It takes hundred days!
On Oct 11th last year, I was called in a conference room and the CEO asked me to leave the org.
After my previous manager resigned, things were not very good with the new one. Few months into the thing, It was clear to me that we didn't align much. Office everyday was too much stress and not just the work part. I wanted an out and when the CEO asked me to leave, the first feeling was of 'relief'.
They offered me 3 months of salary and I could stay part of the org on paper for those 3 months, even though I was not expected to contribute. The journey of transformation began.
Exploring forums like Reddit and Grapevine, I got to understand that the market is brutal, much less good jobs, leetcode is the king etc.
In the past, DSA was not something I had been good at, and I got my first job through campus placement, which was mostly based on my github contributions and developer profile and accolades. One thing led to other and while improving as a software engineer I missed the train on competitive coding.
Now 5 years and 2 jobs later, I was standing here looking at the uncertain and blurry future, and less than 1 question solved on leetcode.
The first couple of weeks were brutal. I read questions and just understood the English. No concepts, no techniques and no deep imagination. It felt like either I had been fooling myself(and the world) as a engineer for all these years or i was just not good enough.
"Not good enough". I was not ready to accept that. I have been regarding myself highly all through my life and this was just not it.
Starting November, I bought premiums for a couple of websites. Leetcode and algomonster. I started learning everything from zero or that is how it felt like. Visualised a schedule, made a mental note of things that helped my attention like less mobile and TV, more evening walks, music when coding etc.
1 month of rigorous and simple "following the process and believing in self". I must have applied over 200 companies throughout. Got around 20 calls.
Starting December I started giving interviews. Felt coding is improving i.e first round seemed more or less sorted. Moved onto system design. Bought the premium for hellointerview.
January was the last month and I had to have a job else I would have had a break on my resume. I read online that it is not good. HRs would never believe your stories. So had to push and practice my ass off.
With every interview I felt increasingly prepared. Confidence started seeping in. Towards the end, it felt like I was driving the interviews and not the other way around.
By first week of Feb, I had 4 job offers. All great companies, some MNCs and some startups. I chose an MNC. Having the power to "choose" is what I earned.
To anyone going through this, only moral of this story is "Believe in yourself and trust the process. Life has a way of coming around :)".
PS - Taking a vacation in Goa before starting on the new job.
Stealth
Engineering
SDE 2Bengaluru5 YoETalking product sense with Ridhi
9 min AI interview5 questions
Those three paid months is the best thing your previous employer did to you, hard to find such orgs in today's time. Congratulations 🎉
Yeah man. I believe I made some good rapport with the CXOs while my time there, and this helped me secure the generous severance.
The circle of good intelligent folks is very small in blr. I would suggest to never burn bridges.
Which tech stack bro. And what was the interview process. Can u please tell
Its fullstack role. Golang and JS. Interview comprised of 4 rounds. Introductory call, take home assignment, backend round, front-end round.
Bro I am currently 2.6 years of experience react and node js developer. As per I see the market golang is going well in job market. How should I transition to golang role. Means how should I start with. Any basic roadmap
Good to know that you finally landed the job. Congratulations 🥳. Just one question what was your previous package?
40 base + some esops
Congratulations!
Do you think hellointerview is a must for HLD? And what about leetcode premium?
I think hellointerview will help learn a lot of basics fairly quickly. The practice(their another offering) helps with understanding systems through and through when done before reading the provides solution.
Leetcode premium will be helpful if you are targeting big tech, which I am.
You're inspiring boss!
@TryingStuffOnce nice that your company gave 3 months salary. Indian companies (even foreign ones having branch in India) are not always eager to give 3 months salary. Could you tell which company it was?
I'm not sure given I have talked about them in a bad light in the post. It was a startup.
You are an inspiration. How did you apply , Can you please advise. Thannz
LinkedIn for this job. Other places like instahyre, cold emails etc have also been used for other interviews.
What’s your take on hellointerview?
I like it. I am positive it will help me grow as a better engineer given the material and the deepdives are covering basics and giving you opportunity to know about systems, you might have never before actually worked upon.
But the mocks are ultra expensive. Thought the basic premium is affordable