“Keeping those skills sharp even when you’re not job hunting.”
It’s so tiring to continue to see this.
If the “skills” you need to keep sharp are not the same thing as the skills you exercise through your job, that’s a giant red flag that the hiring company should be avoided.
If you’re practicing leetcode or Kaggle in your spare time to pass interviews, you need to stop and realize you’ve set up your goals completely backward and you are actively helping companies to commoditize your labor product and short change you on poor job quality or experience building.
If you don’t reject companies when they try the algorithm hazing crap that has no bearing on the real day to day job of software engineering, you are setting yourself up to fail and burn out, with crappy resume experience and nothing but perpetual leetcode skill to show for it.
>Again the statement that most engineers are introverted is in no way defensible and its insulting to try and group us all together like that.
Of course its defensible. From the abstract: "Engineers scored higher on Tough-Mindedness and Intrinsic Motivation; but lower on Assertiveness, Conscientiousness, Customer Service Orientation, Emotional Stability, Extraversion, Image Management, Optimism, Visionary Style, and Work Drive."
The advice of going on interviews semi-regularly is one that I tell everyone soliciting advice (even my direct reports, though only once and only if conversation veers that way!).
I don’t mean the leetcode hoops (etc, though that is part of the game) but once you’re in the door.
It’s a unique skillset that degrades fast, not unlike dating skills.
> It’s a unique skillset that degrades fast, not unlike dating skills.
It's crucial to continue dating while you're in a relationship. Especially a long-term relationship, which can cause your dating skills to become very rusty.
Haha, the similarities are more than I thought at first: That's a thought process that you would think when you are young and naïve. Playing the "dating" game. But as time passes, you just stop bothering and the "dating game" becomes just natural interactions.
Same with job-seeking, as time passes by I find myself more and more reluctant to "play the game". To the point that I won't proceed with a job process if it requires me to jump those stupid hoops (my 2 last jobs, 3 and 7 years ago I got without a real technical interview, and they were both highly technical). This means that right now jobs that I get will be "limited" to people I know and people who knows me.
As a head of engineering, right now I am trying to convince a good friend of mine (and amazing technologist) to join my team. I wouldn't dream of putting him through the "normal" that other general candidates go through.
Well, actually I'm in a long-term polyamorous relationship and my partner keeps telling me to go do this because I haven't felt much like dating this year!
Imagine if a Brain Surgeon was quizzed on Liver anatomy every time they wanted to interviewed for a job. It makes no sense and is borderline irrelevant to their actual job of you know doing brain surgery.
> Imagine if a Brain Surgeon was quizzed on Liver anatomy every time they wanted to interviewed for a job.
If software developers had the kind of exams getting initially licensed, and the ongoing continuing education requirements imposed to maintain their licenses, that regulated professions tend to have (doctors, lawyers, nurses, even schoolteachers), then they probably wouldn’t have every hiring process trying to compensate for the absence of such prior screening.
I would however imagine them to need to be able to show good skills at communicating the things they actually do, and being good at communicating that is in itself a skill that they will not necessarily use on a daily basis.
>I would however imagine them to need to be able to show good skills at communicating
Yes, that's called an interview. No one is saying there is no need to interview... So you seem to agree that leetcode style questions are irrelevant and pointless?
Yes, I do, but the comment you replied to above also made the point that those kinds of questions are not the primary reason why you need to practice interview skills, so it's an odd thing to focus on.
Doctors routinely need to update their certification by taking a formal exam; which includes subjects that they never except when studying for said exam.
You don't need technical screenings when just getting through the front door involves passing a rigorous certification process.
> If the “skills” you need to keep sharp are not the same thing as the skills you exercise through your job, that’s a giant red flag that the hiring company should be avoided.
Lots of people want a job slightly different to or at a higher level than what they currently do, so they don't get to exercise the skills they will need at work and practice them at home instead.
I don't get why people here are so hostile to people investing their time to try to better themselves and achieve their goals.
If that can help you move up your annual salary significantly and make you better at handling arbitrary challenges, then it is exactly "Bettering oneself".
Before practicing you were worse, and afterwards have improved.
If Leetcode is all you can think of to do to learn and practice skills then you've got a poor imagination.
One side project I did in my spare time outside of work got me onto my PhD and has literally saved people's lives. People here probably think that's a waste of time and I should have just lazed about instead.
> If Leetcode is all you can think of to do to learn and practice skills then you've got a poor imagination.
I think the point is that real-world experience often doesn't translate into Leetcode skills, meaning that you have no choice but to devote time to the otherwise-useless[0] skill of solving Leetcode problems. If making a cool side project, etc. was what helped most software developers get better at interviews, "people here" wouldn't be complaining in the first place.
Sure, you are learning something by solving Leetcode problems, but not anything useful[1] except in the artificial world of software interviews.
[0] This is probably heavily dependent on the specific jobs in question—I'm only speaking from my personal experience.
The best paying tech jobs I’ve had did not ask leetcode style hazing questions. I earn more and feel more valued at a mid size e-commerce company than I ever did previously working for FAANG or quant finance forms.
I think the high wage allure of those companies only applies to very junior engineers. Once you have 4 years of experience, if you’re good, lots of places will pay FAANG levels of total comp, and most won’t put you through leetcode hazing or stick you at the back of a thousand-engineer wait line for interesting projects.
Are you in the US? There’s not many companies outside of FAANG (and the FAANG-alike like Uber and Snapchat) that pay software devs with 5-10 years of experience over $300k/year. Perhaps financial companies in NYC?
I am in the US. Most midrange ecommerce companies will meet that total comp. I’ve had total comp north of that working for not-name-brand stock photography companies, education tech companies, payment processors and online shop / storefront companies.
It's not just about "algorithm hazing" but about presentation and communication skills that are often not a big part of the job of especially lower level developers, or at least not assessed in the same way.
Keeping your communication and presentation skills sharp will not just benefit you in finding a new job, but also in advancing where you are, but you're rarely fired if you fail to improve at it.
If I was going to judge dev interviewees solely on presentation and communication I'd have hired FEWER people than I have using algorithm questions as well.
If you're junior, and you can't tell me anything interesting about the work you've done in the past, but can at least write some code quickly to solve some sample problems, you've at least shone something.
If you're pretty experienced, though... not having much you can talk in depth about is a bigger flag.
It’s so tiring to continue to see this.
If the “skills” you need to keep sharp are not the same thing as the skills you exercise through your job, that’s a giant red flag that the hiring company should be avoided.
If you’re practicing leetcode or Kaggle in your spare time to pass interviews, you need to stop and realize you’ve set up your goals completely backward and you are actively helping companies to commoditize your labor product and short change you on poor job quality or experience building.
If you don’t reject companies when they try the algorithm hazing crap that has no bearing on the real day to day job of software engineering, you are setting yourself up to fail and burn out, with crappy resume experience and nothing but perpetual leetcode skill to show for it.