My Interview Story

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I had my first internship interview last Monday afternoon at Mercedes-Benz Distribution Indonesia, the office building is located at Imam Bonjol Street, near Bundaran HI.

Several weeks ago, I sent my application to Mercedes-Benz for an internship in marketing division, it was my very first application because until I write this post, I haven’t sent any other applications to another companies. So, I sent my cover letter, internship application letter, GPA transcript, and also my CV to their HR Department, and surprisingly, on Wednesday (20/06) I got a phone call from Mercedes-Benz and the lady on the phone said whether I could come for an interview on Friday morning or not. I directly said that I could make it, and its deal. But, the next day, she called me again and said that the interview had to be cancelled because the interviewer had another business, and the interview was rescheduled to be on Monday at 2 p.m.

So, there I was, came to Deutsche Bank Building (Mercedes-Benz office is on 17th & 18th floor) at 1.40 p.m. and I had to wait around 20 minutes until the interviewer came. Mr. Yudi was the name of my interviewer and he was quite humble. As soon as he had greeted me, the interview begun. When he first greeted me, he was using Bahasa, but after that he said that the interview would be conducted in English.

His first question was, "Please tell me about yourself, what you have learned, and why do you choose Mercedes-Benz", then I introduced my self and explained about various kind of course subjects I had attended, my organizational experiences, my organizational events, and the reason why I want to do my internship there and what division I interested to.

Second question was, "So, which one do you prefer, marketing or sales? Because you mentioned both". Then I answered that maybe I would prefer choose marketing because most of my experiences are doing marketing roles when making an organization's events.

After that, he explained that actually he came from sales division and explained what kind of people he was searching for doing some job desc in his division. He also explained that, actually, in Mercedes-Benz, sales & marketing division support each other and do work together, and he asked me whether I still have an interest or not, which I answered immediately by a loud 'YES SIR, OF COURSE'. I told him that the division is not the most important thing when doing my internship, but the experience is. So, it's okay to be placed in whatever division, as long as I still can learn something on my internship. Moreover, I said, I have been learning almost all management theories (have I? haha), from supply chain to accounting principle, from sales to production and operation management, so I think it would be still okay.

Next, he asked several question related to my cover letter and other documents, and also about how long I could do my internship. I explained to him that actually my university requires a 2-months full internship, but it still could be negotiated with the company because there will be evening classes on my 7th semester.

Then, he told me the process of how I can be called to have an interview on that day. So, HR Department have given him several documents of student who want to apply for an internship, then he have picked some of them, and one of them was my application. So, he said, he still had to interview another candidates and decide which candidate he would choose. I was just nodding my head. He told me to wait for the application result several days from that day, whether I would be accepted or not.

Last, he asked ,"Do you still have a question?" and I said ,"No, Sir". But then, he explain a little bit about remuneration system for internship student at Mercedes-Benz. He said that internship students would be given a sallary on basic level—not the best offer but its still good, money for food & transportation expense,  and many new experiences.  I said it's OK, because I am not searching for the money, but the experience is the most important one. (Actually money is the second most important thing to be considered, haha :p)

Had finished with the interview, then I left the building with mixed up feelings and hopes.

Wish me luck! May I receive a good news I've been looking for.

Ciao!

Annisa Sudibyo