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This is exactly what happened to me when I quit. “Now I’ll have time for my projects!!” Instead it’s been “Grokking Algorithms”, “The Competitive Programmers

This is exactly what happened to me when I quit. “Now I’ll have time for my projects!!” Instead it’s been “Grokking Algorithms”, “The Competitive Programmers Handbook”, Alex Xu’s “System Design”, and enough leetcode that I’m actually doing more than I did at work. What sucks is that there are still lots of medium problems I cannot do. Hards are right out. Dunno what I’ll do.

martythemaniak 4y ago
Not a widely shared opinion here, but this process will make you a better engineer. Keep at it.
- carlmr 4y ago
  I see this all the time, "coding interviews suck", "leetcode doesn't test if you're a good coder", but in the end it's better than nothing, and having worked at places without coding interviews there's almost no bottom to people's abilities. So a low, but existing, floor is a good thing.
  - vsareto 4y ago
    The biggest issue IMO is lack of flexibility. Leetcode is a specific format with specific questions, but is not necessarily the work you'll do day-to-day. What would be great is if companies offered multiple formats including leetcode, take home, pair programming, Github review, project review, just talking, etc.
    - shagie 4y ago
      There are several issues that leetcode solves that the other ones don't work as well with or have flaws that prevent their use in some hiring processes. Leetcode has a single rubric. The same questions and the same answers. Conducting it has minimal additional effort on the employer's side. It does have false negatives, but it has fewer false positives. Take homes are often similar to leetcode, but some less scrupulous companies have used them for unpaid work (note that this becomes more and more of an issue as the take home becomes more and more relevant to hiring company) the and unless the interviewer has done the take home themselves to benchmark it (this should take between 1-2 hours), it is possible that the request be "do this thing that will take 20 hours." GitHub review requires that the person have a GitHub project of sufficient size, that it isn't just copied from someone else and that they have time to work on it. There's a joke in /r/adventofcode that shows a GH repo that only has activity in December. With pair programming, project review, and just talking the lack of a rubic becomes an issue and it becomes more likely that biases get into the interviewing process and leads to possible issues of discrimination. When mixing any of these so that some people do leetcode, others do pair programming then it becomes an issue that not everyone is considered using the same scale and those biases and discrimination issues become even more something that legal starts wondering about if they'll have to deal with a lawsuit. If one person can do the interview with "just talking", then that should be the same criteria that everyone uses (no leetcode) and "just talking" has an abysmal false positive rate.
- throwawaysleep 4y ago
  Memorizing decks of leetcode problems improved your engineering skills?
  - the_doctah 4y ago
    Shockingly, sometimes Software Engineers are asked to write algorithms for their job.
    - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
      And you don’t resort to memorized algorithms when that happens. You research.
    - awa 4y ago
      Frankly, Leetcode seems like a more objective test to me than a panel of interviewer grinding me on behavioral questions checklist.
    - throwawaysleep 4y ago
      And you would never plunk down a memorized verbatim fix in such a scenario.
      - the_doctah 4y ago
        No, but I'd be far more likely to choose the appropriate data structure or canned algo since I know how they all work
  - amusedcyclist 4y ago
    Who said anything about memorizing
- eulers_secret 4y ago
