1 00:00:14,240 --> 00:00:18,719 Hello, ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another episode of Adventures and DeVos. 2 00:00:18,960 --> 00:00:22,879 Today. I am your acting host, Jonathan Hall, and I have with 3 00:00:23,000 --> 00:00:27,719 me absolutely no one. So I'm going to do a solo show, or 4 00:00:27,719 --> 00:00:30,440 at least I'm going to try it will be an adventure. I hope you'll 5 00:00:30,480 --> 00:00:36,359 join me before the show. As I was staring at my screen trying to 6 00:00:36,399 --> 00:00:41,119 decide what I could talk to you about without anybody helping me, I decided 7 00:00:41,159 --> 00:00:44,799 I'm going to talk to you about getting a job. The new year is 8 00:00:44,880 --> 00:00:48,560 upon us. That means a lot of companies have new budgets, They've opened 9 00:00:48,600 --> 00:00:52,039 new positions. It's a great time for a lot of people to start looking 10 00:00:52,079 --> 00:00:56,000 for work, or to continue if you've already started. So I think it's 11 00:00:56,039 --> 00:01:00,200 a timely topic. Before I talk about some of my suggestions and advice on 12 00:01:00,280 --> 00:01:03,920 how you might go about getting a job, or more to the point, 13 00:01:03,159 --> 00:01:07,319 how you might interview for a job and what you might do in that regard, 14 00:01:07,840 --> 00:01:11,040 I want to talk about my background so you understand where I'm coming from 15 00:01:11,120 --> 00:01:15,879 and my sort of employment history a little bit. So I have spent most 16 00:01:15,879 --> 00:01:19,480 of my career as a software developer. Back in two thousand and six, 17 00:01:19,680 --> 00:01:25,079 I applied for a job as a network administrator. Actually, during the job 18 00:01:25,120 --> 00:01:27,079 interview, they gave me a whiteboard and a marker and they said, Jonathan, 19 00:01:27,159 --> 00:01:30,719 we just bought three news servers and we want to set up our spam 20 00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:37,680 email filtering service on these three servers to serve customers in the cloud. Sort 21 00:01:37,680 --> 00:01:40,560 of a sass, how would you do that? And so I drew some 22 00:01:40,599 --> 00:01:45,439 squiggly lines between these three boxes that represented servers, and I guess I liked 23 00:01:45,480 --> 00:01:47,560 it because I said, great, Jonathan, we want to hire you to 24 00:01:47,560 --> 00:01:52,079 come do that for us. So I joined this company as essentially an operations 25 00:01:52,120 --> 00:01:56,560 network engineer, but within a couple of months, the lead developer of the 26 00:01:56,599 --> 00:01:57,840 project. And it was a small team, there were two or three of 27 00:01:57,920 --> 00:02:01,879 us at the time. Lead developer left the company, so they were looking 28 00:02:01,920 --> 00:02:06,920 to replace him, of course, and while they were looking, of course, 29 00:02:07,000 --> 00:02:09,199 they still needed some work done. Customer requests came in or bugs needed 30 00:02:09,240 --> 00:02:13,280 to be fixed. So I was sort of filling the gap and helping with 31 00:02:13,319 --> 00:02:16,360 some of these requests for a while. So after a while of doing that, 32 00:02:16,439 --> 00:02:20,919 they decided I was doing a reasonable job and they didn't necessarily need to 33 00:02:20,919 --> 00:02:23,039 replace me. So they said, Jonathan, would you be willing to be 34 00:02:23,360 --> 00:02:28,680 our news software developer? And I agreed and we did hire some other help 35 00:02:28,719 --> 00:02:31,240 over time, but for a long time I was the lead developer on this 36 00:02:31,280 --> 00:02:38,599 project and also the lead networksh only network engineer on this project. So although 37 00:02:38,599 --> 00:02:42,840 my career has been mostly software development, it has been with a slant towards 38 00:02:43,520 --> 00:02:47,319 back end services, software deployment, network infrastructure, and all of these sorts 39 00:02:47,360 --> 00:02:51,439 of things, so very much what we would nowadays called DevOps, although that 40 00:02:51,520 --> 00:02:53,280 term didn't exist at the time. I worked at that company for close to 41 00:02:53,319 --> 00:02:58,879 ten years, and since then I've applied it a large number of other companies. 42 00:02:58,919 --> 00:03:01,680 I've interviewed it, probably several dozen. I've probably had at least one 43 00:03:01,759 --> 00:03:07,800 or two dozen job offers in the last say five years, because I liked 44 00:03:07,840 --> 00:03:09,199 you. When possible, have two or three offers on the table and then 45 00:03:09,240 --> 00:03:13,159 I can choose the best one. So that's a little bit about my experience 46 00:03:13,240 --> 00:03:15,599 as a software engineer as it relates to finding a job. I have also 47 00:03:15,639 --> 00:03:19,120 been on the other side of the table. I have been an engineering manager. 