10 ms·
The “one that works out” can also give you a misrepresentation of how the world works and a false sense of how lucky one should expect to be over a long period
by throwaway643384 10mo ago
The “one that works out” can also give you a misrepresentation of how the world works and a false sense of how lucky one should expect to be over a long period of time.
At an earlier point in my life, I had been applying to many well-known big tech companies right out of school (not a top school either). I never got a reply from any of them so I ended up accepting a local job with a non-tech company after months of searching.
But I didn’t give up my hopes and kept applying to big tech, and while I did manage to get the occasional interview with some mediocre companies or the random startup, I also miserably failed all of them too.
At some point during my long period of despair at never getting a better job, my very top pick (and arguably one of the best tech companies in the world at the time) reached out to me. Even more miraculously, I somehow passed their interview (the only tech interview I passed in the prior year) and accepted a job there.
I really enjoyed working there. Some of the best years of my life. And my performance reviews were great too, so the imposter syndrome from having failed so many tech job interviews sort of faded into the background. But after a while, perhaps due to the “hedonic treadmill” mentality, I thought I could do better. So I left to join a startup.
Well, the startup failed, as startups tend to do, but what I didn’t expect and what caught me off guard was that I was now back in the same situation I was in right after graduating from college. Don’t get me wrong—having “the name” on my resume now meant I could get at least one chance at an interview about anywhere. But much like the first round that I tried to forget about, I once again failed all the interviews.
Unfortunately, this second time around never procured a “get out of jail free” card.
So I guess my lesson is: 1) there’s a lot of luck involved in these things, 2) if life gives you a winning lottery ticket at some point, don’t throw it away for the chance to win an even bigger lottery, and 3) that famous saying about “the only actions regretted are those not taken” is absolutely, totally wrong—almost all of my regrets in life relate to taking some action I shouldn’t have rather than inaction.
- Sevii 10mo agoA lot of people experienced that during the 2020 boom. The lucky break wasn't a lucky break it was just a huge hiring boom. Once that's over the status quo returns.
- throwaway643384 10mo agoMy lucky break occurred many years before the pandemic, but after the original dotcom boom. Companies were neither hiring nor firing like crazy.
- _michaelhuang 10mo agoIt just sounds like you are in a middle of another journey my friend.
- BitsAndObjects 10mo agoCorollary: Choosing _not_ to do something is as much an action as choosing _to_ do something. Which shines a bright light on the meaninglessness of the phrase “the only actions regretted are those not taken”.
- Archonical 10mo agoThere's also the option of choosing to not commit to either action. One stays in the status quo without choosing it, but since agency is negatively correlated with regret and no agency was used, the 'choosing not to do something' option probably has a higher chance of being regretted.
- kccqzy 10mo agoWell with the style of tech interviews we have, luck is definitely involved. Some questions are simply my style (I like graphs and dynamic programming for example), and I’m lucky if the interviewer happens to choose these. But I don’t like for example two pointers problems. And also I’ve long ago dissociated my tech interview performance with my actual performance indicated by performance reviews.
- jandrewrogers 10mo agoI have thrown away (in hindsight) amazing lottery tickets a hilarious number of times. Despite that poor track record, I have been able to grind out an enviable life sans lottery ticket. Showing up and being hungry is a huge part of the game. I’ve also had to reboot my career relatively late, which isn’t a place you want to be but it isn’t a death sentence if you don’t want it to be. While there is an element of survivor bias to my story, people always underestimate the role of stamina and willingness to grind when no one else would. It is a very long game but so is life. I was never looking for the easiest way, and in hindsight I think that produced more satisfying results even if the path had much lower lows.
- mmarian 10mo agoThanks for writing this, I'm in a similar position and feel the same way.
- Vishon 10mo ago[flagged]
- nerdsniper 10mo ago> It’s allowed because it just runs locally like any overlay and doesn’t interact with their systems. This is account is spamming - as in advertising on HN. This software is definitely not "allowed" during any typical leetcode interview. The website is very explicit and upfront about this being cheating. They're also posting during the middle of the day in the country where the company making this product is headquartered, and it's 4AM in the country where the vast majority of HN users are.
- chegra 10mo agoYou still only need one. Keep trying.
- queenmab 10mo agoI thought there was something very odd about the way this was written. >Don’t get me wrong—having “the name” on my resume now meant I could get at least one chance at an interview about anywhere Never mind, it's been written or at least edited by ChatGPT.
- throw-qqqqq 10mo agoThat is a horrible, unfounded accusation!
- queenmab 10mo agoIt contains multiple instances of classic ChatGPT phrasing, em-dashes, smart quotes, things that you simply never saw before 2020, etc. One of these in isolation and yeah okay it's an unfounded accusation, but I don't understand how you're all not seeing how many posts on HN now are AI.
- einsteinx2 10mo ago> em-dashes…things that you simply never saw before 2020 I’m sorry but this is patently false. Apple devices have been autocorrecting two hyphens into a em dash since as long as I can remember and I personally used them all the time before LLMs were a thing and absolutely saw them online. I try not to use them now because people will annoyingly call me out for using ChatGPT when I’m not. I think Apple devices also default to “smart quotes” if I understand what you mean by that. For example I’m typing this on my iPhone and I get this quote character automatically when I tap the double quote button on the default keyboard: “ If I want straight quotes I have to long press the quote button and explicitly select it: " I think on macOS it’s the opposite for quotes, but macOS will absolutely autocorrect double hyphens to em dashes. > I don't understand how you're all not seeing how many posts on HN now are AI. There’s a also a big difference between using AI to reformat/clean up your text, especially for non-native English speakers and a bot just spamming LLM replies, but none of your “gotchas” can discern the difference…
- 10mo ago
- John23832 10mo agoLol same. Left a great tech company where was doing well to pursue the startup life. "If I work hard, I will make it". Startup failed, and the same prior opportunity hasn't come around. Such is life.
- gniv 10mo agoThere was a time 10-15 years ago when there was a lot of discussion (including here on hn) on whether it's best to stay at a fang job or join a startup. It was basically a choice between making millions at a steady but intellectually unrewarding job or risking it all at a fun startup.