Daniel Albrecht in alumnus of the International MBA, class of 2013 and currently works for Unilever in the Global Supply Chain Strategies area.
• How did you know about this job opportunity?
In the MBA I completed the International Consulting Project which worked with the Sustainability team within the larger Unilever SC Strategies team. Got to know the team and their work through this project and presented our findings to their VP at the end of the project.
The SC Strategies team then came on campus for hiring and the informational session and the call for applications was publicized and so applied. The UL experience through ICP certainly helped as did my experience in supply chain in emerging markets.
• How did the CMC and your IE experience helped you during the recruiting process?
The CMC brought the SCS team to IE and on campus for applications and interviews so this very much enabled my opportunity with this role. The interviews were on campus and organized through CMC.
Many of the MBA classes were quite useful in this interview process as it was quite technical with mini-cases in Supply Chain & Operations, Finance, and Marketing – so the ability to understand these areas strategically was important. They shortlisted partly on academic grades so that was important as well.
-The ICP project gave me an understanding of how UL worked and the consulting process, as well as an intro to this team and good referrals once we were in the interview/offer process.
• How did the recruiting process was: stages, tests, interviews, etc.?
Call for applications, and then 12 of us were shortlisted for an all-day interview workshop on campus.
A few days in advance we were asked to prepare a 10 minute presentation, 1 minute about yourself and 9 on the most complex and challenging project we worked on in the past 2 years. Presentation was followed by some questions.
A few made it to the final interview round with a Director and Project Lead. Interview was intense! Rapid fire mathematical questions, formulas from classes, and mini-consulting case questions. Thought it was the worst interview I had in my life!
• Would you want to share any tips, advice with current student interested in applying to Unilever?
Get connected to the company however you can to establish ties (conferences, academic projects, alumni) as it can be difficult to enter externally and from other industries.
Know the story that you want to tell the employer. Boil the reasons why they should hire you down to three messages (ensuring they align with the job/company) and make sure everything in your answers comes back to this. Make it unique and memorable.
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