48 00:03:19,439 --> 00:03:22,479 I have hired, I have interviewed and hired a large number of developers 49 00:03:22,520 --> 00:03:27,879 for multiple companies, and so I also have my own style of interviewing candidates, 50 00:03:28,199 --> 00:03:30,039 and that definitely influences the things I'm going to be telling you today. 51 00:03:30,280 --> 00:03:36,080 So with that background in mind, let me talk a little bit about what 52 00:03:36,159 --> 00:03:40,039 I like to do to prepare for a job interview as a candidate. And 53 00:03:40,120 --> 00:03:44,879 actually, before I talk about what I do to prepare, let me tell 54 00:03:44,919 --> 00:03:49,039 you what I don't do to prepare. I see a lot of talk on 55 00:03:49,120 --> 00:03:54,080 LinkedIn, on social media book titles about essentially cramming for a job interview. 56 00:03:54,240 --> 00:04:00,759 Cramming is, of course, the idea of learning facts a memory, facts 57 00:04:00,759 --> 00:04:05,479 about something about say AWS, or about a programming language, or about network 58 00:04:05,560 --> 00:04:11,039 infrastructure or whatever the topic is. Learning these facts so that when they ask 59 00:04:11,080 --> 00:04:14,719 you a question, when they say, how do you do X on AWS, 60 00:04:14,840 --> 00:04:16,839 you can give them an answer, Or when they say how many bytes 61 00:04:17,480 --> 00:04:21,160 or how many bytes in a TCP header or something like that, you have 62 00:04:21,199 --> 00:04:25,040 an answer. I don't do that, and I don't think you should either. 63 00:04:25,160 --> 00:04:29,439 I don't think cramming for interviews is a good idea. And let me 64 00:04:29,519 --> 00:04:33,920 explain why. First, I believe that an interview is about it really is 65 00:04:33,920 --> 00:04:38,360 about or should be about getting to know each other, the company getting to 66 00:04:38,399 --> 00:04:42,040 know you and you getting to know the company. And if you are reciting 67 00:04:42,120 --> 00:04:46,839 memorized facts, you're not giving an accurate representation of yourself. And I don't 68 00:04:46,879 --> 00:04:50,079 want to get hired based on a false representation of myself because that means that 69 00:04:50,160 --> 00:04:56,040 I will have unrealistic expectations on the job, and I'm setting my own self 70 00:04:56,120 --> 00:04:59,040 up for failure. So I don't want that. If I know an answer 71 00:04:59,040 --> 00:05:01,600 by heart, that's a different thing, because it's not a sort of false 72 00:05:01,759 --> 00:05:05,240 sense of who I am. If somebody asks me how many bites are in 73 00:05:05,279 --> 00:05:09,879 a TCP header and I actually know the answer because I've done TCP engineering for 74 00:05:09,920 --> 00:05:12,759 so long that I know the answer, then it's fine to give that answer. 75 00:05:12,879 --> 00:05:15,399 And by the way, I don't know the answer, but cramming that 76 00:05:15,439 --> 00:05:18,879 the idea of memorizing facts quickly for a short term recall, I think is 77 00:05:19,240 --> 00:05:24,279 a dishonest way. Maybe dishonest isn't the right answer, but it's not a 78 00:05:24,360 --> 00:05:28,120 genuine way of giving an interview, and it's setting yourself up for failure. 79 00:05:28,199 --> 00:05:30,240 That's the first reason I don't like this approach. Second, I think it's 80 00:05:30,279 --> 00:05:33,560 a terrible way to do an interview. It's terrible for the company doing the 81 00:05:33,600 --> 00:05:38,480 interview. So as a candidate, I don't really want to work for a 82 00:05:38,519 --> 00:05:42,720 company that does that style of interview because I'm likely to be working for a 83 00:05:42,759 --> 00:05:46,480 company that doesn't understand engineering correctly. And let me explain what I mean by 84 00:05:46,480 --> 00:05:49,800 that. As a hiring manager or a development manager, a software development manager, 85 00:05:49,879 --> 00:05:55,240 or an engineering manager, I want to hire engineers who can solve problems. 86 00:05:55,399 --> 00:05:58,480 I don't want to hire engineers who have answers memorized. In fact, 87 00:05:58,560 --> 00:06:01,600 the memorized answers are usually the least valuable. I want an engineer who, 88 00:06:01,639 --> 00:06:04,680 when they're faced with a new problem they've never seen before, they know how 89 00:06:04,720 --> 00:06:08,399 to find an answer. Now. I don't care if they find the answer 90 00:06:08,519 --> 00:06:11,920 in their own head, if they invent something. I don't care if they 91 00:06:12,000 --> 00:06:14,839 go to Google. I don't care if they ask their grandmother. I don't 92 00:06:14,839 --> 00:06:16,199 care if they go to a meetup and talk about it over the weekend. 