What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp • Hacker News Board

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#221

Post by AlexC04 » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:32 PM UTC

hasbroslasher wrote: post #142

I too went to a bootcamp and spent about 3 months searching for a job afterwards. I didn't study anything. I let my bootcamp knowledge get written to disk and freed up more room for new stuff. I drank a lot of beer and went hiking in the woods as much as I could. I worked on my projects ~5-7 days a week but never for 8 hours at a time. Just a constant, undirected exploration and work towards building new things. Gran…

This is a really nice story! It made me smile. Thanks for sharing your experience.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#222

Post by mjevans » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:32 PM UTC

poikniok wrote: post #193

sushid wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The first part sounds about right. The second part is definitely wrong. For $2900 you won't be able to afford even a 1BR (unless we're talking about place far out from the main parts of the city). For instance, places around me in SoMa have 2BRs listed above $4,500.

I think he means with a roommate, at least that is how I understood it. 5.8k for 2 bedroom luxury apartment sounds about right.

It sounds like what I've heard the market rate is.

That rate however; "it just ain't right".

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#223

Post by crystalPalace » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:36 PM UTC

seangrogg wrote: post #205

franciscop wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally real question, could you please ballpark estimate from a simple glance at my github how much I could be making in the US? I'm curious to know what's there to offer: http://github.com/franciscop/ If you want to adjust it with some extra notes: winner of worldwide NASA competition; degree in Industrial Engineering in Spain with final year project on Neural Networks in Tokyo University; organizer of one of the b…

I've not ever really had my github brought up in interviews nor known anybody else that has. If you could direct me towards a resume, though, I'd be totally happy to try and estimate.

My github account was brought up in a recent technical interview. The hiring manager felt that my account lacked professionalism because I had several >= 1 year old, unfinished repositories.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#224

Post by TorKlingberg » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:37 PM UTC

linkregister wrote: post #94

TorKlingberg wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two years ago $120k was just £77k (still good). Salaries are famously sticky as a number, and do not change quickly when currencies move after events like Brexit.

It makes sense they wouldn't; have costs of living in London increased since the referendum? I was under the impression rents and real estate values were down.

Costs have not gone up much, though there is a delaying effect on consumer prices too. But salaries are not only determined by cost of living, or programmers wouldn't be making $100k+. Companies in London will have to offer higher salaries in £ now when competing with U.S. based companies for overseas talent.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#225

Post by sedachv » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:37 PM UTC

mordocai wrote: post #134

jeremymcanally wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because that's what a lot of these bootcamps sell. I've interviewed several grads, and while it's not universal, many of them literally tell their graduates they're going to be better prepared for the Real World™ than their college educated counterparts. Almost like, "You'll be better than a CS grad. All they can do is explain and apply the fundamental thinking process behind all this 'engineering' crap. You ,…

To be fair, for 99% of web development being able to select elements based on their CSS class is seriously way more useful than being able to explain and apply "engineering crap". Pretty much until you get to the point where you need to scale infrastructure you won't use any of your CS degree when working on most web applications.

It worked for a lot of COBOL programmers.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#226

Post by cableshaft » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:38 PM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #58

For some strange reason people hate recruiters, but during my most recent job search - a month ago - I worked with seven recruiting companies. I was submitted to 15 jobs after filtering for commuting distance, technology, salary requirements. First noticed that I filtered based on salary. Most companies don't divulge salary ranges but recruiters know that up front. Out of the 17: 2 - positions already filled before I…

How did you get one recruiter to submit you to 17 different positions? Any time I deal with a recruiter they seem to stop (or at least really slow down) trying to find you something until they hear a firm 'no' from whoever they submitted you to.

I think the most phone screens a single recruiter ever got me is two in a single week....maaaaybe three. And only one in-person interview at a time. It took a lot longer than 2-3 weeks to find the next job through them.

