Today’s guest entry was written by Alessio Orlando, who will be joining the program in 2017.

During the application, I felt the need to better understand if what I wanted to realize was worthy. I wanted to see the place where I could spend most of my time for an entire year and see if it was right for me.

Once I arrived at the IMD campus, I did a questionnaire about my background followed by a very open and honest talk with a representative of the MBA Recruitment Office.

During the visit, we stopped at the MBA classroom. It’s a smaller room than other Business Schools. Once inside, looking at the 90 seats, I tried to feel the vibrations. IMD strongly underlines its “90 exceptional people” policy and once you are there you understand why. A very intimate room, I guess name tags are useful for the first couple of days then everybody is brother and sister with everybody.

At the end of the visit, I decided to go on the lakefront to think about the day. Looking at Lausanne and IMD from there, I decided to do my best in pushing the application forward.

IMD Assessment day: to be or not to be…

Now, here I am, in the train to Lausanne, just a few hours away from the big opportunity. During the past weeks, I read all possible information, legends and rumors about the Assessment Day at IMD and now I am frenetically reviewing all my notes.

I arrive at the hotel. It’s a beautiful, late summer evening in Lausanne. I am just in time for dinner with some of the other participants. Of course, we break the ice exchanging advice about tomorrow.

Finally, the morning is here. Ten minutes’ walk to IMD, few words are spoken, we are all trying to concentrate. A couple of meters away from the entrance, what I consider now the best advice to face IMD Assessment Day comes to me out of the blue: be yourself.

During 8 hours of different activities, it is impossible and counterproductive to pretend to be someone else. Do not be your Assessment Day avatar, just be yourself.

Considering the outcome, I would say it works well…

Alessio

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