Resume Advice Thread - January 30, 2018 CS Career Questions |
- Resume Advice Thread - January 30, 2018
- Daily Chat Thread - January 30, 2018
- [UPDATE to yesterday's post] Got an offer, but I feel like it's way too low, question about negotiating a salary
- How do you manage working full time?
- How long did it take you to not feel like an idiot anymore? Does it ever go away?
- Graduating in a couple months. Bachelor's in CS. What should I do now to make sure I can land a good job right away?
- Feeling extremely MISLEAD into current job by employer
- What are some cringy CS phrases/terms a junior developer should avoid? Similar to “synergy” in business.
- Got rejected after a take home assignment, I'm at a loss.
- Has anyone worked at a biotech company?
- I am graduating with a CS degree, but do not want to be a software engineer.
- I'd rather take a bullet to the noggin than work on another website. What's a good language and/or job switch to make?
- On the Job Search - Blog Post
- Is it bad to say I'm leaving because of my manager?
- New grad and supervisor is draining my patience! What should I do?
- What is a reasonable salary for an Associate Software Developer new grad in Austin, TX?
- Difficult situation regarding my upcoming review.
- Appropriate title?
- How difficult is it to find an internship in New York City?
- Why is nobody talking about the new H1-B I-Squared bill?
- Finding a software engineer internship in Montréal
- Requesting information on the cost of building a website.
- AWS cloud support associate
- Does “x” years of experience really matter?
- Advice for early CS grad- full-time job or grad school?
- Node Red is awesome...but how do you think it will affect demand (and wages) for software developers?
- Should I major in CS, data science, or statistics if I want to become a data analyst or quantitative analyst?
Resume Advice Thread - January 30, 2018 Posted: 29 Jan 2018 11:06 PM PST Please use this thread to ask for resume advice and critiques. You should read our Resume FAQ and implement any changes from that before you ask for more advice. Abide by the rules, don't be a jerk. Note on anonomyizing your resume: If you'd like your resume to remain anonymous, make sure you blank out or change all personally identifying information. Also be careful of using your own Google Docs account or DropBox account which can lead back to your personally identifying information. To make absolutely sure you're anonymous, we suggest posting on sites/accounts with no ties to you after thoroughly checking the contents of your resume. This thread is posted each Tuesday and Saturday at midnight PST. Previous Resume Advice Threads can be found here. [link] [comments] |
Daily Chat Thread - January 30, 2018 Posted: 29 Jan 2018 11:07 PM PST Please use this thread to chat, have casual discussions, and ask casual questions. Moderation will be light, but don't be a jerk. This thread is posted every day at midnight PST. Previous Daily Chat Threads can be found here. [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 08:42 AM PST Here is the original post. TL;DR of that post: got a job offer for Jr Software Engineer, they asked me about my salary requirements. I gave them 65k, they came back with 45k. So I emailed them, and told them 45k was a lot lower than I was expecting, and but I would accept 55k. I was worried about them changing their mind on me, so I went to indeed.com to fill out some more job applications. Lo and behold, they reposted the job posting before I even replied, so I thought for sure they were going to move on regardless. This morning, I woke up to an email, and they were willing to come up to 50K. So still less than I had hoped, but it's a bit more than what I was making in IT, and the job title would look great on my resume, so I accepted that offer. I'm going to work my ass off, and once I'm up to speed and comfortable with the job, I plan on negotiating a raise. Thanks to everyone for your advise! It really did help me out a lot. [link] [comments] |
How do you manage working full time? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 09:45 AM PST Im a junior programmer and I'm two months into my first position after graduating. I like the company I work for (its a small non-tech company that feels medium sized). The pay is good for me currently, but more importantly the experience I'm gaining is great, with another programmer who is mentoring me. I am writing code everyday and getting better everyday. However even with these great perks, I am getting both mentally and physically exhausted with this full time schedule. I'm an introvert so not being home drains me. I wake up 5 AM every morning to go to the gym, then come home shower get ready, then I go to work and be back home by 6 PM. This leaves a 3-4 hour window for anything else, whether it's errands, chores around the house, taking care of my dog, prep/eating dinner, relaxing, etc. I do get some time to relax in this time window, but I'm also doing other things as I mentioned and it doesn't feel like relaxing because of the limited time before getting to bed. Is there any advice you guys have for me? Some time management tips, or maybe should I be looking to ask to work remotely or part time remotely (if yes, at what point can I look into sending a formal request?), or is it because company culture is draining and in the future at other companies it wont be as draining, or should I suck it up and this is just life? Any advice, or other people venting about their situation that might be similar, etc is appreciated. EDIT: Thank you all for the great advice. I'm going to try to improve what I can, and appreciate everything else. It really helped to be able to express myself and talk to you guys and hear your input. Thank you again! [link] [comments] |
