee knows you’ll be a little nervous during the video essay, so don’t beat yourself up if you feel you portrayed this in your video essay. However, if you tend to get extremely nervous or freeze up, make sure to practice extra hard to make sure this doesn’t happen during your official recording.
Here at Ellin Lolis Consulting, we also offer video essay training sessions with our team of interview experts who focus on helping you adjust your body language and tone. Work with our MBA experts to get personalized help with your video essay!
Tip 3: Make sure you’re the protagonist
Another common mistake we see our clients make while drafting their video responses: maintaining too much focus on colleagues and teamwork rather than their own efforts. Especially because you have such limited time, you want to make sure that your response maximizes the number of insights that the viewer can learn about you, not your team members.
So, make sure you’re the protagonist of your answer. Of course, you can absolutely include stories involving teamwork and collaboration. However, when detailing your results and actions, don’t talk about what your team did, talk about your specific role within the team’s achievements. What did you contribute to the success, and how did this impact the overall results? What approaches and ideas did you come up with that might set you apart from other candidates? Answering these questions will ensure that you leave a memorable impression in the adcom’s minds.
Tip 4: Choose examples that add value to your application
Throughout the MBA application process, you’ve most likely brainstormed plenty of examples that illustrate your strengths, skills, and values.
Of course, you have probably used some of your proudest stories in your written essays already. And while these examples are surely impressive, it’s best to diversify your stories rather than let them overlap. In this context, that means using new examples for your video essay that don’t overlap with ones that you’ve used in other parts of your application.
Try to think of what you have already illustrated about yourself — what strengths, characteristics, skills, and values have you already shown in your written essays? Are you missing anything, or is there anything else that you think needs emphasized, especially when thinking about what the particular school is looking for?
Ultimately, you want to choose examples for your video essay that add additional value to your application. Use this as a strategic opportunity to show another aspect of yourself and your achievements that you haven’t been able to show in other parts of your application!
Record a video essay that gets you admitted
You have stressed about every aspect of your MBA application, and now you are ready to record your video essay! With the right preparation, this can be your chance to shine and get a highly-coveted spot at a prestigious business school.
However, maybe you don’t know where to start in preparing, or maybe you ramble and lose your focus while answering.
Our video essay prep focuses on helping you determine how to present yourself to the admissions committee while using appropriate, impact-driven language without being artificial, or worse, robotic.
Want to put the Ellin Lolis advantage to work for you? Schedule your preparation session with our team of interview experts today!
Real MBA Essays That Got People In
School-specific sample essays that got our clients accepted
