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My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

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Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#261

Post by marcinzm »

LargeWu wrote: post #195
dehrmann wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe you're too arrogant, not arrogant enough For all the criticism hacker news gives whiteboard algorithm interviews, those at least are testing performance under pressure for a skill related to the job. Arrogance is a bigger problem in interviews. What comes off as confidence in an interview might come off as asshole at work.

"testing performance under pressure" What kind of companies are these that their engineers need to write perfect code under severe (i.e. on the order of minutes) time constraints? Are they constantly opening sockets for Jack Bauer? The only whiteboard questions I find useful as an interviewer are the super-easy ones that weed out the bozos who have somehow slipped through the initial filter. Things like "can you writ…

>What kind of companies are these that their engineers need to write perfect code under severe (i.e. on the order of minutes) time constraints?

I, oddly, had to do that once in my career although I had an hour or so. Retail advertising, Cyber Monday, data pipeline is backing up severely, advertising budgets aren't updating, only other data person I can reach is drunk. Bottlenecking code is written in perl. I don't know perl. And no real testing environment. Very stressful hour of my life.

edit: Of course, such things happening often enough to note are generally a symptom of bad process and management, probably a lot of technical debt as well. So generally a workplace to avoid.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#262

Post by charklet »

cletus wrote: post #66

So I'd say anyone looking for engineering work should aim to have at least one (and just one is fine) of the following: 1. A good (and well-known) school. MIT, Stanford, CMU, UW, Waterloo, you get the picture. 2. A good (and well-known) employer. FAANGs in particular. Ideally as an FTE but internships are good signals here too. 3. To be known for something you've done. Well-used open source project, well-known blog,…

A fourth: have a specialization either in a technology, part of the stack, or in an industry. That allows you to stand out for roles that really need someone with experience in that area, right now.

That said, I think your 3 recommendations lean more to a "how to play the interview game on easy mode" than every developer should to do this. I feel like I may be exaggerating your intent a little, but it did read a little like "Go to MIT, work at Google, write a famous blog" :)

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#263

Post by Mandatum »

marcinzm wrote: post #9
mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #2

This is terribly useless for anyone else. I’d go so far as to say it is not, in fact, a data point for anyone. - 65 days is a very very short time to be on the market - the coding interview experience of this applicant and requirements of the companies appears to be far more lax than most experiences in tech hiring - it took place right around the pandemic / unemployment / layoff time period which is a nasty confound…

>- 65 days is a very very short time to be on the market I'm an experienced engineer (10+ years) in a good location. For me, 65 days is absurdly LONG pre-pandemic. Assuming you interview well, you can go from nothing to offer in something like two weeks with most startups. >- the coding interview experience of this applicant and requirements of the companies appears to be far more lax than most experiences in tech hi…

I'm always fielding JD's from recruiters. I don't live in SV so I don't get absolutely inundated, but I get quite a few quality opportunities come my way which become useful during negotiations.

My recommendation to everyone, unless you're like the guy above me: Even if you're in a stable FTE, right now you should be practicing and fielding job interviews - just in case. If you're made redundant or caught in a spreadsheet, you'll be better to take the package and jump straight into work somewhere else before culture turns toxic.

You'll be up against far, far more people than you were when you last applied for a job. This will be stressful.

So get in front of it.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#264

Post by Tomis02 »

scarface74 wrote: post #220
Tomis02 wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it's even worth it to hire 2 devs for everyone you need and fire the worst performing one in a few months (flip a coin if they're pretty equal and can't afford them both). You're a bit of a piece of shit, aren't you? Playing with people's lives like you're a god.

And no one says that about Netflix: https://www.slideshare.net/reed2001/culture-1798664

If they don't then they certainly should, it sounds like a toxic workplace.

What annoyed me about that slide was the comparison to a pro sports team, which shows how the "ultra-elite" Netflix lacks the critical thinking to see that this comparison doesn't hold.

For one, performance in a pro sports team is quantifiable. So-and-so player scored so many points vs so many tries, whereas the average is so and so. It's relatively easy to plot a normal distribution.

Not quite so easy for software developers. Companies like to say they can measure performance but we all know they can't. Not easy to compare someone who got lucky and worked on greenfield projects with someone who drew the short straw to maintain some legacy code. If the latter struggles, does this say anything about the former? Can you predict the performance had the roles been reversed? No.

So it always falls back to a mix of "how much does your manager likes you" and "how well you can argue you performed". Or if you're at Google then you can add "how well you chose and optimized metrics", regardless of whether you're measuring the right thing.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#265

Post by ebalit »

bitL wrote: post #101
cmarschner wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have clicked on github links in resumes many times, and I have yet to get impressed. Most of the time you‘d find empty repositories, some forks that were never touched, and other garbage, and hardly any activity. If you can‘t clean up your profile when submitting an application, just remove that link.

Stuff you can find in my resume are links like my own self-driving car, humanoid robot, music studio, links to software that was #1 on HN etc. Yet still almost nobody clicks on them :D Recruiters/HR/interviewers seem to be quite lazy and what is on the paper must be sufficient to convince them to give you a shot or make you likable enough.

