
Ask HN: How to get a job while having a job? - samfisher83
All these hackerrank&#x2F;leetcode tests + White board tests + all day interviews. How is it possible to work a full time job and dedicate enough time to get another job? Especially if you have been out of school for while. I got like 100 on my algorithms classes, but its been so long ago and its not like most developers write red black trees, suffix tree, heaps etc. I have started to review this stuff and it takes so much time.<p>Why can&#x27;t we have some sort licensing board like a medical board so that you prove you can code, and then interviews aren&#x27;t so time consuming.
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kentosi
I just went through this so let me give you my thoughts/experience.

Separate work and job-hunting as two different skill sets in your mind.

Use any note-taking tool of your choice (I used EverNote) and write up:

\- Standard algorithm questions and answers to quickly revise on

\- Soft questions (like name a time you rose to the challenge/etc) with pre-
prepared answers.

\- ANY f*ckups from previous interviews and how to not do that again

\- ALL tech questions you were asked + solutions to revise.

I hope you get the gist of what I'm saying here. Job-hunting is a "mode" you
enter in. It's like preparing for an exam where you're learning a whole bunch
of stuff before-hand, but knowing very well that once the exam is over you'll
forget everything.

This has already happened to you with algorithms. Same thing goes with jobs.
You'll enter into algo-solving and interviewing mode, but once you have an
offer you'll have the luxury of forgetting it all once you start working.

It's when you're back on the path of finding a job again that these notes
you've taken serve as an anchor for quickly getting back into that job-hunting
mode.

It's served me for years.

All the best.

~~~
james_s_tayler
Funny thing about the hiring sieve is just going through enough interviews
prepares you at some point enough to pass somebody's hiring bar. So it's not
that you were actually worthy of being hired, rather it's that you had studied
for the test enough at that point.

The whole thing is mildly comical.

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jurassic
It sounds like you are applying cold and going through the process used to
filter the unwashed masses (e.g. new bootcamp grads, college grads, career
changers with no network, fakers of all stripes). There are some diamonds in
the rough there but it's no surprise they put that candidate population
through the ringer to make sure they don't waste their engineering staff's
time screening duds.

If you've been working for a while it's much more efficient to get jobs
through your personal network. I have about 4.5 years of industry experience
and was able to skip directly to the final round onsite with a couple
companies where I have close friends/former colleagues trying to recruit me. I
just started a new job with desireable BigCo that I got this way. Unless you
are specifically passionate about getting in with a specific company to work
on a specific product, you're much better off focusing your energy on
companies where you know people who will vouch for you.

~~~
twoquestions
So it sounds like building your network is a more valuable thing to do than
study for all-day interviews.

However, why should some well-connected person want to talk to some bozo who's
only giving them the time of day to job hunt? Especially in a career like ours
that isn't dominated by talking like sales is?

~~~
jurassic
You should study. You still have to have the chops to pass a full-day onsite.
Having a contact from your network trying to bring you in just cuts down on
the amount of pointless hoop-jumping.

Building and maintaining a professional network is something you should be
doing all the time. If you wait until you need a job to network you are doing
it wrong.

~~~
ccore
Well then I must be doing it wrong because all I want to do after work is
relax and not talk to anyone and sometimes play video games. I still want to
be recognized for the work that I do but apparently that's not enough.

Maybe I have Asperger's or something else, but this whole thing about relying
on connections to get jobs more easily doesn't come naturally to me.

------
joezydeco
You have to plan ahead. Use lunch breaks to talk to recruiters (don't do it in
the office). Bank up vacation time to go on interviews. Use the occasional
sick day to handle last-minute requests, but don't abuse it.

We all do this. Yes, it's a hassle.

------
pradhyo
I am in the exact same situation - I am trying to get into machine learning
from being a web developer so I am learning a lot of new things too.

After months of not finding time to do courses online, I've been studying
between 5-7am for the last couple of weeks. Previously I would wake up, go
straight to work, come back home tired and waste time on Netflix before going
to bed. Now I spend less time for entertainment after work and sleep sooner
because I have to wake up early.

This may not help you but thought I would share my experience.

Edit: Reading your question again and looking at the other comment, looks like
your question may not be about time management so this may be irrelevant.

~~~
tomiplaz
How do you stay motivated? Do you have negative days, days full of doubt,
insecurities, etc.?

