Opinion: IB recruiting is 95% luck, 5% skill

After going through the process alongside many others, I feel like most people lie about the actual competitive nature of the recruitment process. As long as you're somewhat outgoing & not a complete robot and you have your technicals down - both of which anyone can do if they care enough. There is very few other ways you can seprate yourself.

In other words, once you have the 5% down, the remaining 95% is all luck. You can network great, and not get a R1 (compared to others this is the least likely). You can have a perfect R1 and not get a SD. You can have a perfect SD and not get an offer.

My theory is that most people have the mindset "I earned my offer, and those who got dinged along the way either didn't work hard enough or were a robot" and this is what leads to many people failing - because luck is such a bigger factor than people want to admit

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Meh I think 95% is a bit much but definitely as with many things in life has a bit of luck involved

 

Yeah I def used 95% to try to gain more thoughts from people but I would realistically stand by it being upwards of 80-90% with how little spots exist across the board esp since BBs & EBs are ultra competitive and EBs & MMs having less spots. I also think the natural ego of people distorts this picture much more 

 

Came here to like this post because I do think it is ridiculously luck-based. The difference between landing nowhere and landing an OK offer is small. The difference then between landing an OK offer and a great offer is also very small. I think certain people have more or less luck in their processes, but at the end of the day, all it takes is one great interview and the rest don't matter. But would agree 95% is a bit excessive. Maybe 60-70%

 

I understand your stance and maybe I've just been slightly blind/had different experiences but from what I've seen a lot more of it comes down to spliting hairs or whoever is the most perfect - slightly to your point.

I would argue it can become a game where someone who is 99.9% qualified wins over someone who is 99.8% qualified with the difference often being completely out of control of both candidates or even irrelevant

 

The % of luck is underrated for any particular group, sure. You could be an all-star candidate but fail early on in a CVP process because they get an intangible sense you'll leave early or in an EVR process because the personality of one of their zillion school-industry-matrix groups didn't match well with yours.

But despite the idiosyncrasies, there's a reason good candidates have such high cross-offer rates overall.

 

I think you are overstating luck here, but it is still the key driver of whether one strikes out vs. getting an offer. Ignore my title, but I struck out in recruiting because I could never click with the interviewers, no matter how much I tried. Back then, I didn't know I have Asperger's, which makes it hard to connect with interviewers.

 

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