93 00:06:16,279 --> 00:06:18,839 I don't care how they get the answer. What I care about is that 94 00:06:18,920 --> 00:06:24,839 they can provide an answer to solve my business needs and canned trivia questions like 95 00:06:25,000 --> 00:06:29,560 how many bites in air tcpheader don't help solve those problems. So as a 96 00:06:29,600 --> 00:06:32,279 candidate, again, I avoid this sort of cramming approach because I think it's 97 00:06:32,480 --> 00:06:36,959 not genuine and it's also not useful, and so I don't want to work 98 00:06:36,959 --> 00:06:41,120 for companies that rely on that sort of interview process. So that's what I 99 00:06:41,160 --> 00:06:44,720 don't do. Let me talk about some things I do do when I'm preparing 100 00:06:44,759 --> 00:06:46,680 for an interview. I'm still talking about before I'm at the interview, right, 101 00:06:46,759 --> 00:06:48,959 one of the first things I will do is I will read up on 102 00:06:49,000 --> 00:06:53,879 the company. I think that's really important. Now there are times they're rare, 103 00:06:53,959 --> 00:06:57,000 but there are times when this is not practical. If you're interviewing at 104 00:06:57,040 --> 00:07:00,920 a stealth mode startup and they have no web site or the website is intentionally 105 00:07:01,000 --> 00:07:03,839 vague. And I've had this experience once. I once interviewed at a startup 106 00:07:03,839 --> 00:07:08,560 in this stage and I really knew nothing about what they did from the website. 107 00:07:08,600 --> 00:07:11,079 But that's okay. At least I looked at the website. So you 108 00:07:11,160 --> 00:07:14,519 want to look at their website and know enough that you can have a reasonably 109 00:07:14,560 --> 00:07:17,519 intelligent conversation about the company during the interview. Of course, it's also good 110 00:07:17,519 --> 00:07:20,120 to know if you want to work in the industry and that type of company. 111 00:07:20,399 --> 00:07:25,199 If you have a particular industry and mind, or certain types of companies 112 00:07:25,240 --> 00:07:27,759 you don't want to work for, then this helps you solve that problem. 113 00:07:27,800 --> 00:07:30,680 But while you're investigating the companies, there's a few things you should definitely look 114 00:07:30,720 --> 00:07:34,720 at. Spend ten fifteen minutes research in a company and learn what their core 115 00:07:34,759 --> 00:07:39,560 business is if possible. If you can't for whatever reason because the website doesn't 116 00:07:39,600 --> 00:07:42,480 tell you, then that's fine. But learn their core business. Are they 117 00:07:42,519 --> 00:07:46,199 selling to businesses? Are they selling to consumers? Do they sell physical goods 118 00:07:46,279 --> 00:07:49,160 like say Amazon? Do they sell services? Do they sell software? How 119 00:07:49,160 --> 00:07:53,120 do they make money? Or are they a nonprofit? Learn the high level 120 00:07:53,519 --> 00:07:56,680 information about what is their business model. You don't need to know all the 121 00:07:56,680 --> 00:07:59,600 details, but generally speaking, what do they do? It's good to know 122 00:07:59,639 --> 00:08:03,079 if they're publicly traded company or a privately held company. Are is there a 123 00:08:03,120 --> 00:08:07,199 single owner or are the multiple stakehold shareholders. You know, things like this 124 00:08:07,240 --> 00:08:09,439 are good to know. They're not always essential, but that they're good to 125 00:08:09,480 --> 00:08:11,000 know. So just learn a little bit about the company. How big is 126 00:08:11,040 --> 00:08:15,800 the company? Is it is it five people, Is it a thousand people? 127 00:08:16,040 --> 00:08:18,439 Is it a worldwide company? And every country on the planet with thousands 128 00:08:18,480 --> 00:08:22,680 of people? Learn the high level stuff. And while you're doing this, 129 00:08:22,160 --> 00:08:26,680 have some questions in mind. Take notes if you want to questions that you 130 00:08:26,720 --> 00:08:30,839 can ask during the interview. Every good interview will give you an opportunity to 131 00:08:30,839 --> 00:08:33,960 ask questions. It's really a two way street, right, It's not just 132 00:08:33,080 --> 00:08:37,759 about you introducing yourself with the company. It's not an audition. It's a 133 00:08:37,759 --> 00:08:41,240 two way conversation. You're getting to learn to know each other. Think of 134 00:08:41,240 --> 00:08:43,679 it more like a date than like an audition. So you need to be 135 00:08:43,720 --> 00:08:46,519 asking questions of the company too. And if they don't give you time for 136 00:08:46,559 --> 00:08:48,879 