Hi all,
Hope that you're continuing to survive internship season alright...let the busyness of travel begin. I had my first two interviews this past week, and at both, I had a hard time gauging how interested the sites were in me as an applicant, at least compared to graduate school interviews (which were at research-oriented PhD programs).
At grad school interviews, I generally got the sense that they thought I was a good fit too, and that they truly were interested in me as an applicant (e.g., providing more personalized recruiting pitches for why I was a good fit, eagerly following up with questions, etc.). However, at my first two interviews, although there were plenty of social niceties (e.g., it was great meeting you; feel free to get in-touch with questions, etc.), and obviously some interest because I was there in the first place, I had a much harder time determining if the sites truly were interested in me as an applicant (i.e., would a be a "top" or sought-after candidate).
Obviously I am new to this, but for people who have been through this process, did you generally have a good sense or feeling of where you would be ranked highly at/after the interview day? I realize that the process could just be different from grad school (e.g., sites are interviewing far more applicants, they can't disclose ranking-related information, etc.), but if this keeps going as is, it's going to be really difficult to get any sense of where I am highly wanted. I have heard that you are not supposed to try to guess which sites like you and to make your rankings based on which sites you truly liked best (which I plan to do), so all of this doesn't matter in many ways. However, this whole process is going to difficult psychologically in some ways (more so than it already is!) if there isn't more concrete positive feedback (although I realize I may be overthinking this).
So, long explanation aside, my question is, for sites where people interviewed, did you have a good sense of where you were wanted? If so, were there clear signs of this (e.g., follow-up emails/calls initiated by the site, more direct language about high interest at the interviews)?
I apologize for being neurotic, but any insight into this would be helpful! Just not sure how this is supposed to go, and as stated, these first two interviews have been a much different experience as far as "recruitment" is concerned than were my grad school ones. Thank you very much for any thoughts/advice.
Hope that you're continuing to survive internship season alright...let the busyness of travel begin. I had my first two interviews this past week, and at both, I had a hard time gauging how interested the sites were in me as an applicant, at least compared to graduate school interviews (which were at research-oriented PhD programs).
At grad school interviews, I generally got the sense that they thought I was a good fit too, and that they truly were interested in me as an applicant (e.g., providing more personalized recruiting pitches for why I was a good fit, eagerly following up with questions, etc.). However, at my first two interviews, although there were plenty of social niceties (e.g., it was great meeting you; feel free to get in-touch with questions, etc.), and obviously some interest because I was there in the first place, I had a much harder time determining if the sites truly were interested in me as an applicant (i.e., would a be a "top" or sought-after candidate).
Obviously I am new to this, but for people who have been through this process, did you generally have a good sense or feeling of where you would be ranked highly at/after the interview day? I realize that the process could just be different from grad school (e.g., sites are interviewing far more applicants, they can't disclose ranking-related information, etc.), but if this keeps going as is, it's going to be really difficult to get any sense of where I am highly wanted. I have heard that you are not supposed to try to guess which sites like you and to make your rankings based on which sites you truly liked best (which I plan to do), so all of this doesn't matter in many ways. However, this whole process is going to difficult psychologically in some ways (more so than it already is!) if there isn't more concrete positive feedback (although I realize I may be overthinking this).
So, long explanation aside, my question is, for sites where people interviewed, did you have a good sense of where you were wanted? If so, were there clear signs of this (e.g., follow-up emails/calls initiated by the site, more direct language about high interest at the interviews)?
I apologize for being neurotic, but any insight into this would be helpful! Just not sure how this is supposed to go, and as stated, these first two interviews have been a much different experience as far as "recruitment" is concerned than were my grad school ones. Thank you very much for any thoughts/advice.
