My INSEAD recruitment/placement statistics

Without giving absolute numbers, here is how my recruitment went and what I did.

1. I did the necessary song-and-dance. I went to most presentations, most cocktails, did whatever coffee-chat interviews I could.
2. I tailored almost all my covering letters - in the absence of information of who reads it and who does not, I preferred to err on the side of caution. Besides, creating tailored letters also helps to understand the company better.
3. I had 2 CVs - both had subtle differences in what I highlighted. One was for consulting companies and the other Industry.

My recruitment statistics - all numbers are slightly skewed and not very accurate, so don't get imaginative. Don't conclude anything too hastily.

1. Almost all my applications were in P4 while interviews went across to P5 as well
   
2. I had a 50% call rate from application to interview.
3. 50% of those that called me for 1st round invited me to the final round
4. About 45% of those that called me for the final round made an offer
5. For industry - about 65% of those I applied for called me for 1st round, and about 80% of them converted to 2nd round
6. For consulting - about 35% called for the 1st round and I had a 67% chance of going to the second round
7. I withdrew from a couple of final round interviews and also refused couple of first rounds - my % do not adjust for these
8. I have no good idea why company X shortlisted me and why company Y did not. My background was not a very "straight fit" to strategy consulting. Most of the small/niche consulting companies rejected me without an interview.
   
9. I think the timing of our recruitment (July promotion is out of cycle with regular US and 2 year programs so many companies had hired and then maybe went into a scared "wait-and-watch" situation) combined with an awful economic situation made it a lot more stressful than it perhaps is.
   
10. If you are from another business school and have been through this, you can compare notes and conclude that I am an idiot, just don't post that as a comment ;) I'm sure there are superstars with 90% success rate from application to offer, I'm not one of them.
    
11. Recruiting for what you want takes lot of work.
    

Overall Possible locations

When I include the offers I have and the offers I might have had and the offers I did not have after final rounds, the locations were (some locations may have occurred twice)

London, New York, Dubai, Amsterdam, Dublin

Offer Locations

London, New York

Type of jobs

Both consulting positions and MBA leadership positions

Interview intensity

Highest Number of interviews before an offer was made - 10 (MBA leadership)
Lowest Number of interviews before an offer was made - 6 (Consulting) + lunch evaluation

Types of interviews

Most were case based, industry always did 1 or 2 competency/motivation interviews, individual case presentation and group presentation.

The offer numbers

Yeah right ;)

For those who might mail me asking questions about specific companies, interview details, offer numbers and so on - I'm sorry but I will not be responding to any of them. If you join a B-school you will get plenty of information from your school.