~~~
pradhyo
Back when I was a student, I had to find a job so I put in a lot of effort..
until I found a job and settled in nicely. Couple years in, I am now familiar
with the team and our stack so it takes less effort to keep up to date. I have
a lot less free time than before due to the full-time job but I spend a larger
percentage of it on unproductive things - lack of motivation when everything
is cozy.

My situation has changed a little bit now (due to some deadlines) and though I
can find a web developer job more easily, I want to give it my best shot
trying to get an ML job, since I have realized I might never do it if I don't
do it now.

Luckily I don't have a lot of those negative thoughts/days. I've felt bad a
couple of times for wasting too much time on that particular day but I think
of the overall progress I've made and get over it pretty quickly.

------
auspex
It's almost like we need a piece of paper from something like an accredited
institution of some sort.

\----- I'm just kidding but it is really expensive to hire and fire a poor
performer. These are high paying jobs where bugs can mean loss of revenue so
it makes sense that they want the best.

Honestly, you should be reviewing algorithms every few years so you never
fully lose it... not just when you need a new job.

Update: You should not be trying to memorize problems but learn the 10ish
basic algos... and understand how to quickly classify a problem as solvable
with a specific algo. It makes the entire process less daunting.

~~~
scarface74
_I 'm just kidding but it is really expensive to hire and fire a poor
performer._

Using the simple Joel Spolsky criteria for hiring, “smart and gets things
done”, the only thing that testing whether someone can do algorithms is
testing is whether they are smart.

There are plenty of people who are smart but don’t have the follow through to
get things done and are always distracted by the “ooh shiny”.

~~~
auspex
I think it also tests pattern recognition and attention to detail. I
definitely think most jobs don't require deep algorithmic knowledge but given
the choice...

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bootsz
Yes, the system sucks. That said, there are ways you can deal with it.
Everyone's situation is different, and I don't know yours. But there's
basically two main approaches you can take:

1) Don't devote much time to studying, and focus on companies that don't rely
on whiteboarding leetcode-style interviews. They're harder to find, but they
exist. FAANG probably isn't going to be an option, unless you get lucky.

2) Go all-in on studying. Make the time. Even an hour a day. Cut back on work
and social obligations. Chip away at problems for several months. Keep track
of the ones you get stuck on and re-do them a few weeks later. Try some
practice interviews at sites like interviewing.io with real humans, and listen
to their feedback. Repeat, repeat until you feel more confident. It takes
time, but it pays off.

~~~
paulie_a
Is whiteboard interviews a sv thing? Because they seem to be rare in the
Midwest? Maybe I've just been lucky. But they seem like an incredibly poor way
to interview someone.

~~~
pmikesell
I’m curious to know what you think a better way would be?

~~~
scarface74
It’s not really that difficult.

I have a simplified skeleton of class that is similar to the problems we solve
every day and failing unit tests.

They have to make the unit tests pass.

Then I give them a second set of requirements and they have to make the second
set of tests pass without breaking the first set.

~~~
paulie_a
Honestly, tech interviews are really simple to conduct. Give a few challenges.
See if they stumble hard. See how they interact (quite frankly the most
important aspect if they have any technical experience). Give hints if
necessary. Interviews are stressful enough, so a small nudge is fine. But you
can definitely tell who is capable, and those that don't have the experience
pretty quickly.

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lbriner
Doctors still have interviews even though they are licenced. As issa said, an
interview tests your personality, ability to think on your feet and even how
committed you are to the application - the effort proves you are very
interested.

I totally agree on better industry accreditation though, it would be good to
prove a basic level of qualification and experience although we have all met
people who are great on paper and useless in real-life!

------
rwhitman
> Why can't we have some sort licensing board like a medical board so that you
> prove you can code, and then interviews aren't so time consuming.

That's a really interesting point. I think you may have just nailed why the
software developer hiring process is so broken right now.

Our industry is about at the stage of maturity where civil engineering or
medicine were circa the turn of the 20th century when state accreditation
boards began licensing in those industries.

I actually don't have a CS degree at all and admittedly poor understanding of
algorithms and data structures as I originally was educated in code at an art
school. But after 16 years writing code, due to the increasing amount of
gatekeeping being put up around CS fundamentals I'm actually going "back to
school" right now, taking online courseware to gain at least some rudimentary
online certificates in those CS areas just to demonstrate that I'm qualified
to continue working in the industry.

It would actually be quite nice to have a real board certification in this
stuff to study towards, rather than some BS online course certificate, or
worse, having to re-do my entire undergrad 16 years into my career...

