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Yes. Any reasonably good programmer can get a job at a FANG company with three months of serious study; any reasonably intelligent person can become a good entr

Yes. Any reasonably good programmer can get a job at a FANG company with three months of serious study; any reasonably intelligent person can become a good entry-level programmer with 1-2 years of serious study. The demand for engineers far outstrips supply.

marcus_holmes 6y ago
I'm over 50 and been working in the industry for >25 years... what are my odds?
- decafninja 6y ago
  Disclaimer: I don't work at a FAANG. However this is my observations from interviewing at FAANGs. Seems random to be honest. Some of my interviewers have been older people. Some of the people waiting with me at lobbies prior to interview have been older people. I'm 38 FYI. Seems your ability to pass the leetcode problems is the most important factor, so long as you don't torpedo yourself with odd behavior during the non-technical portions. For more experienced candidates like yourself and I, I hear the system design round is also important. But your success in that is more difficult to gauge, whereas you kind of know whether you bombed an leetcode round or not. Depressing is that your multiple decades of experience might be absolutely worthless as far as passing leetcode rounds go. Your experience may or may not be useful for the system design round. It's useful if your experience with systems matches that with what the company is looking for. It's useless if not. I've noticed the systems at many non-tech enterprise companies don't exactly align with the systems at newer tech companies.
  - marcus_holmes 6y ago
    Thanks, useful :)
decafninja 6y ago
I've been studying for the past two years and have failed at multiple FAANGs, some twice. Failed at FB, NFLX, AMZN, in addition to MSFT and UBER. Then again, I'm not entry level (10 yoe), so I might be competing at a higher bar. However, I'd gladly join any of these companies as a junior engineer without hesitation. I've seen stories of, amongst others, someone who studied while in prison get into GOOG, someone who was a aesthetician get into NFLX, a cab driver who got into UBER, all as SWEs. I actually wish I wasn't a SWE so I could compete at the entry/junior level. I feel my 10yoe (SWE at investment bank), which gives me a TC only slightly higher than a FAANG junior SWE, is wasted.
- hysan 6y ago
  Same here. I’ve considered wiping my resume and leaving off my background intentionally just to get the chance to interview at the entry/junior level. Of course, those positions are now mostly exclusively reserved for those coming out of college. So unless you have the income and time to go get another CS degree, you still can’t apply. This is all assuming you can get past the resume filter which is all luck unless you know someone with enough pull within the company already.
- dkersten 6y ago
  Why use stock ticker names instead of typing the company names out properly? It literally only takes a second or two longer and is much clearer to read.
  - teddyh 6y ago
    It’s usually signalling. Specifically, it signals “I can afford to invest so much into stocks that I live and breathe stocks, and if you don’t, then I don’t care about you.” It’s a very conceited attitude. Of course, in this case specifically, it might be because they worked for 10 years in an investment bank, and might be used to always speaking about companies in terms of stocks.
- diN0bot 6y ago
  This is a particular kind of challenge that definitely occurs for more experienced engineers, however I also suspect you have a stronger foundation than you realize and could shine with some specific guidance. A buddy and I provide all kinds of practice interviews to help engineers get into FAANGs. We work on a success based payment model, and help substantially with negotiations, too. If you're interested send me a note with availability for a chat (email and website in profile). I would love to at least offer some advice for next time even you decide our coaching is not for you.
- rapfaria 6y ago
  But why would you want to join those companies as a junior engineer?
mywittyname 6y ago
This is kind of depressing for me. I've failed interviews at Amazon, MS, Google and Netflix. I studied a bunch and managed to get 5/5 on all but one section of the TripleByte test.
- the_af 6y ago
  Don't be depressed. It's false that any reasonably good programmer can get a job at those companies. There are plenty of reasons why you may not get a job at any of them (bad luck, peer competition, interview antipatterns (google Yegge on this), maybe algorithms aren't your strong suit, ageism, etc). Even worse, from initial rejections you can spiral down into anxiety that will hinder you in future interviews, and listen to this: you cannot tell a person not to get anxious at the prospect of rejection, either. People who say it's easy are arguing from an optimistic point of view specifically addressed as unhelpful at the start of the article.
- shahbaby 6y ago
  Don't be. There's a lot of luck involved in the interview process and most people who had luck on their side won't understand this.
jfk13 6y ago
> Any reasonably good programmer can get a job at a FANG company with three months of serious study Do we seriously believe there are so many FAANG jobs available that "any reasonably good programmer" who wants one can have one, just for the price of a bit of "serious study"? I don't think so. Google et al may be big, but they're not that big or growing that fast. A great deal of the demand for engineers does not come with anything like FAANG-level prospects.
- decafninja 6y ago
  This. For every junior FAANG engineer, there are legions of senior or staff level equivalent engineers at companies outside of the Silicon Valley style tech/software sector who will retire with their TC topping out at maybe around what a lower-mid level engineer at a mid-top tech company would make.