that, ask for time for that. That could be one of the first 137 00:08:48,879 --> 00:08:50,320 things you say the interview, Well, I have time for questions, So 138 00:08:50,480 --> 00:08:54,120 have two or three good questions ready. I can tell you this honestly as 139 00:08:54,159 --> 00:08:58,799 somebody who has done many interviews as a hiring manager is it always makes a 140 00:08:58,799 --> 00:09:05,159 good impression when the candidate asks me questions. When I turned the interview around 141 00:09:05,200 --> 00:09:07,960 at the end, you know there's thirty minutes twenty minutes left, and I 142 00:09:07,000 --> 00:09:11,200 say, what questions do you have and the candidate looks at me and it's 143 00:09:11,240 --> 00:09:13,919 like, oh no, nothing really. That really leaves a bad impression. 144 00:09:13,000 --> 00:09:16,519 And honestly, I don't care what they ask as long as they ask something 145 00:09:16,639 --> 00:09:18,519 and as long as it's a meaningful question. So have questions ready to ask. 146 00:09:18,559 --> 00:09:22,279 And while you're researching the company is probably the best time to prepare some 147 00:09:22,320 --> 00:09:26,080 of those questions. I'll talk about some more of those types of questions later, 148 00:09:26,080 --> 00:09:28,960 but do it here. If you can't figure out who what their core 149 00:09:28,039 --> 00:09:33,440 business is, definitely ask that during the interview. Say I looked at your 150 00:09:33,440 --> 00:09:35,879 website for twenty minutes and I couldn't find an answer. Do you primarily sell 151 00:09:35,879 --> 00:09:39,399 them to end users or to businesses or whatever the question is. So get 152 00:09:39,519 --> 00:09:43,519 questions, have two or three questions at least ready when you go into the 153 00:09:43,519 --> 00:09:46,039 interview after researching the company. I like to have a list of certain standard 154 00:09:46,120 --> 00:09:50,679 questions ready. And these are questions that I could ask at any of any 155 00:09:50,679 --> 00:09:54,000 company. So if you forget to do the company research for some reason, 156 00:09:54,080 --> 00:09:56,840 or maybe it's a company you were already familiar with, so you skip that 157 00:09:56,879 --> 00:10:00,720 step, you could still fall back to some of these questions. So when 158 00:10:00,720 --> 00:10:03,240 the interviewer says, what questions do you have? You can go straight to 159 00:10:03,279 --> 00:10:07,080 these and these are just standard questions that are usually appropriate at any company. 160 00:10:07,320 --> 00:10:11,080 Sometimes these questions do get answered naturally during the course of an interview, so 161 00:10:11,159 --> 00:10:13,720 you can skip the ones that have already been answered. But questions I like 162 00:10:13,759 --> 00:10:16,759 to ask things like what techstact does the company use. Do you use Java 163 00:10:16,840 --> 00:10:22,200 or She's c sharp? Are you a Microsoft shop or a Mac place whatever? 164 00:10:22,600 --> 00:10:26,159 Do you use Aws or Google? What project management or agile methodology do 165 00:10:26,159 --> 00:10:30,360 you use? Are you a scrum shop or do you use con bond or 166 00:10:30,399 --> 00:10:33,840 is it a mix your own and do whatever you want sort of place? 167 00:10:33,320 --> 00:10:37,120 Do you do agile? Do you do DevOps? Ask them what DevOps means 168 00:10:37,159 --> 00:10:43,480 to them? Because DevOps has so many meetings around the world, every company 169 00:10:43,559 --> 00:10:46,279 kind of has their own concept. Ask them what they think DevOps means. 170 00:10:46,440 --> 00:10:48,639 Ask them do they have DevOps engineers on each team or do they have a 171 00:10:48,679 --> 00:10:54,000 separate platform team? Ask them questions like this. What a question I like 172 00:10:54,080 --> 00:10:58,360 to ask is what's the main reason I should not work here? And that's 173 00:10:58,360 --> 00:11:03,080 a good way to get I a little bit of an honest response from whoever's 174 00:11:03,120 --> 00:11:05,960 interviewing you. Sometimes it's two or three people. If it is, ask 175 00:11:07,000 --> 00:11:09,679 each of them to answer individually, what's the number one reason I should not 176 00:11:09,759 --> 00:11:13,159 work here? And I asked this at every interview when I'm a candidate, 177 00:11:13,200 --> 00:11:16,279 and I get good answers. So consider that one closely related to the list 178 00:11:16,320 --> 00:11:20,879 of standard questions. I think it's really important to know your deal breakers before 179 00:11:20,879 --> 00:11:24,039 you go into an interview. It's good to be prepared with a list of 180 00:11:24,080 --> 00:11:28,440 things that you absolutely want to have or need to have for your