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They Rejected Us

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Re: They Rejected Us

#211

Post by vonmoltke »

sethammons wrote: post #199
linkregister wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm earnestly trying to avoid downplaying his work, but it's only a package manager. I don't really know what to tell you, except I feel like you may be new to software engineering or have forgotten much of what goes into it. The vast majority of engineers at Google will never lead a software project with the utility and breadth of use as the most popular package manager for mac OS for almost a decade. Most enginee…

I think you answered it yourself. His skill set (running, managing, community, etc) are not what Google needs (as they see it). They need someone who "will contribute to a small portion of software that will be run by a large fraction of the planet's computers, but owning the architecture, project management, testing, community support, and coding? No."

Your "etc" includes writing the damn thing in the first place, which indicates he is more than qualified for "will contribute to a small portion of software that will be run by a large fraction of the planet's computers".

Furthermore, for L5 and up Google is most certainly looking for systems design and engineering leadership skills.

Re: They Rejected Us

#212

Post by dwild »

gamesbrainiac wrote: post #201
pmden wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"possibly the most important piece of software on OSX" I'm earnestly trying to avoid downplaying his work, but it's only a package manager. Unless he was interviewing to be Google's next head of package management on OSX, I'm not sure why you think assessing him on something other than his useful side project is bad form. I'm also not certain how an answer being 'easily-googleable' makes it arbitrary or pointless. So…

Package manages often determine the success of an entire ecosystem. To give you an idea of how hard this is, Go still has not been able to come up with proper package management. Some of the best engineers in the world built that language.

> Package manages often determine the success of an entire ecosystem.

Nobody said it wasn't great, just that whether he is good to make a package manager, doesn't determine if he is a good fit for anything else. If that hiring position was to build a system to manage packages, sure, he is probably the best hire for that, but theses skills are specific to exactly this task.

A great interviewer though would have kept his contact information though and would have tried to put him somewhere else though. He may have not been a good fit for what they were looking for, but they can clearly use his skill in some ways some where else.

Re: They Rejected Us

#213

Post by icebraining »

davnicwil wrote: post #147
jakeinspace wrote: post #24

This is like It Gets Better, but for fragile software engineers who obviously are talented enough to make 6 figures some place else. I understand rejection can feel personal, especially when so much of your life and identity comes from the work you've put into mastering some field, but this doesn't seem like the healthiest mindset. I'm just leaving college now and don't have much of a perspective yet, but the applica…

Yeah, I like the idea of this site but was disappointed to find most of the entries being something like I was rejected by Fashionable BigCo X and Y but then eventually got a job at Fashionable BigCo Z Which is great, it really is, but not really all that interesting (sorry!). You've only been rejected in a very narrow sense. Everyone has an off day, or off interviews. You were actually accepted by the mainstream, ev…

I don't think the point is to be "interesting", just motivating to someone who just got rejected themselves.

Re: They Rejected Us

#214

Post by dwild »

vonmoltke wrote: post #211
sethammons wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you answered it yourself. His skill set (running, managing, community, etc) are not what Google needs (as they see it). They need someone who "will contribute to a small portion of software that will be run by a large fraction of the planet's computers, but owning the architecture, project management, testing, community support, and coding? No."

Your "etc" includes writing the damn thing in the first place, which indicates he is more than qualified for "will contribute to a small portion of software that will be run by a large fraction of the planet's computers". Furthermore, for L5 and up Google is most certainly looking for systems design and engineering leadership skills.

> he is more than qualified for "will contribute to a small portion of software that will be run by a large fraction of the planet's computers".

Maybe, but for that part he was in competition with people that were simply better to "contribute to a small portion of software that will be run by a large fraction of the planet's computers".

Re: They Rejected Us

#215

Post by travisjungroth »

vikasg wrote: post #202
projectramo wrote: post #6

Note to self: If I get rejected from a lot of companies, just apply to Twitter. They'll surely say yes. Addendum: there should be a companion site "Even twitter rejected me!"

The site was made by an ex-twitter engineer, so lots of the entires come from other Twitter engineers.

