Ask HN: I don't like technical interview, how do I go about getting a new job? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: I don't like technical interview, how do I go about getting a new job?

9 pointsNhanH8 comments

Background: I graduated two years ago, and has been working at a startup since then. Due to personal circumstances, I have been looking for a new job in the last month. I got two phone interview with Google and Snapchat thanks to internal referrals, and my conclusion was simply that I can't think for my life during the phone interview -- I don't know if I will do better with on site interview.

The excuses (reasons) can be numerous: living in REPL and Emacs make me looks like an idiot on normal text editor, personal issue is causing my confidence to be all-time-low right now. Anyway, assuming that I'm half competent, I'd like to preserve my sanity and do away with the (technical) interview altogether.

I'm not at the point where I can just be hired based on credentials/past work yet. Likewise, my network is no where near enough to make a hire recommendation that can just skip interview -- I hope that it will be the case a few years from now, but not right now. That said, is it realistic, and how can I find a job without technical interview (ie whiteboard/ google Docs coding)?

My current job title is "Lead Software Engineer" (I was first engineering hire), although I don't manage anyone directly and is still individual contributor. I'm just looking for another SE job, obviously. Probably not junior level, but I don't really know how "senior" normal senior job is.

Take technical interviewing head on. You can't have fear and worries run your life.

Unless you have a strong network, (or a personal brand) and people who have worked with your prior recommending you, it's unlikely that you will be able to escape some sort of technical screen early in your career. Especially if you are in the valley (are you?)

Some other ways to mitigate the screen that you could try, are:

1. Giving talks on a certain topic you are passionate about and can do well. 2. Writing and maintaining a blog on those same topics.

Even then, it's unlikely that you will be able to totally bypass a technical screen for a developer role at a company worth working for (simply because they are getting a lot of applications and hence they just need a decent way of filtering candidates).

In the long run, it's better to take technical interviewing by the horns. Learn it, practice is, focus on it, and get it over with. There are books, there are websites, there are friends, and then there are classroom courses (Disclaimer: I run InterviewKickstart.com, which is a classroom course).

Most companies fail to compensate for confidence bias at the interview stage, which is what I'm guessing has bitten you here. It's not a problem which is going to go away soon, sadly.

The way I see it you've got two options:

Firstly you could try to work around the problem: Find companies with enlightened hiring practices. Find second-rate companies who aren't so fussy. Start your own thing. Or get your Github/OSS profile up to the point where work comes to you.

Secondly you could address the problem, which (assuming I've understood correctly) is confidence under pressure. You could talk to a professional therapist or coach. You could try rejection therapy. You could book yourself some technical speaking engagements. Maybe taking up an adrenaline sport might help?

Just some thoughts. I'm not a professional therapist/coach. I don't know you, etc. etc.

Thank you.

It isn't strictly confidence under pressure, I'm just having a general existential confidence issue right now. And unfortunately I don't see it changing in the short term. Partly also the reason why I don't want to continue doing more interviews.

Not sure what your physical exercise options are like but I believe there's evidence to suggest that things like sport can improve confidence. If it's an option you should seriously consider it.

Otherwise (and I have no idea what's available) you might get some benefit from talking to the medical profession. I don't usually like pharmaceutical solutions, but this sounds like it's badly affecting your quility of life.

You need to address this otherwise you're increasing your exposure to depression, etc.

> I don't really know how "senior" normal senior job is.

At startups, "senior" can mean you've worked at one other company before. At big companies, "senior" means you have 20 years of experience in the real world. At medium companies, "senior" can be anywhere in-between.

> hired based on credentials/past work yet.

Most cargo cult hiring practices these days only focus on one 20 minute coding session to evaluate you. Few companies consider any past accomplishments in immediate hiring decisions. It's kinda sad.

> living in REPL and Emacs

That's the killer right there. Most people code by "write code, see if it works, write more code." But during an interview, they want you to write a complete working theoretic algorithm with no "it works" feedback. So, you're constantly under pressure of a persistent, and growing, doubt about "does this thing even work? I can't run it in this shared document!"

Coding interviews are a teaching position not a coding evaluation. It really doesn't make sense to evaluate a programmer on how well they operate while being immediately judged based on what they type. I'm paid for _results_, not my flailing process that kinda makes everybody look incompetent anyway.

There's no solution for you besides interview at 10+ places. Employers think they are special (above you) and they think interview candidates are disposable. Employers aren't there to treat you with respect or kindness as a candidate, they are there to see if you are one of the 0.0001% top people in the world, even though after you get hired, you'll probably be doing the same CRUD work and email writing as someone who doesn't even know what a for loop does.

Keep interviewing until you find good companies without crap interviews.

Here's a soft-skills interview question to think about: "If you wanted something that required a skill you don't have, how would you go about obtaining that skill?" -- "Can you give an example of a time in your life you set a big goal and achieved it? How did you approach it?"

You probably can't fix technical interviewing, but you can practice it and get better at it. And, if you are a good programmer, the part you are missing is small comparatively.

> my network is no where near enough to make a hire recommendation

The obstacle is the way. Start carving out time for strategic networking. Go to meet-ups, conferences, workshops. Make a point to chat with 2-3 people at each event. Suprisingly, these can lead to serendipitous introductions.

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