job. 181 00:11:28,720 --> 00:11:33,360 This list often gets longer as you get older, and that's appropriate, but 182 00:11:33,399 --> 00:11:37,399 there probably are some obvious things on your list. No matter the stage of 183 00:11:37,440 --> 00:11:41,039 your career. If you're fresh out of university or you've just taken a boot 184 00:11:41,039 --> 00:11:43,879 camp or something like that, and this is your first tech job, you're 185 00:11:43,879 --> 00:11:45,679 still going to have a list. It might be sure, but you'll have 186 00:11:45,679 --> 00:11:48,960 a list. An obvious thing would be something like what city is it in 187 00:11:48,080 --> 00:11:52,600 or is it remote? You probably don't want a sixteen hour commute every morning 188 00:11:52,639 --> 00:11:54,600 to your job, so geography is going to be an important thing on your 189 00:11:54,639 --> 00:11:58,799 list. Are you willing to commute? Are you willing to relocate? If 190 00:11:58,840 --> 00:12:01,879 the job is sixteen hours away. That would obviously mean actually, you need 191 00:12:01,919 --> 00:12:05,000 to relocate. Are you willing to do that? Are you willing to pay 192 00:12:05,000 --> 00:12:09,240 for the relocation or do you need the company to give you a relocation bonus 193 00:12:09,279 --> 00:12:11,840 if that's what you're going to be doing. Do you need a four day 194 00:12:11,879 --> 00:12:13,600 schedule or a five day schedule or something like that. Maybe you need to 195 00:12:13,639 --> 00:12:18,120 take care of your children, maybe you are still studying. Know your schedule 196 00:12:18,159 --> 00:12:22,320 requirements. Maybe you're willing to work forty hours a week, but it needs 197 00:12:22,360 --> 00:12:24,000 to be on four days a week, you know, four ten hour days 198 00:12:24,039 --> 00:12:28,879 something like that. Know that ahead of time, and be prepared so it 199 00:12:28,960 --> 00:12:31,360 doesn't take you by surprise when they ask you and you're just like, yeah, 200 00:12:31,360 --> 00:12:33,200 okay, whatever, and then later you regret it. Knowing your deal 201 00:12:33,240 --> 00:12:37,360 breakers beforehand, putting them on paper, or at least having them in your 202 00:12:37,399 --> 00:12:43,200 head, is really valuable when it comes time to do negotiations and make an 203 00:12:43,240 --> 00:12:46,279 offer. Do you want a conference budget or a learning budget? Is that 204 00:12:46,320 --> 00:12:50,759 important to you? That usually becomes more important as your career advances. Many 205 00:12:50,759 --> 00:12:52,919 companies offer that. Some will if you ask, I've used that as a 206 00:12:52,960 --> 00:12:56,600 negotiation technique. Maybe they can't give you a pay raise, but they can 207 00:12:56,639 --> 00:13:00,440 offer you an extra thousand dollars per year to go to conferences or something like 208 00:13:00,480 --> 00:13:03,559 that, and anything else you think of. Maybe you want a specific operating 209 00:13:03,600 --> 00:13:09,559 system on your laptop, maybe you want a monitor to maybe you're working from 210 00:13:09,559 --> 00:13:13,200 home and you want a big monitor from them, whatever, whatever is important 211 00:13:13,200 --> 00:13:16,000 to you. Just have your list ready, and you can have a list 212 00:13:16,000 --> 00:13:18,360 of deal breakers and a list of nice to have, but bring those things 213 00:13:18,399 --> 00:13:22,039 up and ask about them. If there's an important deal breaker, be prepared 214 00:13:22,039 --> 00:13:24,320 to ask during the interview if that's going to be a problem for you. 215 00:13:24,080 --> 00:13:28,759 So that's basically my interview preparation. It's those fourth it's not cramming research. 216 00:13:28,799 --> 00:13:31,799 The company have a list of to innered questions and know my deal breakers. 217 00:13:31,799 --> 00:13:35,080 So that's kind of the all I do to prepare for an interview. Once 218 00:13:35,120 --> 00:13:39,440 I'm at the interview at the first stage or so, that's when my mindset 219 00:13:39,639 --> 00:13:43,840 changes a little bit and I'm working on different things mentally. One of the 220 00:13:43,879 --> 00:13:48,159 things I'm looking for at that stage is how they do technical evaluations. In 221 00:13:48,200 --> 00:13:54,279 my view, automated coding challenges are a complete waste of time. Whether it's 222 00:13:54,320 --> 00:13:58,320 hacker brank or leap code or anything like that. It simply does not test 223 00:13:58,759 --> 00:14:03,000 the things that matter on the job. It's high pressure, it makes people 224 00:14:03,039 --> 00:14:07,960 nervous, and it's completely artificial environment. Nobody is going to ask you to 225 00:14:07,000 --> 00:14:11,759 traverse a linked list on the job