Funny enough, that's exactly how I got my current job. I have no code up on github or anywhere else, but I sent them a piece of a project I had worked on as a c

Funny enough, that's exactly how I got my current job. I have no code up on github or anywhere else, but I sent them a piece of a project I had worked on as a consultant (with permission from all the pertinent people). They were impressed with it. We discussed the decisions I made over the phone as well as my other views on software development and just like that I was hired. No in person interview required. The company is fully distributed, so they didn't have an office I could go to anyway. It's also important to point out that the interview process went fast and smooth because I had the exact mix of skills they were both looking for and lacking at their company at the same time. Those skills in this case were PHP based CMS's and single page web applications. So, to OP, if you want the interview process to go better, identify a company that needs the skills you provide badly. Most mid-sized startups in SV who advertise that they're hiring typically just need meat to scale their operations. Sometimes you can get lucky and use those opportunities to switch domains (ie: from JS web development to mobile game development) but most of the time those jobs just suck.