The Room

There is one question

No form of the usual kind. No motivation paragraph, no list of your achievements, no reason you would be a great fit. One question, and how you answer it is the entire decision.

Describe a transformation decision you currently own and have not yet made. Include the real numbers.

Why this question

Somebody who currently operates can answer it in ten minutes, because they are already carrying the decision around. They know the numbers because the numbers keep them up.

Somebody who advises cannot answer it at all, and the failure is specific and visible. They will describe a client's decision, or a decision in general terms, or a decision they helped somebody else make. All three are disqualifying, and none of them require us to make a judgement call about anybody.

It also means the first thing we know about you is the shape of a real problem, which is the thing the room exists to work on. Read how the room works before you write, in particular the part about who is not in it.

Your answer is stored as you wrote it. Nothing is scored automatically.

Applications are read by one person. Chatham House applies from this point onward, including to anything you write above. Nothing you send is shared, published, or used as an example.