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Hey goons! Navigating my first CS job search and hoping for some advice. Google invited me to their coding challenge. I passed it, and I'm currently scheduling an on-site interview for Software Engineering in between furiously practicing code on a whiteboard. It'd be an amazing job, but obviously I can't rely on getting an offer, so about applying to other jobs: 1. Would passing the Google coding challenge and getting an interview be worth working into my resume as a credential, considering my lack of experience? Or would that be counterproductive/tacky? Something like "solved a series of increasingly complex graph theory, combinatorics, algorithm, and optimization problems to earn an on-site interview at Google." 2. Is it frowned upon to apply to two different positions at the same company? I'd like to try for jobs in data but I'd certainly be interested in straight development positions as well, and the latter seem way more tractable with my level of experience. I'm just worried about sending a mixed message. Chomposaur fucked around with this message at 05:17 on Aug 29, 2015 |
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Aug 29, 2015 02:04
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| # ¿ May 17, 2024 02:43 |
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Thanks, both of you! Those answers definitely make sense.
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Aug 29, 2015 02:47
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This is a while back now but thanks everyone for the advice! Y'all made good points about not making companies feel like backups if/when a "big name" interview falls through. Especially since it's not true; there are a lot of companies out there doing interesting things in more appealing (to me) locations. With that in mind, I polished my projects up to PEP 8, added a couple blog posts, did a lot more coding challenges and whiteboard practice, and generally feel more confident about what I want. I'm going to start sending out apps this week in earnest. Hopefully some of them turn into interviews. Also, some of these code challenge websites get crazy! I decided to try a "hard" problem and next thing I knew, I had blown a couple hours learning and implementing the Needleman-Wunsch DNA alignment algorithm... despite packages for it already existing. It was interesting practice with dynamic programming. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. Just have to work on bringing some balance back into my life. There is so much to learn that I have become a hermit for the past couple months. Which is probably why this is turning into a blog post. So I will stop.
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Sep 13, 2015 07:29
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As an extra example, if you get something like "1123231134323", the answer would be 13!/(4!*3!*5!) distinct arrangements, because there are 13 total numbers, but "1" gets repeated 4 times, "2" gets repeated 3 times, and "3" gets repeated 5 times. If you're getting lots of combinatorics questions though, it'd be worth going through Khan Academy and learning the intuition behind this stuff because there are lots of slightly different flavors.
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Sep 22, 2015 03:02
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Finished my Google on site. I honestly have no idea how it went. There were some scheduling issues so some of them were cut short, but I got through at least one question with all of them. My biggest enemy was the sleepless night before, but I'm hoping my excitement and adrenaline came through more than sleepiness. It was surprisingly fun and collaborative though, and I'm less worried about interviewing now that I've done it. Onto the next one!
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Sep 29, 2015 16:12
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So recently I've been doing some three hour drives to get in for on-sites, mostly with medium-sized startups, and the financial cost of gas and parking is definitely a consideration for me. Is it a faux pas to ask if a company provides some transportation reimbursement after they ask me to come in? I figured that the worst they'd tell me is no, but one of my older relatives seemed horrified that I'd be presumptuous enough to ask.
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Oct 18, 2015 02:29
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The other thing is seriously, seriously, seriously don't take job requirements at face value, and don't put off applying until you're "ready". The best thing that happened to me in my job search was a nice person on Reddit smacking some sense into me on that. This dude has a pretty good version of that talk. Sure, practice algorithms on a whiteboard and do some projects to stay sharp, but applying for jobs is something you do in parallel with building your skills, and interviewing is a skill that you learn by doing (plus, the worst outcome is "no, try again next year").
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Oct 19, 2015 20:14
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Thanks goons for your help on my first job search (including the OP)! A place I really like called to let me know the details of an offer they're extending, and I'm waiting to hear back from a couple more places to see what they might offer (or not). There's a delay of a couple days before the written offer, ostensibly because of logistics with the CEO, but I don't think it means anything. I'm just gonna be stressed until I put my name on a contract. Cicero posted:After much, much anxiety*, just got the promo from SWE 2 -> SWE 3 with glowing peer reviews & committee feedback; no longer junior, I am now officially a ~*~mid-level~*~ engineer. Speaking of OP, congrats!
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Oct 31, 2015 04:00
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I taught myself Python just this year and had pretty good success (albeit mostly for data engineering rather than data sci). It's totally doable. I had a lot of luck with data driven startups, and every one that got back to me cited my projects, cover letter, and website. Even a Big Gaming Company read my cover letter and looked at my website. I think coming from a non-traditional background, the projects are important to show that you can actually code/perform analysis, and the cover letter helps explain your trajectory. You need good answers for "why are you switching careers," "why data," etc. There's also a lot of emphasis on communication skills, culture fit, and enthusiasm for learning new stuff/doing data work. My experience interviewing is that the data positions tended to get softball coding questions, but it's worth doing a little whiteboard practice so that you don't get caught out by Fibonacci or some Fizzbuzz poo poo. IMO, just start showing up to those networking events. I've found the CS community to be pretty supportive, and the Women In CS community is probably even more so. Make contacts, explain where you're at, ask them about their work, ask for some guidance or if they know of any opportunities. Do one or two fun projects for your own practice, for something interesting to talk about, to show your enthusiasm, and to slap on a resume. I'd be happy to talk to you about the places I applied and the kinds of interviews I got in PMs.
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Nov 5, 2015 20:39
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TheOtherContraGuy posted:I read The Master Algorithm by Pedro Domingos and it's got me obsessed with machine learning and data science. I would love to help push the fields forward but I have a suspicion that I'll need at least a master's degree before anyone would seriously consider for that type of position. Has anyone here tried doing an online master's while working full time? Would it be worth pursuing a formal computer science degree? How can I make myself a more attractive candidate? As someone with an MS, I was able to get offers at smaller shops where the main job was data engineering with an eye towards working on some ML stuff, but it was unlikely to push the field forward. If you are really really committed to doing research and pushing the field forward, that's the entire point of a PhD. The research-heavy positions that I looked at all listed PhDs as a hard requirement. That's a hell of a commitment though, so I'd start with something like Kaggle as greatZebu mentioned. I have seen a couple places using Kaggle standings as a recruitment tool, and obviously on Kaggle you're free to experiment with whatever algorithms and tools you want.
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Nov 14, 2015 23:55
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| # ¿ May 17, 2024 02:43 |
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huhu posted:I will say, I have discussed my website in several interviews but that's only because it's the third thing on my resume after my name and GitHub. I have had it run the gamut -- people who haven't even looked at my resume, to people who were quoting my cover letter at me. I think having a website with some interesting visualizations helped me out some, because I was able to whip it out in interviews if we finished questions early and show them some (ostensibly) neat stuff.
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Aug 14, 2017 16:41
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