3 ms·

You think preparation alone can get you in the Big4? Obviously you are very smart if you passed every single one of their interviews multiple times. Hard work a

by toephu2 10y ago

You think preparation alone can get you in the Big4? Obviously you are very smart if you passed every single one of their interviews multiple times. Hard work alone won't get you there. Just curious, so where do you work now?

dlp211 10y ago
I do think that hard work and preparation can land you a job at these companies. I went from doing a manual labor job and never making over $33k/yr, to busting my hump 4 years in University to land these jobs. I also recognize that interviewing is its own skill that needs to be worked at, and simply doing LeetCode questions or reading Intro to Algorithms by CLRS isn't everything. I can honestly say that I have never had all the interviews go my way during a loop. I have been given problems where I could only find the naive solution. I have been in an interview where I made it through the first teaser question to be completely stumped by the second question. And I have made really ridiculous coding mistakes like increment the string variable instead of the index variable. But I also manage to never beat myself up about these mistakes, always talk about what I'm thinking during the interview, listen and try to apply the hints that the interviewer gives me, and have pleasantries with the other person during the interview. I dress well, always with a fresh haircut and clean shaved face, wear deodorant and take a shower the morning of an interview, and walk with good posture, because I do think that these things matter. I do also believe in the interviewer anti-loop (see Steve Yegge's blog[1]), but I also think that it doesn't really matter unless you really want to work for a specific one of these large tech companies. I currently work at Microsoft and just finished interviewing with a couple of the other large tech companies and have pending offers from them. I don't know, maybe I am smart, but when I see people like Andrei Alexandrescu or Mark Russinovich speak, or watch a video of Grace Hopper explain how she demo'd nanoseconds to military generals, I feel like an idiot compared to those people. I personally think you obviously have to have problem solving skills, but also gumption and a can-do attitude goes a long way. [1] http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-google.html http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-goog...

by toephu2 10y ago

dlp211 10y ago

I do think that hard work and preparation can land you a job at these companies. I went from doing a manual labor job and never making over $33k/yr, to busting my hump 4 years in University to land these jobs. I also recognize that interviewing is its own skill that needs to be worked at, and simply doing LeetCode questions or reading Intro to Algorithms by CLRS isn't everything. I can honestly say that I have never had all the interviews go my way during a loop. I have been given problems where I could only find the naive solution. I have been in an interview where I made it through the first teaser question to be completely stumped by the second question. And I have made really ridiculous coding mistakes like increment the string variable instead of the index variable. But I also manage to never beat myself up about these mistakes, always talk about what I'm thinking during the interview, listen and try to apply the hints that the interviewer gives me, and have pleasantries with the other person during the interview. I dress well, always with a fresh haircut and clean shaved face, wear deodorant and take a shower the morning of an interview, and walk with good posture, because I do think that these things matter. I do also believe in the interviewer anti-loop (see Steve Yegge's blog[1]), but I also think that it doesn't really matter unless you really want to work for a specific one of these large tech companies. I currently work at Microsoft and just finished interviewing with a couple of the other large tech companies and have pending offers from them. I don't know, maybe I am smart, but when I see people like Andrei Alexandrescu or Mark Russinovich speak, or watch a video of Grace Hopper explain how she demo'd nanoseconds to military generals, I feel like an idiot compared to those people. I personally think you obviously have to have problem solving skills, but also gumption and a can-do attitude goes a long way. [1] http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-google.html http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-goog...