Today I want to talk about my current job search. Last week, I had two interviews for companies that I would have really liked to work for. Each interview was a 1-hour technical assessment. Unfortunately, the interviews did not go as well as I had hoped. After having some time to reflect, I have identified some key areas of improvement that I need to focus on in order to increase my chances for success in the future.
Stay Calm
In one of the interviews, I was given a fairly challenging problem which I had never seen before. I had 30 minutes to figure it out before moving on to the next problem in the interview. I made some progress on the problem, but in my mind I felt like I was struggling and did not do well. Because of this, I started panicking which made it hard to think clearly. The second problem I was given in the interview was much easier but because I was panicking, I performed poorly on that problem as well.
From that experience, I know for the future that no matter how poorly the interview is going, I need to stay cool and stay in the moment. I do not know how the interviewers are grading each question. It is possible that they may not have even expected me to fully solve that problem, but they wanted to see my thought process and how I handled pressure. If that was the case, then I still could have had a good interview if I kept my composure going into the second question.
Abstract away the details
In these interviews, some of the problems were presented in a confusing way and I had a hard time figuring out what they were even asking me to do. Each time this happened, the answer ultimately was very simple if I was just able to understand the question that was being asked. I think my solution to this issue will be to ask better questions – forget all the irrelevant details and the context provided with the question. What exactly is it that I’m trying to solve?
Practice, practice, practice
Whether I like it or not, it feels like a big portion of the interview process has been gamified. If you don’t practice LeetCode, you likely won’t have much success. I have been practicing LeetCode, but I can still do more and put more of an emphasis on it during my interview prep. I am surprised by my lack of success with these recent interviews because I did well in most of my interviews when I was looking for an internship. The questions I’ve encountered when looking for a fulltime job have been much more difficult and I clearly need to spend more time practicing challenging problems.
If I am able to get through the technical portions of these interviews, I feel good about my chances for landing a job. I have always been good at discussing my past experience and answering general interview questions. I just need to reach that part of the interview!
