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How (not) to apply for a software job

benhoyt.com

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Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#71

Post by ahhfgshando6698 »

rawbert wrote: post #42

Am I the only one who is not maintaining some kind of private Github repo? I am doing this job for the money and not the "coding fun". If I had the urge to code more, I would just do more hours in my regular job and get paid for that.

No, my GitHub is entirely private save for a couple of 6-8 year old archived school group projects, and the very occasional pull request.

I can understand why it may be useful if you are making a big switch in terms of the type of programming you do and can see myself putting together a "portfolio" in that case. Otherwise its probably worthless.

This isn't to say I don't have side projects or experiments I do for fun. They just don't go on GitHub (and why should they? It's not particularly more convenient than any other way to host your code. Mostly I use cgit these days since it's very platform portable and lightweight and I can host it internally with just a c compiler), and if they do, there's very little benefit to them being public unless you are doing what I mentioned above about needing to "prove yourself".

I'm not a web developer though, maybe it's more valuable the closer you get to frontend stuff? Just a thought, I don't actually know enough about that to say.

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#72

Post by GoToRO »

VonGallifrey wrote: post #61
GoToRO wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what you wrote, sounds like one of the best. At least it sounds better than most other interviews I had that were basically random.

10 Steps are about 7 too many. Writing a Personal Essay after, what sounds like, an automated email is not something I would consider as a good interview process.

For most software companies no. For top software companies... I might do it. The problem is with NoName companies that think they are Google or in this case Canonical.

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#73

Post by ayhanfuat »

Another arbitrary set of tips for the perfect resume. It provides zero evidence that this selection process results in better candidates. None of the perfect resume guides does that. What they do instead is list a bunch of personal preferences and try to justify them because they are blinded by their position. Did you really make a better job than randomly eliminating 90% of the applications? Who knows.

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#74

Post by r4indeer »

tsak wrote: post #8
daniel-s wrote: post #6

Isn't Canonical famous for having one of the worst candidate selection processes? Also, there's a lot of superstition and nonsense about how to succeed at interviews and job applications.

I once applied for a job at Canonical. This was their process (roughly two years ago)... Thank you for applying for Software Engineer. The application process has several stages: - Initial screening (done) - Personal essay (this stage) - Culture interview - Standardised aptitude and personality tests - General interviews - Recruitment screen - Technical assessment - Role-specific interviews - Hiring manager interview…

I'm sorry, a 10-stage application with at least 5 different interviews? How many weeks is this going to take? This feels like FAANG-level recruitment.

Am I so out of touch to expect an application, one interview and maybe a technical assessment for most IT/CompSci jobs? Wouldn't the probationary period be way more effective to see if you fit into the team/company/culture/etc.?

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#75

Post by 22289d »

A common phenomenon in the age of ChatGPT. Making the mistake of thinking you can spot AI writing because you can spot bad AI writing. You're only spotting the bad. The good you think is real. Some of the best cover letters and answers the author reads were probably written with the assistance of AI.

The key to using AI to write better is: 'with the assistance of'. You don't write a prompt, get a bunch of text and copy paste it. Instead, you use AI to help you, as basically a spellchecker on steroids that can accept commands to do anything.

One example is where the author mentions non-native English speakers. They can use AI to turn their broken English into exactly what they said but with perfect grammar, formatting, spelling and punctuation - and sprinkle in some thesaurus help and rewording here and there. They can even get some ideas for making the tone witty or serious or professional or funny. Key there is 'ideas'. Don't copy paste, use it to help.

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#76

Post by verve_rat »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #35
notgoliath wrote: post #7

Software engineers using tools like ChatGPT isn't really about trying to game the system. It's more about how out-of-touch the old-school job application process feels. We really just want to make things easier on ourselves. We're in a time where we're all about automating the boring stuff. Why? Because we can. The whole idea of writing a cover letter feels ancient. Honestly, when I'm shooting out a ton of job applic…

This is one of those “it depends” areas. The author is talking about a fairly “classic” approach. I was a hiring manager for a long time, and had a similar (but more flexible) worldview. It may not age well. I personally think that being able to leverage AI tools will be an important skillset, in the future, and would not disqualify AI submissions, right off the bat (but maybe not consider them a “leg up,” either). T…

The problem is that there are two types of roles you need to fill. The first type is the role where you need the best you can get, it is worth passing on good candidates to try to get the great ones.

The second type are the roles where you just need someone that passes the minimum bar, good enough will do.

Problem is, everyone thinks that their role, their company, can only operate with the first type, where really most of them are the second type.

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#77

Post by bluedino »

rawbert wrote: post #42

Am I the only one who is not maintaining some kind of private Github repo? I am doing this job for the money and not the "coding fun". If I had the urge to code more, I would just do more hours in my regular job and get paid for that.

Judging by my traffic logs nobody actually looks at those anyway

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#78

Post by ss1996 »

yakshaving_jgt wrote: post #23
ss1996 wrote: post #17

"but the written interview part (the part people seem to protest the most) I actually find quite useful." Yeah, not taking advice from this fellow. Good writing doesn't necessarily make you a good software engineer (and vice versa). Save this garbage for college applications.

It doesn’t necessarily make you one, but it’s a darn good indicator.

How so? If it was, most novelist should be great software engineers. They are not.

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#79

Post by gemstones »

benhoyt wrote: post #26
daniel-s wrote: post #6

Isn't Canonical famous for having one of the worst candidate selection processes? Also, there's a lot of superstition and nonsense about how to succeed at interviews and job applications.

They have been derided for their interview process (though not, as far as I know, for their candidate selection), but that's not the point of the article. I'd love if it we stuck to discussing the content of the article: how to write when applying at any company. If you could describe what superstition and nonsense you see in the article, that might be helpful.

There is something salient about the fact that Canonical’s culture is not one to mimic, though.

What if there is something about following this advice that unwittingly selects for candidates who will make a super long and off-putting interview loop?

Re: How (not) to apply for a software job

#80

Post by steinuil »

daniel-s wrote: post #6

Isn't Canonical famous for having one of the worst candidate selection processes? Also, there's a lot of superstition and nonsense about how to succeed at interviews and job applications.

I actually just looked at their application form for a systems software developer position. They really want to know how good you were at maths and native language in high school for some reason, and not only do they ask what top percentage you were in (whatever that means, high schools in my country don't do that), but they also ask you to directly point to evidence for these scores.

Right before the application form they say "We are proud to foster a workplace free from discrimination." Not everybody had the luck to be able to perform at their best in high school, so that looks like a pretty big discriminant right away! And for most people applying to that kind of job that was more than 10 years ago, so I fail to see how it is relevant to a job application.

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