in thirty minutes. Nobody's ever going to 226 00:14:11,799 --> 00:14:13,519 do that, I promise you. What they will ask you to do is 227 00:14:13,879 --> 00:14:18,840 solve a performance problem in production and do it as quickly as you can. 228 00:14:18,879 --> 00:14:22,200 If it takes thirty minutes or six weeks, do it. So I avoid 229 00:14:22,320 --> 00:14:26,440 hacker rank style questions. If you're early in your career and you just need 230 00:14:26,480 --> 00:14:30,440 a job, maybe go ahead and do it. Not everybody's good at those 231 00:14:30,480 --> 00:14:33,600 tests. Actually I'm not very good at them. It's a lot more of 232 00:14:33,600 --> 00:14:37,240 a mental game than it is a capabilities test, really, So if you 233 00:14:37,320 --> 00:14:41,039 need to and you're good at it, go ahead. Otherwise I just skip 234 00:14:41,080 --> 00:14:46,000 those. I would tell the interviewing manager, I'm sorry, I don't do 235 00:14:46,039 --> 00:14:48,320 tests like that. Well. Actually, there's two options. At this stage 236 00:14:48,360 --> 00:14:52,279 of my career, when it's relatively easy for me to find new offers, 237 00:14:52,440 --> 00:14:56,200 a new new companies interview fat I just passed on those companies. So if 238 00:14:56,200 --> 00:14:58,679 they ask me to do a hacker rank or leak code, I just like 239 00:14:58,960 --> 00:15:01,200 withdraw my candidate to say immediately for the one thing, I don't really want 240 00:15:01,240 --> 00:15:05,960 to be working for a company that uses that as part of their screening because 241 00:15:05,960 --> 00:15:09,240 they're not doing a good job at screening. But if you're looking for if 242 00:15:09,240 --> 00:15:11,879 you really need a job, if you're either desperate or it's your first job, 243 00:15:11,080 --> 00:15:13,519 you can't be that picky, and that's fine. Ask if you could 244 00:15:13,519 --> 00:15:16,720 pass on it, and if not, maybe you do it, maybe you 245 00:15:16,759 --> 00:15:18,840 don't, but you make that call. I don't like those types of tests. 246 00:15:18,919 --> 00:15:22,360 I'm also not a big fan of the take home long term coding tests 247 00:15:22,360 --> 00:15:26,879 where they ask you to write a rest API or to build a small test 248 00:15:26,919 --> 00:15:30,480 app that does something. If you are faced with that, I do have 249 00:15:30,519 --> 00:15:33,399 some advice that might help, although it takes a little while to get there. 250 00:15:33,440 --> 00:15:37,600 I've been coding for many years and I have a couple of open source 251 00:15:37,679 --> 00:15:39,919 projects. One of them has something like three hundred stars on Kithub. So 252 00:15:41,039 --> 00:15:43,879 what I usually do is when somebody asks me to do, whether it's hacker 253 00:15:43,960 --> 00:15:48,480 rank or a take home style coding assignment, I say thank you for offering 254 00:15:48,679 --> 00:15:50,240 offering me to do that, but I think it would be a better use 255 00:15:50,279 --> 00:15:54,279 of both our time if you would review this code that I've already written. 256 00:15:54,399 --> 00:15:58,039 It's much more extensive than anything that I could do in a half day project, 257 00:15:58,440 --> 00:16:00,279 and it gives you a real sense of the code I have written. 258 00:16:00,360 --> 00:16:03,919 And I have had many companies chick me up on that and say thank you, 259 00:16:04,120 --> 00:16:07,279 we'll review that instead. I've also had some say no, we really 260 00:16:07,320 --> 00:16:10,159 want you to do our coding challenge. If they say that, then you 261 00:16:10,200 --> 00:16:11,759 decide whether you want to do the coding challenge or not. If you don't 262 00:16:11,759 --> 00:16:15,080 have an open source project like that, and I'm guessing most of you don't, 263 00:16:15,519 --> 00:16:18,919 that's fine. It doesn't need to be like that. If you can 264 00:16:18,960 --> 00:16:22,519 get some code from a previous job that you're legally allowed to share, you 265 00:16:22,519 --> 00:16:26,799 don't have an NDA or something to keep to you from sharing it. You 266 00:16:26,840 --> 00:16:30,600 could use that if you're in university, uses one of your coding assignments from 267 00:16:30,679 --> 00:16:34,360 university, put that on your GitHub, and point in potential employers to that. 268 00:16:34,480 --> 00:16:37,000 Next time you're asked to do a coding assignment, say I think it 269 00:16:37,000 --> 00:16:38,960 could be a better use of our time if you would review this code. 270 00:16:38,960 --> 00:16:41,720 I already wrote, would you consider that? If you don't have those options, 271 00:16:41,840 --> 00:16:45,559 you could easily do a coding katta. Codecutter dot com has a bunch 272 00:16:45,639 --> 00:16:49,000 of katas, which are basically just little story problems, so to speak. 