  You're definitely correct, I've learned a lot while practicing leetcode. Especially about my chosen language (Python). I do feel I'm a better engineer because of it. I don't think much of what I've learned will be useful in the day-to-day SWE grind. It's really quite interesting, but I cannot recall ever having to remember the skeleton of an iterative DFS before now. I've taken away more useful lessons from system design studying. If I had my way, I'd spend more timing finishing "Designing Data Intensive Applications" (AWESOME book), instead of figuring out why my oranges aren't rotting correctly or trying to remember how to solve the coin problem using dynamic programming instead of a greedy algo. On the plus side, once I've got a good memory base and can solve random Mediums and some Hards, I should be OK to pass basically any technical interview - barring random chance. Right now I took a break for xmas and need to go back to it, and that is the hardest part :)
fein 4y ago
What situation are people in that they have to result to this? Is this an issue with getting laid off and trying to find a FAANG job? I was laid off from one consulting company back in 2018 or so and had a new gig with more pay a week or so later. No leetcode or dev tests, just talking with people in phone interviews. It was a company I had previously done contract work for, and they called me, but nothing at the FAANG level. Is it an experience issue (are the people getting laid off junior devs?), because I had maybe 6 years of dev experience across various stacks by that time. In my 10 years of being an employed dev, I have never had to do leetcode interviews.
- Swizec 4y ago
  Unpopular opinion: If you’re competing for a cattle job, you have to do leetcode. If you want to be a pet, you have to stand out to people who are looking for you (what you have to offer), not just any fungible developer with a pulse. The challenge is that cattle jobs in tech have historically paid very well thanks to the free money environment. It looks initially like the right strategy: Cushy job, cushy work, much money. But the glass ceiling is hard and you won’t see it coming until suddenly you’ve had the same day-to-day for 10 years and no amount of grinding leetcode gets you to the next level. Fortunately standing out is easy: My girlfriend got a (not-coding) FAANG-level job out of 2000 applicants in part by being one of the three people who actually read the job description and could hold an insightful conversation about what she can bring to the table.
- anon50118810 4y ago
  In very large part what your interviews look like depends heavily on when and where you're searching, what type of job you want and what your background is. It's hard to overstate this. 2018 might as well be an entirely different universe. That said I would be a little suspicious as a mid/senior-level developer if I got hired at a place that didn't ask me to do any coding for them at all beforehand.
  - nicoburns 4y ago
    > That said I would be a little suspicious as a mid/senior-level developer if I got hired at a place that didn't ask me to do any coding for them at all beforehand. I'd be suspicious if they didn't ask me to do any coding, but I'd be just as suspicious if the coding they asked me to do was leetcode.
the_only_law 4y ago
God I wish I could get to suffer leetcode interviews, but right now I can’t even get past automated ATS screens.
krumpet 4y ago
I was in the exact same situation. What I did was take a web manager job at a non-profit. I run their Wordpress website. It isn't what I was hoping for when I left marketing in the SAAS space, but it's a start and I finally enjoy going to work. I have complete autonomy in this role and am setting things up so I'm not just managing a WP site, but actually working on the code base and learning as I go. My thinking is it's better to get paid to learn than grind Leetcode at home (which I did for six long months).

