Cold-emailed and got an interview, now what?

Hi all, looking for some advice so here goes:

Quick background

  • Non-target undergrad in CEE
  • Internship in big 4 financial advisory
  • Currently full time analyst in a BB in the back office in another CEE country

The story

Cold-emailed my way into a phone interview for an IB internship in a small boutique in Central Europe. The interview went great, knew all answers to the technicals and seems I connected well with the interviewer as they asked me whether I'm interviewing with other firms and if they should be aware of any deadlines to which I answered truthfully no. (I guess they wouldn't ask this if they didn't want to proceed with my application?).

Now, here is the problem. During the phone call, they told me they will get back to me the following week. I waited and there was no answer, so I followed up and reiterated my interest, they thanked me for the follow up and said there was a lot of holidays/work so it was a mess and they couldn't get back to me, and that they will get back to me beginning of this week, and there's no answer still. I'm planning to follow up next week again if there will be no answer by then, which will be 1 week after they were supposed to get back to me, according to them. Should I do this or just wait indefinitely? I don't want to come across as needy or desperate as I already followed up once after they didn't get back to me.

Additionally, should I say that I have started to interview with other firms so as to get them to speed up the process? Is this a good idea? I would say no and I would hate to not be honest and transparent, but I really want this internship and I am worried that the longer the process spans out the less my chances are. I have no idea what to do and whether to take this as a negative sign, so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

7 Comments
 

The thing is I'm having difficulties scoring first round phone interviews due to my non-target background, even though I'm well prepared and know all technical questions and have a good "why xx" story. This interview was a result of over 300 randomly sent requests for chats etc. and it was the one and only reach-out that actually resulted in being invited to start the process.

So I'm kind of looking on how to deal with this particular situation as I have very low confidence I will be able to score other interviews

 

After a week or maybe a little longer, I would follow up with another cordial e-mail, without putting additional time pressure on them unless it's the truth. What other contacts do you have at the boutique you could reach out to?

Do you mind sharing what you have been sending for requests for chats? Happy to try and help improve the process to get you more at-bats if you want.

 

Thanks for the thoughts and offering to help!

I unfortunately don't have any contacts per se, only the analyst I initially reached out to. Will send my cold message privately to your inbox.

Do you think this might be a negative sign, them not coming back to me and skipping their own deadlines?

 

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