Medical 6 T20 IIs but no A - Should I prepare for the worst?

[Mr.Smile12]

Hi! I was very fortunate to have interviewed with 6 of the “T20” schools so far. However, I have thus far been deferred by one school and waitlisted at another (very few post-WL acceptances so basically a R). I am still waiting to hear back from 4 of them, most likely in March. I also have an interview with my state school coming up.

Here are some basic information about me:
ORM
LM 76
WARS 85-89
T10 undergrad

While I understand I am a poor judge of my own interview performance, I felt that I generally did fine. With most of my interviewers I had a very pleasant conversation, except for one at the school that deferred me. I am usually pretty good at conversing with others, so I don’t (hopefully) think my interview performance is holding me back.

Should I start preparing for the worst? Is there anything I can do to boost my chance? Thank you so much for your time!

Until you get an offer, you should have a contingency plan.

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[GoSpursGo]

Agree with above, anyone without an A should have a plan B just in case. But you're also getting a little ahead of yourself, since you haven't heard from 5 schools that likely won't respond for a month.

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

This screams too top heavy list.

 

[Goro]

While I understand I am a poor judge of my own interview performance, I felt that I generally did fine.

Do you see the contradiction in the bold?

The healthiest way to look at this process is that you are rejected until you get that accept email in your Inbox, and always be working on your Plan B.

It's been a very competitive cycle, and you might get those A's once wait list time comes in May/June.

But for starters, work on interview skills.

 

[Goro]

Thank you for your feedback! I have actually really questioned myself and wondered if I overestimated my interview performance, given the outcome so far. For several interviews, the conversation went so naturally that my interviewer and I started talking extensively about topics not directly related to my application. I also had interviewers explicitly making positive comments about me. So I thought those were all good signs, but maybe they were just being polite.

Since I have one more coming up, could you offer some advice on how to improve my interview skills or how to become aware of my interview issues? I also did mock interviews with my undergraduate school’s premed office and was told that I did well...

Bolded: Interviewers are trained to be polite.

Read this:

• Goro's Guide to Interviews

 

[TheBoneDoctah]

Just because someone is being polite does not mean you are good at interviewing. The problem with interviewing is that if you are bad at interviewing, you may have bad interpersonal skills, hence you don't really know that you have bad interpersonal skills....it's a circle. You likely won't have enough time before your next interview to really learn how to interview well, but just make sure you have solid answers for the interview questions everyone gets asked, know your app well, and be friendly. If you don't get accepted this year, maybe look into further interview coaching if you believe it may have been an issue.