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Ask HN: How to deal with job search burnout?

6 points by eugenefedoto ↗ HN
I've had a very unsuccessful job search since graduation. Before it, way before I ever was concerned about getting something before graduation, I used to be excited about CS. I would read books, do tech, and many other things. When the job search came, I became depressed, and now finally burned out.

I've had several final interviews with unknown, non-tech companies, but never managed to snag an offer. I worked at a contract job (NodeJS) for 2 months. I keep reading online advice: work on projects and study interviewing problems. The thing is... no one has ever asked me any challenging tech questions in interviews, and no one has asked about my past projects.

My recent interviews:

1) Last week I got a referral from HN for a defense company. I'm waiting to see if they'll proceed to a 2nd interview.

2) Last month, I didn't make it past the 2nd interviewer for a QA role, because the interview thought I wasn't convincing enough to transition to QA from someone with developer experience.

3) Last month, I couldn't make it past a phone screen for a tech startup, because either the recruiter said I stated a too high salary (he didn't let me proceed until I said something): $80k - $90k in NYC, where Glassdoor states the average is $110k; or he got confused and thought I was fired from my 2-month contract (I wasn't; it ended on great terms).

So, I'm terribly burned out. What should I be doing in order to improve my life? CS has been my entire life -- from computer camps (Montclair University, Stevens Insitute, etc.) of playing Starcraft on LAN, to reverse engineering of programs, to weekly installs of Linux distros on high school weekends. I really don't know anything else, and would like rekindle the light. I obviously can't take a vacation. Maybe there's an interesting book or recommended exercise routine.

5 comments

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ivan_ah
Stick with it and don't despair. The job search space is totally non-sense these days. Don't let the rejections bring you down—most recruiters don't know what they're doing.

What are your expectations? From my experience and that of friends around me, it can take a year if not two to find a job using the usual "apply with CV" approach. You should consider asking friends in your network for a "plug" in the company where they work.

Also, check this out in San Diego, really cool project: https://learningequality.org/about/jobs/?gh_jid=524256

eugenefedoto
I did make a post on LinkedIn. Only one person replied saying "hire him!" and I only know him because I previously reached out to him (his company is mainly security IT stuff). He did a presentation in my ACM club. All my "friends" (people with whom I worked on projects across multiple classes) and university network basically are not communicating with me. It's really disheartening, since I did help classmates with some things and was always positive.

I've also asked my neighbors (software dealing with Oracle), electrician, and friends of family. No one can provide anything concrete, besides stating "it's easy to find a job."

Honestly, it's more disheartening to learn you have no network when you thought you did.

liquidcool
Shocked to hear nobody asked about past projects, that's usually the core of the interview. What are they asking instead? If behavioral questions, are you practicing those?

And if they are not asking about algorithms, you're likely not interviewing at startups or major software companies. I know startups tend to go for experienced engineers, but you still have established s/w companies.

Short answer is to contribute to a popular open source project, that should raise eyebrows. I find meetups are also motivating. Finally, I have a developer career course (link in profile). Will help focus your efforts.

eugenefedoto
I'll be honest. I can only remember one company actually asking me about my projects. They invited me on-site for a $15/hr position. Then randomly, out-of-the-blue prompted me to bring up my code, somehow, on their laptop. I obviously didn't have it, besides some poorly looking code hosted on Github.

"What are they asking instead?"

SAT score. Why did I choose my university, instead of going to a higher ranked one? Expected salary. Favorite programming language. Most commonly, how well I know the skills listed in the job description, what I'm interested in learning, and whether I'm more interested working with front end or back end. Tell me about yourself. I did once get actual STAR questions from Quicken Loans

An example of an interview (more like a phone screen) I had with Booz Allen Hamilton:

1) "Why did you leave your last job after 2 months?" (it was obviously a 2 month contract)

2) "Are you more interested in front or back end, or more full stack?"

3) "Will you be able to pass the background check?"

4) "Have you ever worked for the government?"

5) "How well do you know the referrer?"

6) "How did you find about this job?"

With an on-site at a software shop for a .NET role. Note: that they gave me a take-home project to do, then never discussed it:

1) "How well do you know this <skill>?"

2) "What do you read to learn about new stuff?"

3) "How do you know when to stop researching and instead actually do the coding?"

4) "Do you play video games?"

5) "Tell me about yourself."

With an on-site at a travel company -- that you probably haven't heard of -- for a VB.NET role:

It was simply a "tell me about yourself" to the CEO, and a couple of implementing some functions on paper, and writing some SQL. I aced the writing portion.

I've applied to startups, most of the time. They generally ask tech knowledge/trivia.

Eridrus
Projects are useful because you can stick them on your CV, and because if they're interesting enough people will reach out to you, especially if you write a blog post about what you did. For best results pick a new up and coming tech or one your target companies are using, the ideas are low hanging and there's less competition. No-one will read the code or use your software, but as long as it sounds impressive and you can talk about the things you did and challenges you overcame, that will be enough.

Though that's really only going to be at tech companies, non-tech companies are usually looking to see that you can hit the ground running with their tech stack.

Also, contact people at hiring companies directly, find their email or message them on Twitter or get a trial of LinkedIn's premium plan that lets you message anyone. Look at angel.co. Talk to coworkers from where you contracted, if there are developers there and they liked your work they can help you, though I guess if it's contract work they may not have any more devs.

Also, I've found startups to be stingy unless they really need you, check out what people list on Angel.co, and consider the middle or bottom of those ranges given you're right out of school. A stingy job is better than no job in your position.

Sucks that your network isn't coming through, it would be really useful to find someone who can vouch for you, especially if you worked on projects together.

Consider using someone like Triple Byte or Hired or interviewing.io who will conduct a technical interview then recommend you to companies they work on based on how it went.

Don't give up and get discouraged, it can take a while.