Rejected at a lot of companies
I am trying to look out for a job.. I have been practicing with leetcode for about 5 months now. I was weak in a few areas. But even after doing mock interviews.. I can't seem to convert any of them into an offer.. I have got rejected onsite from Uber Amazon Cavium Arista Microsoft. I need some advice from you people on what am I doing wrong?
What did you learn/realize from your interviews..
What I learned from the interviews is that some expect the answer at first shot.. they don't expect you to think through the process.. Also.. single mistake is not tolerated.. like Uber.. I fumbled in a design interview.. but recovered yet got rejected because of bad performance on that round
Also with Google.. phone screen.. I solved the answer correctly.. everything was good.. they rejected me at phone screen saying needed more efficient approach.. despite solving it in the most efficient way possible
Keep trying. 5 rejections isn't bad at all. Don't shoot for top brands immediately. The competition is too severe. Shoot for nonames with comparable comp then move later.
Tough transition. I made the transition in the reverse earlier in my career (Dev to infrastructure). If you are dead set on going this route, maybe get your feet wet with a smaller company or maybe a college/university doing C++ / python.
I have a master's degree.. college is a bit out for me
As an employer... they hire developers and can’t compete with the big shops salary wise. You get experience and confidence, then loop back in a year.
The number of rejections are not that bad, but as others mentioned you should focus on the 2nd tier first. This way you hone your interview skills, become more confident, etc. Keep trying is all I can say, never give up (BTW that is one of Gayle's advice)
Thanks.. I will try to do this
I was rejected 10 times before I landed here. So don't lose hope OP. Also I was in Cisco.
I have friends who are at google/amazon right now but were initially rejected from more than 10 Companies before. Some people are just not good at interviews. They realized that and took help. I think one of them took the personal coaching offered by careercup. It really helped. They aced multiple interviews after the coaching. You might want to try it
In many cases people just underestimate the amount of preparation necessary to pass a compatetive technical interview, but that doesn't seem to be your problem. Other blockers I can imagine: * you said something wrong during a culture fit interview * your (whiteboard) coding wasn't fluent enough * you did well with one coding question, but the interviewer wanted to ask two questions in the same amount of time * despite great interview performance, your relevant experience developing software places you in a junior role, but the jobs you apply for are very senior In summary, it seems you didn't get enough feedback from mock and real interviews to understand what piece is missing. Not sure how you mock interviewed, but my advice would be to pay for professional help, e.g. Interview Kickstart.
You are quite Right.. a lot of times recruiter do not give detailed feedback.. like Amazon.. just reject mail then nothing else.. Uber and MS gave some detail as to what went wrong.. so yes you are right I need to zero on the missing secret sauce
Interview Kickstart is brilliantly done. My roomie was in a very similar situation. They helped him get past that. He just got an offer at FB.
Not that you shouldn't move into software but wouldn't it be easier to transfer companies into system infra, then do a really good job for one year, before transferring teams internally? Recruiters usually tell you that you can change roles or change companies but that it's hard to do both, at once. (Software for mid career also expects a certain amount of job readiness already being there)
Good answer.. I am also trying to do that.. have applied to other companies for system infra
what do you do in your current job? how are the jobs you apply for different from that? does what you are studying bridge that gap?
I am in system infra of routers dealing with hardware/software.. I am looking to move it to other software-only products preferably in C++/python