That's a really interesting sort of survivor bias.

Re: They Rejected Us

#216

Post by tathougies »

jakeinspace wrote: post #24

This is like It Gets Better, but for fragile software engineers who obviously are talented enough to make 6 figures some place else. I understand rejection can feel personal, especially when so much of your life and identity comes from the work you've put into mastering some field, but this doesn't seem like the healthiest mindset. I'm just leaving college now and don't have much of a perspective yet, but the applica…

Seriously though. The issue is tying your self-worth to getting accepted be facebook, apple, google, etc.

A healthy person, when rejected from a company, realizes that the company did not need their skills at this time. This says nothing about the quality of their skillset, just that it's unneeded. Sort of how, if Linus Torvalds himself showed up to a frontend development interview, he probably wouldn't get the job.

Re: They Rejected Us

#217

Post by dwild »

tlackemann wrote: post #170
Aunche wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Google tells you what to prepare for during an interview. I'm sure that if Max Howell spent a few hours reviewing data structures and algorithms like the rest of us, he would have passed with flying colors. His hostility towards his interview experience only reinforces that he likely wouldn't be a good fit in a large corporation like Google.

And that's exactly why I would never apply for Google. Despite me having years of leading product teams and enterprise applications, the fact that I need to "study" for an interview is asinine.

> Despite me having years of leading product teams and enterprise applications, the fact that I need to "study" for an interview is asinine.

You no longer study? You stopped any form of education? I have an hard time believing that's actually true, but if it is, I guess you aren't a good fit for them either.

I read on new technologies constantly, I learn new languages constantly, I haven't gone to any formation yet (I just finished my software engineering degree) but I will certainly. Continous learning is nothing new.

They need someone able to adapt, which does means learn, and clearly in the case of Google, pretty quickly too. Studying to pass their interview process is no different than studying to apply X new principle.

Re: They Rejected Us

#218

Post by godot »

electrograv wrote: post #166
pmden wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"possibly the most important piece of software on OSX" I'm earnestly trying to avoid downplaying his work, but it's only a package manager. Unless he was interviewing to be Google's next head of package management on OSX, I'm not sure why you think assessing him on something other than his useful side project is bad form. I'm also not certain how an answer being 'easily-googleable' makes it arbitrary or pointless. So…

> I'm earnestly trying to avoid downplaying his work, but it's only a package manager. I'm earnestly trying to avoid downplaying your comment, but you sound like you have no clue how much engineering effort and talent is actually required to build and maintain a reliable, functional, production-grade package manager that a huge number of people use. Being able to completely implement and support a sophisticated softw…

To add to your points, the problem is not just missing good engineers because they don't study and play the game, but also hiring bad engineers because they study and play the game.

I personally know of people who habitually study FAANG interview questions, and make it their career to jump ship every few years for salary boosts. I've worked with some of these people; while they are nice and friendly folks and I consider some of them good friends of mine, they are much less-good engineers compared to many others I know, who stay in smaller startups and want to get things done and don't want to play the interview game.

Re: They Rejected Us

#219

Post by akhilcacharya »

Aunche wrote: post #203
akhilcacharya wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“A few hours”? Sounds a bit elitist don’t you think? Lots of people review for months to years and still don’t make it into X, Y, or Z. If anything you’re convincing me this webpage was a good idea!

My assumption is that he's a smart guy, so he wouldn't have to prepare as much as the average candidate.

Well, ouch.

Re: They Rejected Us

#220

Post by tom_ »

sho wrote: post #103

I still can't get over the fact that Google rejected mxcl, author of homebrew, possibly the most important piece of software on OSX, because he couldn't remember some useless piece of easily-googleable (ha) CS trivia on the spot. Even though they all run it internally. If that isn't the purest, most concentrated form of arbitrary, blind, own-goal beaureaucratic corporate idiocy I don't know what is. And people actual…

I failed to find a link to the tweet - best I could find just now is https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12551652, so maybe he deleted it? - but at some point he tweeted that he'd left Apple because working at a big company wasn't really his bag.

So maybe the Google people didn't make the wrong decision after all.

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