Fellowship Interview Advice

[Rumalum]

Hello, with fellowship interview season off and running, I was looking to see if there is any broad advice on what questions to expect and what questions are worth asking during a fellowship interview day? I haven't found much discussion about this myself. If it matters, I am applying for heme/onc

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[SurfingDoctor]

Hello, with fellowship interview season off and running, I was looking to see if there is any broad advice on what questions to expect and what questions are worth asking during a fellowship interview day? I haven't found much discussion about this myself. If it matters, I am applying for heme/onc

I always ask similar questions. Tell me about yourself and why your interested in this field? What can you tell me about project X you were involved in? Of the projects youve been involved in, which one or ones were your favorite and why? If you could paint me a picture of what your career looks like 15 or 20 years down the road, tell me what it would look like? If you had a bucket list of items you could check off to make the perfect fellowship, what would be on that list? Based on the answers to those five questions, I determine how I score the interview.

There are a whole host of other questions that people ask on fellowship interviews to gauge your passions, aspirations and how you handle situations. Too numerous to count and some are great questions and some are utterly outlandish and ridiculous. I got asked a long time ago “Why are you on this Earth?” I think I told them because my parents drank to much after a concert one night... but then went on to tell them what I wanted to do in my career because that was their version of that question I guess.

What questions should you ask? That’s up to you. They can be generic like “What are some successful fellow projects in the past couple years and how were they successful?” Or ask very specific questions to a program like “I read that your program does X, can you tell me more about that?”

 

[mvenus929]

Have a list of questions to ask. It's much more about you than even residency was. And you will be interviewing with 5-15 people each day, and all of them will ask if you have questions.

 

[applicant2016]

@SurfingDoctor

how to do you score applicants based on their answers to your questions? everyone will have a story and a long-term plan, what makes you score applicant A higher than B based on their story and plan? is it if you think their story and plan fits the program vision or if you just like them?

 

[SurfingDoctor]

@SurfingDoctor

how to do you score applicants based on their answers to your questions? everyone will have a story and a long-term plan, what makes you score applicant A higher than B based on their story and plan? is it if you think their story and plan fits the program vision or if you just like them?

Nope. Insightfulness and plausibility.

 

[thelogicalsong]

I have heard that in fellowship interviews, unlike residency, post-interview communication between programs and applicants is very common to ensure mutual interest and ranking each other to guarantee match, is this true? when does this communication usually happen? immediately after the interview or before rank list deadline? in other words, do programs usually express interest in an applicant? do they do it in the interview or before rank list?

 

[BigRedBeta]

Not sure that I would say it's a must, but there is a definitely significantly more. It's easy to imagine that it holds greater meaning as well simply because most places are interviewing 20-30 candidates max. However, it's still up to the program director to determine how much weight to place on such communication. And if you are a low on their list, your interest isn't going to move the needle much.

When I was going through the process half a decade ago, I sent thank you emails every where and for places that I liked, the messages were more involved, asked further questions to try to garner a reply, etc. I had a well connected fellowship director at my residency program that I met with after I completed my interviews, and we went over my thoughts on each program. Even though he wanted me to stay, he understood that his role was to help me get where I wanted to go (in part because he knew it reflected well on his division and program). He reached out to the places high on my list to share my interest, and he also got a lot of communication from a couple of places that were keen on me. That was an extremely useful set up.