marcus_holmes 6y ago

I'm over 50 and been working in the industry for >25 years... what are my odds?

decafninja 6y ago
Disclaimer: I don't work at a FAANG. However this is my observations from interviewing at FAANGs. Seems random to be honest. Some of my interviewers have been older people. Some of the people waiting with me at lobbies prior to interview have been older people. I'm 38 FYI. Seems your ability to pass the leetcode problems is the most important factor, so long as you don't torpedo yourself with odd behavior during the non-technical portions. For more experienced candidates like yourself and I, I hear the system design round is also important. But your success in that is more difficult to gauge, whereas you kind of know whether you bombed an leetcode round or not. Depressing is that your multiple decades of experience might be absolutely worthless as far as passing leetcode rounds go. Your experience may or may not be useful for the system design round. It's useful if your experience with systems matches that with what the company is looking for. It's useless if not. I've noticed the systems at many non-tech enterprise companies don't exactly align with the systems at newer tech companies.
- marcus_holmes 6y ago
  Thanks, useful :)

decafninja 6y ago

I've been studying for the past two years and have failed at multiple FAANGs, some twice. Failed at FB, NFLX, AMZN, in addition to MSFT and UBER. Then again, I'm not entry level (10 yoe), so I might be competing at a higher bar. However, I'd gladly join any of these companies as a junior engineer without hesitation. I've seen stories of, amongst others, someone who studied while in prison get into GOOG, someone who was a aesthetician get into NFLX, a cab driver who got into UBER, all as SWEs. I actually wish I wasn't a SWE so I could compete at the entry/junior level. I feel my 10yoe (SWE at investment bank), which gives me a TC only slightly higher than a FAANG junior SWE, is wasted.

hysan 6y ago
Same here. I’ve considered wiping my resume and leaving off my background intentionally just to get the chance to interview at the entry/junior level. Of course, those positions are now mostly exclusively reserved for those coming out of college. So unless you have the income and time to go get another CS degree, you still can’t apply. This is all assuming you can get past the resume filter which is all luck unless you know someone with enough pull within the company already.
dkersten 6y ago
Why use stock ticker names instead of typing the company names out properly? It literally only takes a second or two longer and is much clearer to read.
- teddyh 6y ago
  It’s usually signalling. Specifically, it signals “I can afford to invest so much into stocks that I live and breathe stocks, and if you don’t, then I don’t care about you.” It’s a very conceited attitude. Of course, in this case specifically, it might be because they worked for 10 years in an investment bank, and might be used to always speaking about companies in terms of stocks.
diN0bot 6y ago
This is a particular kind of challenge that definitely occurs for more experienced engineers, however I also suspect you have a stronger foundation than you realize and could shine with some specific guidance. A buddy and I provide all kinds of practice interviews to help engineers get into FAANGs. We work on a success based payment model, and help substantially with negotiations, too. If you're interested send me a note with availability for a chat (email and website in profile). I would love to at least offer some advice for next time even you decide our coaching is not for you.
rapfaria 6y ago
But why would you want to join those companies as a junior engineer?

mywittyname 6y ago

This is kind of depressing for me. I've failed interviews at Amazon, MS, Google and Netflix. I studied a bunch and managed to get 5/5 on all but one section of the TripleByte test.

the_af 6y ago
Don't be depressed. It's false that any reasonably good programmer can get a job at those companies. There are plenty of reasons why you may not get a job at any of them (bad luck, peer competition, interview antipatterns (google Yegge on this), maybe algorithms aren't your strong suit, ageism, etc). Even worse, from initial rejections you can spiral down into anxiety that will hinder you in future interviews, and listen to this: you cannot tell a person not to get anxious at the prospect of rejection, either. People who say it's easy are arguing from an optimistic point of view specifically addressed as unhelpful at the start of the article.
shahbaby 6y ago
Don't be. There's a lot of luck involved in the interview process and most people who had luck on their side won't understand this.

jfk13 6y ago

> Any reasonably good programmer can get a job at a FANG company with three months of serious study Do we seriously believe there are so many FAANG jobs available that "any reasonably good programmer" who wants one can have one, just for the price of a bit of "serious study"? I don't think so. Google et al may be big, but they're not that big or growing that fast. A great deal of the demand for engineers does not come with anything like FAANG-level prospects.

decafninja 6y ago
This. For every junior FAANG engineer, there are legions of senior or staff level equivalent engineers at companies outside of the Silicon Valley style tech/software sector who will retire with their TC topping out at maybe around what a lower-mid level engineer at a mid-top tech company would make.