I don't know about recruiters but I am interested! Would you mind sharing those links here?

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#266

Post by mettamage »

lynchdt wrote: post #201
mettamage wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I want to ask a silly question. I know there are no such things as silly questions according to some people. In any case: What happens if great companies do not hire for humility as a trait? Is it truly as simple as: too many unkind people get into the company? Or could one be more cynical and say: it's easier to not have humble people negotiate tough salaries? Or is it something completely different? I honestly don'…

Maybe I was a little terse in my response. Humility often comes hand in hand with a growth mindset and a real eagerness to learn. Not hiring for that limits the long term upside of the hire ie you get what you get right now.

Is that what humility is? I find the word so confusing (non-native English speaker). When I look at the definition of it [1], I can't see that it means a growth mindset and a real eagerness to learn.

From the definition that I read, could as easily mean having a mindset of that whatever you know now is something one should be grateful for, and you don't always need to push yourself so hard.

[1] : freedom from pride or arrogance : the quality or state of being humble accepted the honor with humility The ordeal taught her humility.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#267

Post by bregma »

ipnon wrote: post #209
bregma wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've done more than a handful of interviews as an engineering manager trying to fill team positions. I can tell you the question is not looking to find out what you've done so much as to find out who you are. When I'm trying to fill a req I will usually get hundreds or thousands of applications, which get winnowed down to a dozen or so by the HR department, or system, or something. All of those applications have resu…

Do you think this confirms the adage that in-person interviews succeed when the interviewer is socially attracted to the candidate, as opposed to when the candidate is merely qualified?

I have no doubt, and it explains the rice-pudding consistency of the industry.

I try consciously not to let that influence my decisions, but I'm human. I notice most of the teams I've worked on look and talk a lot like me.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#268

Post by dominotw »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #256
dominotw wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just did that one, didn't find the actual coding hard at all. what what the time complexity of your solution? I failed the interview cos n^m soln wasn't accepted. he said hes looking for logarithmic soln.

It could be improved yes. Earlier I noticed I only split the array into two and not into m pieces. So later went on a tangent on finding the best way to do that. But, I made the test case happy. Also it says the length of the array is under 1000, so such an optimization is unnecessary. The point though is that I probably couldn't do the basic solution with a gun to my head, much less an optimized one. One whiff of st…

ok this is what i got

   def splitArray(self, nums: List[int], m: int) -> int:
        @lru_cache(maxsize=None)
        def minSum(pos,count):
            currentSum = 0
            minSoFar = float("inf")
            for i in range(pos,len(nums)):
                currentSum+=nums[i]
                if count !=1:
                   next = minSum(i+1,count-1)
                   maxSplit = max(currentSum,next)
                   minSoFar = min(minSoFar,maxSplit)
            return currentSum if count ==1 else minSoFar

        return minSum(0,m)
I think putting that @lru_cache annotation is what makes this a Dynamic programming problem. If thats the case, i think its resonable interview question.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#269

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

soneca wrote: post #12
mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #2

This is terribly useless for anyone else. I’d go so far as to say it is not, in fact, a data point for anyone. - 65 days is a very very short time to be on the market - the coding interview experience of this applicant and requirements of the companies appears to be far more lax than most experiences in tech hiring - it took place right around the pandemic / unemployment / layoff time period which is a nasty confound…

The title says ”a data point” . This kind of nullify all of your rant for me. You can’t say ”it’s not a data point” , it makes no sense. You could argue it’s an outlier, but it is a data point. I am actually glad that it is not someone pretending to have good advice that might fool me into thinking it is actually good advice. It is refreshing to read just one account that I learn what I want from, without been tricke…

I think you’re wrong. Being a data point isn’t the same thing as just existing. There has to be some space of models or information that can potentially be different because of the example. If it’s not possible for other people’s models to be different as a result, then it’s not data.

Re: My Mid-Career Job-Hunt: A Data Point for Job-Seeking Devs

#270

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

JSavageOne wrote: post #18
mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #2

This is terribly useless for anyone else. I’d go so far as to say it is not, in fact, a data point for anyone. - 65 days is a very very short time to be on the market - the coding interview experience of this applicant and requirements of the companies appears to be far more lax than most experiences in tech hiring - it took place right around the pandemic / unemployment / layoff time period which is a nasty confound…

Sorry I'm going to be blunt here, what an incredibly stupid comment. OP applied to well-known companies like Square and Reddit, shared his resume, interview experiences, and outcomes, and you're here on an anonymous internet forum telling him that this information is completely useless because he didn't mention salary details? I personally found it interesting and helpful as an engineer interested in potentially work…

It’s not useful for others to predict experiences from it.

It’s similar to the selection bias effect of college professors encouraging students to pursue careers in academia because they did themselves. The career details of the professor might be very interesting, but they are useless. Or to be more blunt, it would be like a lottery-ticket winner saying, “the best career advice is to win the lottery” ... there is no actionable info that a listener can take away or use, it’s purely idiosyncratic.

I’m sorry you thought it was a stupid comment, but I very much stand by what I said and feel it is not stupid, rather a very critical caveat.

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