28 karma · joined July 26, 2018
The skill simply demands concise and well-formatted responses from an agent. It is something demanded by anybody daily-driving agents for their actual job since >75% of the text output from agents is fluff. THis would better be named `/i-wont-read-that-heap-of-garbage`
I was in for a horribly rude awakening. I spent 4 months applying for jobs non-stop through linkedin and company career pages and didn't receive a single response back. Finally, when I was nearly ready to give up and move back to my parents' house, I went on my university's alumni directory and searched for people in the Bay Area working in eng leadership at tech companies. I emailed the first person I found and explained that I was really struggling to get interviews and would be willing to take an internship or work for free if it meant I could get some experience on my resume. I got a response within the day. The guy told me that, while the roles listed on his company's website were filled, his wife was worked in engineering recruiting. He passed my resume along to her and within a day I had 3-4 companies asking for an interview. In the end, I got one final round interview and landed the job. Looking back, if it weren't for that email I likely would have given up and pursued another career path.
In short, my only advice is: completely stop applying to open job listings on linkedin or on a company's career page. Those jobs literally receive thousands of applications and, additionally, there is often a recruiter representing the company who is directly reaching out to the most desirable candidates for that position. There is nothing but disappointment that comes from applying to those jobs and, given we're in a very uncertain economic environment, doing so will only discourage you.
Instead, try to find anyone working in the industry you're targeting with whom you have some loose connection and send them an email. I know that sounds scary and stupid, but you would be surprised at how eager most people are to help others. At the end of the day, most people don't derive that much personal satisfaction from their work, but they do get a lot of satisfaction from helping other people.
Does MIT have an alumni directory where you can search for alumni contact info by industry and location? Are you in a fraternity or any social club that might have older MIT alumni that you could get in touch with? Try sending 2 or 3 people an email and see what happens.
> Most software engineers have a healthy circle of friends and social life.
Huh? OP's allusion to "mild-discomfort" when talking about their career field leads you to respond with the patronizing suggestion that "most software engineers have a healthy circle of friends"? That's an unhelpful and presumptuous piece of advice, especially considering it's directed to someone who is opening up about their current mental health issues
I've worked in a toxic work environment in the past. I don't think any less of the people that I watched quit on short notice after continued mistreatment from management; in fact I respected them for not putting up with any more crap when the didn't need to. Assuming this environment is as toxic as described by OP, it's important to remember that many of your coworkers around you will empathize with your decision and respect you standing up to the manager that they too resent.
I'm not sure if it's a recent phenomenon or if it's something that makes itself apparent in young adulthood, but I can't help but notice how many people frame their hobbies and extra-work activities in terms of their ability to maximize personal potential and provide some measurable personal profit. I'm certainly not exempt from this thought-pattern, and I think it takes a serious toll on one's mental well-being. When every bit of your free time must be driven towards some worthwhile pursuit that will provide some measurable benefit, you rob yourself of actually cultivating a genuine hobby: an activity that you pursue for its own sake and enjoyment, and not for some additional gain as a result of practicing said activity
"The other alternative really boils down to a belief that it would be best if humans weren't around." - This too is overly reductive and amounts to nothing more than a straw man's argument. Are you to suggest that the only way to reduce pollution and environmental impact is to get rid of people entirely? How about tightening emissions standards, banning/taxing destructive materials like plastic, putting immense taxes on dirty energy? All of these measures are oft talked about, half-heartedly implemented for the most part, and could do much to reduce our impact all without addressing the population (not that that isn't an issue in and of itself.
The problem with the argument that we should just plow ahead full steam, hope that we can technologically solve our way out of the problem, and then clean up the mess afterwards is that we don't actually know if the problems will be solvable in a couple of decades when the time arrives. We simply don't know if this will work and the further destruction that happens in the meantime will make the challenge all the greater. For example the risk of armed conflict due to resource scarcity or famine (look at Syria right now) or the unforeseen consequences of fully collapsed fisheries and desertification of farmland is a very real one, and should be viewed as a direct danger of climate destruction. We do know, however, that taking extreme measures to reduce emissions and our environmental impact in the present will make this problem easier to solve. I simply don't understand how some find it valid to respond to such an impending risk with nonchalant suggestions that we'll simply solve this one later.