Also, they had many companies that were just plain old slow to schedule interviews. One in particular took two months to get around to scheduling an in-person, and I had found another job in the meantime.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#227

Post by rocqua » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:40 PM UTC

How do people justify and act going into an interview if you think there is a less than 10% chance of you wanting the job.

Do you just walk in and say "Yeah, I don't think this is going to work but I came here just for the hell and experience of it." This feels like a shitty thing to do, it feels even more shitty to walk in like you really want the job when you're mostly there for the practice.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#228

Post by sedachv » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:41 PM UTC

chrisbennet wrote: post #106

iamatworknow wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was the part I didn't understand at all. You go through a CS program for 4 years or more and end up as a junior developer and that's fine, but if you go through a 12 week coding bootcamp you're somehow more qualified and shouldn't be "benchmarked against junior developers"? I do realize I'm making an assumption that there was no prior CS experience before the bootcamp, but isn't that the crowd they're targeting?

I think the boot camp grad is still going to be a junior developer but I can kinda see where someone with a "vocational" (code camp) educated applicant might actually be more productive than a college educated applicant for certain jobs. To use an imperfect analogy, who would be better at actually building houses; a vocational school grad (who built houses all day as part of his education) or a college educated archi…

> To use an imperfect analogy, who would be better at actually building houses; a vocational school grad (who built houses all day as part of his education) or a college educated architect? A lot of programming these days is "hammering nails" not architectural design.

If bootcamps were vocational schools things would be great. As it is, how many are more like for-profit scam courses handing out unrecognized certificates with the main aim of teaching people how to game the programming interview process?

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#229

Post by scarface74 » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:44 PM UTC

talmand wrote: post #69

scarface74 wrote: post #58

For some strange reason people hate recruiters, but during my most recent job search - a month ago - I worked with seven recruiting companies. I was submitted to 15 jobs after filtering for commuting distance, technology, salary requirements. First noticed that I filtered based on salary. Most companies don't divulge salary ranges but recruiters know that up front. Out of the 17: 2 - positions already filled before I…

My impression has always been the spammy feeling of it all when someone is not seeking employment. The apparent never-ending "would you or someone you know be interested in this position" spam that developers get. Personally, I don't mind it at all but I understand why some might. As for the company side, I have directly heard from many a company that they don't like dealing with recruiters because of the cost involv…

I turned off alerts on LinkedIn when I change something on my profile and I don't post my resume online. I also only work with local companies that have been in business for a while.

I've found a few recruiting "companies" that just put up a WordPress blog and the footer even says "powered by WordPress". I don't respond to those at all.

I have 26 local recruiters all from different companies in my contacts. My shortest time from starting the process to having an offer is 4 days - from a Fortune 10 company. My longest is three weeks when I was being very picky about what technology I wanted to use.

Re: What I learned from spending 3 months applying to jobs after a coding bootcamp

#230

Post by sedachv » Mon, Nov 21, 2016, 9:45 PM UTC

Jemmeh wrote: post #180

iamatworknow wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This was the part I didn't understand at all. You go through a CS program for 4 years or more and end up as a junior developer and that's fine, but if you go through a 12 week coding bootcamp you're somehow more qualified and shouldn't be "benchmarked against junior developers"? I do realize I'm making an assumption that there was no prior CS experience before the bootcamp, but isn't that the crowd they're targeting?

I wouldn't say that makes them "better", but it's possible to shorten the time needed to learn to program by quite a lot. Though I mean more like 6mo-12 mo for most people if they do it 60+ hours/week with the right mentor to point them in the right direction. Our current education system isn't always the most efficient way to learn. Skip the unrelated to programming classes, the extra curricular things, make people…

> Our current education system isn't always the most efficient way to learn. Skip the unrelated to programming classes, the extra curricular things, make people basically sleep, eat, and code for a few months and it's doable.

This attitude is the reason why I am strongly in favor of expanding vocational schools and training in the United States and Canada. People who do not actually care about learning or thinking should be discouraged from attending university and wasting the time of other students and faculty.