273 00:16:49,000 --> 00:16:52,559 They're kind of like a hacker Rank style challenge, but usually a little bit 274 00:16:52,600 --> 00:16:56,039 broader, and you do it on your own. Pick one or two that 275 00:16:56,080 --> 00:16:57,240 you like, turn them into some code and put them on GitHub, and 276 00:16:57,480 --> 00:17:00,840 point a recruiter or a high manager to that and ask if they would have 277 00:17:00,879 --> 00:17:03,920 considered that as a last resort. If you simply don't have the time to 278 00:17:03,960 --> 00:17:07,680 do that, maybe you have a family, or you're too busy for whatever 279 00:17:07,720 --> 00:17:10,720 reason. The next time somebody asks you to do a coding challenge, go 280 00:17:10,720 --> 00:17:14,400 ahead and do it, but keep that code and put it up on GitHub. 281 00:17:14,480 --> 00:17:18,200 And then the second time somebody asks you to do a coding challenge, 282 00:17:18,279 --> 00:17:21,359 point them to that and say, I've already written this code. Would you 283 00:17:21,359 --> 00:17:26,079 consider that instead? That will say that will potentially save you many hours of 284 00:17:26,240 --> 00:17:30,880 unnecessary coding during your interview search or during your job search while you're interviewing, 285 00:17:30,920 --> 00:17:34,160 So I highly encourage you to do that. You have the option of deciding 286 00:17:34,160 --> 00:17:41,200 whether or not it's right for you to refuse to continue with the companies that 287 00:17:41,680 --> 00:17:44,759 require a coding challenge. But at least you give them the option and you 288 00:17:44,880 --> 00:17:48,440 might save yourself for eight, ten, twelve hours of coding that isn't necessary 289 00:17:48,680 --> 00:17:52,920 if they're willing to look at some previously written code. During the interview, 290 00:17:52,000 --> 00:17:57,640 I will ask about whether or not or what sort of development environment they use. 291 00:17:57,720 --> 00:18:00,920 And what I mean by that is do they let me choose my own 292 00:18:00,960 --> 00:18:06,920 ide or do they have Maybe they already have a group license for a particular 293 00:18:07,200 --> 00:18:10,160 ID brand and that's that's what they have, and that's all. Maybe you 294 00:18:10,200 --> 00:18:11,559 care about operating system? Do you want to use? Are you a Windows 295 00:18:11,640 --> 00:18:15,720 user? Maybe you're a Mac user? Do you mind switching? If you're 296 00:18:15,759 --> 00:18:18,039 a Windows user and they give you a MacBook, is that going to bother 297 00:18:18,119 --> 00:18:19,720 you? If it does, if you're if you feel less productive, or 298 00:18:19,720 --> 00:18:22,000 you just don't like Mac for some reason, you can ask about that during 299 00:18:22,000 --> 00:18:26,000 the interview and tell them that you really want Windows. Or if you're like 300 00:18:26,079 --> 00:18:29,319 me and you're a Linux user, then maybe it's even more of a contentious 301 00:18:29,359 --> 00:18:32,200 issue. But you know, I really want to work in Linux. I've 302 00:18:32,279 --> 00:18:34,640 I've used Windows in Mac and Linux, and I'm far more productive and Linux, 303 00:18:34,759 --> 00:18:37,720 So for me, that's the choice. But just just have that in 304 00:18:37,759 --> 00:18:40,519 mind what's important to you and ask about it. This is another one of 305 00:18:40,519 --> 00:18:42,480 the questions you can you can make one of your standard questions. Do I 306 00:18:42,480 --> 00:18:45,799 get to choose my operating system? Can I choose my ide? Can I 307 00:18:45,880 --> 00:18:48,960 choose the tools I use? Et cetera, et cetera. Maybe maybe they 308 00:18:49,079 --> 00:18:52,359 let you choose, but they won't pay for it, So ask about that. 309 00:18:52,440 --> 00:18:55,000 You know, if you want to use jet Brains, that's fine, 310 00:18:55,039 --> 00:18:56,799 but you have to buy your own license or something. Ask those questions if 311 00:18:56,799 --> 00:19:00,880 that's important to you. And one of the other things I really, I 312 00:19:00,920 --> 00:19:04,279 really it is a red flag for me during the interview is gotcha trivia type 313 00:19:04,359 --> 00:19:08,839 questions. I was actually in an interview just a year or two ago for 314 00:19:08,880 --> 00:19:14,880 a site reliability engineer role, and the CEO of the company actually asked me 315 00:19:15,119 --> 00:19:18,240 what is the RGB value for yellow? And my mind was blown, like 316 00:19:18,279 --> 00:19:22,680 why would you ask anybody this? Why would you even ask a web designer 317 00:19:22,759 --> 00:19:26,839 or a graphics designer this question. Maybe they know, but it's like there's 318 00:19:26,920 --> 00:19:29,960 there's color pickers and there's Google, just look it up. Nobody needs to 319 00:19:30,000 --> 00:19:33,279 memorize this. There's no reason. And aside from that, who's actually using 320 00:19:33,279 --> 00:19:36,480 pure yellow at a website? Anyway, You're gonna be using some shade. 