------
wan23
Some kind of accreditation for software would save our industry so much time.
It's crazy how many hours we spend asking and answering the same basic
questions over and over. Imagine if we could focus on the important stuff in
interviews!

~~~
geobmx540
Accreditation just acts as another "has a college degree" filter. There is
already a proliferation of certifications that people can attain if they wish,
that may or may not help them in specific instances that try to "give you a
minimum level of knowledge", but really that just means the questions you get
asked assume you know that - ie they are harder and incorporate your algorithm
knowledge, instead of specifically saying "code bubble sort". I don't think
that's any better to be honest.

~~~
samfisher83
I wish there was one that would actually count. For Example if you pass the
boards its a pretty rigorous test and they won't be asking you what the krebs
cycle is.

~~~
geobmx540
I don't know enough about the boards or how doctors interview, but doesn't
this just move the puck in the interview process?

For a lot of the things we build in engineering that kind of qualification
would be ludicrous, yet we've created another barrier for a variety of people
where there doesn't have to be one.

"Must have Super Engineer Accreditation(tm)" \- it'll be the new college
degree. How much does it cost to get? How much time? The girl who doesn't need
to work can study all she wants and pass without having to do nights and
weekends for months / years etc.

------
legohead
start studying[1] for the annoying whiteboard interviews. we all hate it, we
all have to deal with it.

apply for some jobs you aren't that interested in to get used to interviewing
again. you will typically get phone interviewed first so not much risk of
interfering with your job.

you may need to take vacation (sick days) for some interviews.

[1] [https://github.com/mtdvio/every-programmer-should-
know](https://github.com/mtdvio/every-programmer-should-know)

------
scarface74
If you’ve been out of school for awhile and have real world experience, if
you’re anywhere outside of Silicon Valley and the West Coast, you shouldn’t be
competing for jobs where they are asking you to “invert a binary tree”. I
don’t think I had a single leetCode technical question for the job I have now.

I am supposedly a senior developer, but I was asked:

To whiteboard a system that I designed and asked me how I designed it for high
availability, scalability, etc.

How would I improve the current process to bring in CI/CD.

My theory on automation testing.

My previous job interview was similar, I was interviewing for a lead dev
position without knowing it. He asked me 30/60/90 day plan to create a
software development department to ship some green field projects and to
rescue a project that had gone off the rails.

Any company that is more concerned with whether their senior developers can
write algorithms than whether they can ship features and architect systems is
not a company I am going to work for. It’s probably a company full of
architect astronaughts who couldn’t ship if their life depended on it.

Then again, I don’t live in SV but so do live in a major metropolitan area.

------
jmsevold
This might be helpful: [https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-
whiteboards](https://github.com/poteto/hiring-without-whiteboards)

------
souprock
There shouldn't be many all-day interviews. If you are honest on your resume
and there is a phone screen, your chances with the interview should be pretty
decent.

The company doesn't like all-day interviews any more than you do. Multiple
highly-paid people get distracted from their normal duties to interview you.
With both you and the employer having a cost to bear, the interview should
mean that both you and the employer are pretty serious about you being hired.

~~~
teemo91
Sadly, this is not true. I live in the bay area and most startups here, need
you in person for their day of interviews. The industry standard seems to be 1
soft skill/ HR discussion + 1 technical phone screen + 1 day of technical
interviews(4-6). And as optimistic as one can be, it's hard to find the right
(job + company + people) combo in the first try, since it's hard to judge
certain aspects from a HR call and a technical interview which is usually a
45-60min call where most of the time is spent coding. This leads you to
interview in-person at places where you might not like the company culture/
team/ leadership/ commute/ etc. It is true that a lot of resources go into
interviewing from the company's perspective but it is also pretty much the
same for an interviewee.

------
issa
I think one reason is that the interview process isn't JUST designed to check
if you can code. While I agree that the process is broken, there are
legitimate reasons why companies put up high barriers to entry.

~~~
lawn
The problem isn't a high barrier to entry, what's tested is a separate skill
set. It's like testing a carpenter's skill by looking at how good he hits with
the hammer.

~~~
NikolaeVarius
I would like to think we have a problem if a carpenter is unable to wield his
hammer properly.

~~~
antoinevg
Please don't hurt the metaphors. They have feelings too.

------
ykevinator
I think people often worry too much about behind punished for seeking another
job. Any way to be honest with your current employer and use pto for business
hours communications?