martythemaniak 4y ago

Not a widely shared opinion here, but this process will make you a better engineer. Keep at it.

carlmr 4y ago
I see this all the time, "coding interviews suck", "leetcode doesn't test if you're a good coder", but in the end it's better than nothing, and having worked at places without coding interviews there's almost no bottom to people's abilities. So a low, but existing, floor is a good thing.
- vsareto 4y ago
  The biggest issue IMO is lack of flexibility. Leetcode is a specific format with specific questions, but is not necessarily the work you'll do day-to-day. What would be great is if companies offered multiple formats including leetcode, take home, pair programming, Github review, project review, just talking, etc.
  - shagie 4y ago
    There are several issues that leetcode solves that the other ones don't work as well with or have flaws that prevent their use in some hiring processes. Leetcode has a single rubric. The same questions and the same answers. Conducting it has minimal additional effort on the employer's side. It does have false negatives, but it has fewer false positives. Take homes are often similar to leetcode, but some less scrupulous companies have used them for unpaid work (note that this becomes more and more of an issue as the take home becomes more and more relevant to hiring company) the and unless the interviewer has done the take home themselves to benchmark it (this should take between 1-2 hours), it is possible that the request be "do this thing that will take 20 hours." GitHub review requires that the person have a GitHub project of sufficient size, that it isn't just copied from someone else and that they have time to work on it. There's a joke in /r/adventofcode that shows a GH repo that only has activity in December. With pair programming, project review, and just talking the lack of a rubic becomes an issue and it becomes more likely that biases get into the interviewing process and leads to possible issues of discrimination. When mixing any of these so that some people do leetcode, others do pair programming then it becomes an issue that not everyone is considered using the same scale and those biases and discrimination issues become even more something that legal starts wondering about if they'll have to deal with a lawsuit. If one person can do the interview with "just talking", then that should be the same criteria that everyone uses (no leetcode) and "just talking" has an abysmal false positive rate.
throwawaysleep 4y ago
Memorizing decks of leetcode problems improved your engineering skills?
- the_doctah 4y ago
  Shockingly, sometimes Software Engineers are asked to write algorithms for their job.
  - TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
    And you don’t resort to memorized algorithms when that happens. You research.
  - awa 4y ago
    Frankly, Leetcode seems like a more objective test to me than a panel of interviewer grinding me on behavioral questions checklist.
  - throwawaysleep 4y ago
    And you would never plunk down a memorized verbatim fix in such a scenario.
    - the_doctah 4y ago
      No, but I'd be far more likely to choose the appropriate data structure or canned algo since I know how they all work
- amusedcyclist 4y ago
  Who said anything about memorizing
eulers_secret 4y ago
You're definitely correct, I've learned a lot while practicing leetcode. Especially about my chosen language (Python). I do feel I'm a better engineer because of it. I don't think much of what I've learned will be useful in the day-to-day SWE grind. It's really quite interesting, but I cannot recall ever having to remember the skeleton of an iterative DFS before now. I've taken away more useful lessons from system design studying. If I had my way, I'd spend more timing finishing "Designing Data Intensive Applications" (AWESOME book), instead of figuring out why my oranges aren't rotting correctly or trying to remember how to solve the coin problem using dynamic programming instead of a greedy algo. On the plus side, once I've got a good memory base and can solve random Mediums and some Hards, I should be OK to pass basically any technical interview - barring random chance. Right now I took a break for xmas and need to go back to it, and that is the hardest part :)

fein 4y ago

What situation are people in that they have to result to this? Is this an issue with getting laid off and trying to find a FAANG job? I was laid off from one consulting company back in 2018 or so and had a new gig with more pay a week or so later. No leetcode or dev tests, just talking with people in phone interviews. It was a company I had previously done contract work for, and they called me, but nothing at the FAANG level. Is it an experience issue (are the people getting laid off junior devs?), because I had maybe 6 years of dev experience across various stacks by that time. In my 10 years of being an employed dev, I have never had to do leetcode interviews.

Swizec 4y ago
Unpopular opinion: If you’re competing for a cattle job, you have to do leetcode. If you want to be a pet, you have to stand out to people who are looking for you (what you have to offer), not just any fungible developer with a pulse. The challenge is that cattle jobs in tech have historically paid very well thanks to the free money environment. It looks initially like the right strategy: Cushy job, cushy work, much money. But the glass ceiling is hard and you won’t see it coming until suddenly you’ve had the same day-to-day for 10 years and no amount of grinding leetcode gets you to the next level. Fortunately standing out is easy: My girlfriend got a (not-coding) FAANG-level job out of 2000 applicants in part by being one of the three people who actually read the job description and could hold an insightful conversation about what she can bring to the table.
anon50118810 4y ago
In very large part what your interviews look like depends heavily on when and where you're searching, what type of job you want and what your background is. It's hard to overstate this. 2018 might as well be an entirely different universe. That said I would be a little suspicious as a mid/senior-level developer if I got hired at a place that didn't ask me to do any coding for them at all beforehand.
- nicoburns 4y ago
  > That said I would be a little suspicious as a mid/senior-level developer if I got hired at a place that didn't ask me to do any coding for them at all beforehand. I'd be suspicious if they didn't ask me to do any coding, but I'd be just as suspicious if the coding they asked me to do was leetcode.

the_only_law 4y ago

God I wish I could get to suffer leetcode interviews, but right now I can’t even get past automated ATS screens.

krumpet 4y ago

I was in the exact same situation. What I did was take a web manager job at a non-profit. I run their Wordpress website. It isn't what I was hoping for when I left marketing in the SAAS space, but it's a start and I finally enjoy going to work. I have complete autonomy in this role and am setting things up so I'm not just managing a WP site, but actually working on the code base and learning as I go. My thinking is it's better to get paid to learn than grind Leetcode at home (which I did for six long months).