321 00:19:36,519 --> 00:19:40,519 He also asked me the difference between xhtmail and htmail five, and a whole 322 00:19:40,559 --> 00:19:44,480 slew of other ridiculous questions that just had nothing to do with the job at 323 00:19:44,480 --> 00:19:47,200 hand. I told him several times, I don't see how this relates, 324 00:19:47,240 --> 00:19:49,839 and at the end I just I withdrew my candidacy. I was like, 325 00:19:49,839 --> 00:19:52,880 I'm not going to work for this company. They don't know how engineering works. 326 00:19:52,880 --> 00:19:56,720 They're asking ridiculous, unrelated questions. So I've talked about what I do 327 00:19:56,880 --> 00:20:00,400 to prepare for an interview and how oh I like to do the interview. 328 00:20:00,839 --> 00:20:04,200 Make sure that you have a chance to ask your questions. If they don't 329 00:20:04,200 --> 00:20:07,880 give it to you, ask for it. An easy way to do that 330 00:20:07,079 --> 00:20:11,440 is at the beginning of the interview, during the introductions, they're probably going 331 00:20:11,519 --> 00:20:14,759 to ask you to tell them about yourself. Say here's my history, by 332 00:20:14,799 --> 00:20:15,839 the way, while I have time for questions at the end. If they 333 00:20:15,839 --> 00:20:18,480 don't give you time for questions at the end, and your time is run 334 00:20:18,519 --> 00:20:22,240 out and they're pushing me out of the room. Maybe asked to follow up 335 00:20:22,279 --> 00:20:25,039 by email or if they can stay in extra five or ten minutes to ask 336 00:20:25,039 --> 00:20:27,440 your questions. But make sure you ask your questions. As a hiring manager, 337 00:20:27,720 --> 00:20:32,440 people who ask me questions are impressive. The ones who don't, I 338 00:20:32,480 --> 00:20:34,480 don't have a good opinion of them. So I think I have said enough. 339 00:20:34,640 --> 00:20:37,759 My throat is getting dry. I don't know what else I can talk 340 00:20:37,799 --> 00:20:41,319 about when I'm by myself, so I think we're going to call this an 341 00:20:41,319 --> 00:20:47,720 episode. I guess it's time for picks, so I'll turn it over to 342 00:20:47,759 --> 00:20:51,440 myself to do picks. I'm going to pick. I'm going to promote myself. 343 00:20:51,519 --> 00:20:55,240 Since I'm drying my throat out talking today, I'm going to promote my 344 00:20:55,279 --> 00:20:57,440 own material and we're just going to call her to day. I have a 345 00:20:57,519 --> 00:21:03,200 daily mailing list where I talk about all things related to DevOps and software development. 346 00:21:03,279 --> 00:21:07,359 And I do talk about these topics about how to get a better job, 347 00:21:07,880 --> 00:21:11,119 how to interview, things like that. That comes up fairly frequently. 348 00:21:11,119 --> 00:21:15,240 If you're interested, you can go to Jhall dot io slash Daily. You 349 00:21:15,240 --> 00:21:18,960 can sign up for the list it's completely free. Occasionally I will promote a 350 00:21:19,000 --> 00:21:22,480 paid product on there that I do, but for the most part, it's 351 00:21:22,640 --> 00:21:26,039 just free information. I like to give back to the community, so you're 352 00:21:26,079 --> 00:21:29,359 welcome to do that. I would also like to pick a YouTube channel that 353 00:21:29,480 --> 00:21:34,000 I think is helpful. It's geared more for software development, but really it's 354 00:21:34,000 --> 00:21:37,440 not even about the technical aspect of it, so it's really appropriate for anybody 355 00:21:37,480 --> 00:21:41,759 in tech. It's called Healthy Software Developer. The guy who runs a channel's 356 00:21:41,799 --> 00:21:47,119 name is Jamie Edwards. He's an experienced software engineer. He lives I think 357 00:21:47,119 --> 00:21:49,920 he lives in Texas, and he has a good YouTube channel with a lot 358 00:21:49,960 --> 00:21:57,000 of resources about approaching software development and IT culture and product management and all these 359 00:21:57,039 --> 00:22:00,319 things. All the sort of challenges and struggles we deal with. He addresses 360 00:22:00,319 --> 00:22:03,759 these on his channel, so we'll have links to both of those picks. 361 00:22:03,880 --> 00:22:07,519 Thank you for joining me this week. If you're looking for work, I 362 00:22:07,559 --> 00:22:11,039 wish you the best. I hope that this advice has been useful and we 363 00:22:11,079 --> 00:22:11,920 will see you next time.