How long did it take you to not feel like an idiot anymore? Does it ever go away? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 11:10 AM PST So all of my classes thus far have been the same. Start with "hello world" get to a point where you can build a basic app that no one would pay you to develop, take finals, rinse and repeat. I started with html and css, felt stupid all the way through, and now i'm on to feeling stupid in 4 kinds of SQL, along with C#, VB, ASP.net, PHP, Java, and probably others i'm forgetting i'm stupid in. Is this a normal thing? Was there an "Ah ha!" Moment? I don't feel proficient enough in anything to get a job doing it. Is it normal for my curriculum to spend only one or two classes on a single language? I just wanted to get a feel for how other people felt going through school. What was your education like. Did you just get really good at one tool set or feel sub par at a bunch of stuff? For context I have 3 classes left then I graduate. [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:47 AM PST The title says it all. I am graduating in March with a Bachelors in CS. And I'm wondering what I should be doing now (besides finishing school) to help me secure a job once I graduate. [link] [comments] |
Feeling extremely MISLEAD into current job by employer Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:43 PM PST I love CS. I enjoy everything from the theoretical side, down to those annoying testing tasks from my co-op jobs. I can spend all night doing CS work, and time just flies. I can't stop until I make everything work 100%. I applied for a FULL-STACK SOFTWARE DEVELOPER job. They also mentioned they are planning to automate all testing of UI and backend, and they were looking for technical people to do that too. I told them I actually had lots of experience doing that and wouldn't mind. THAT'S FINE WITH ME. (Even though I actually only applied for the SOFTWARE DEVELOPER position) Later I get a job offer saying I was hired as SOFTWARE DEVELOPER. I was thrilled as shit and accepted right away. GREAT NEWS! First Day of work, I was told I'm actually going to be working on the automation instead. Hmmm... THAT'S COOL TOO I SUPPOSE? A month in, it turns out I'm doing almost NO TECHNICAL WORK AT ALL. I'm basically writing a bunch of English and managing/tracking online documents and talking to people. I'm not even coding the automation, other people are! Almost a year in, and I'm even ashamed to tell my parents that I'm not coding or even working on any technical problems at all. They know me. Every strength I've been training for the last 5 years, I'm not even touching. Every single weakness I've had for the past 20, I'm juggling with my anxiety. Somehow, from having the energy and passion to work all night, now I can hardly make it to lunch. I'm no more qualified for this job than a nursing student or music student. I'm depressed on multiple levels right now. Feeling extremely bored of life, but also extremely useless, and worst of all my anxiety is skyrocketing because of it. There I was sitting today working 2h late, and just admiring the cleaning lady emptying trash. What a fucking great life that would be. Free mind. Anything. GUESS WHAT THE MESSED UP PART IS. A co-op student is hired. When we were getting introduced, he says "Hi, my names XXX. I'm hired as a full-stack software developer."... NOPE, YOU AREN'T BUDDY! Fuck man, I'm too stressed out these days. I don't even know if I'll be able to read any replies until I quit or get fired, whichever happens first... I had one of the highest grades in my class... but now I'm fucking USELESS PIECE OF SHIT! FFFUUUUUUUUCKKK this!!! [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:16 PM PST |
Got rejected after a take home assignment, I'm at a loss. Posted: 30 Jan 2018 09:24 AM PST Hi there, I recently got an update that based on my code from the take home exercise, I won't be considered further. The task was to write a part of a vending machine to track change. Some requirements:
I was given one evening to do it. I ended up spending some three hours on this and thought I'd done alright, but apparently what I'd submitted was bare minimum. The API worked, I wrote 5 unit tests for different aspects of the API (most likely too few it seems) and wrote two pages (API documentation + design decisions). My question is then: what would be a reasonable production quality solution for this, given the constraints? How many tests? What documentation? Thanks. edit: they were happy with my resume, only then they gave the test. edit2: at risk of looking like a complete idiot, I'm posting my code for the exercise - it's in the comments. [link] [comments] |
Has anyone worked at a biotech company? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 11:01 AM PST I'm currently a mid-level dev at big N company in Seattle. I've been working here for two years after graduating with a BS in Comp Sci & Mathematics. I've been thinking about working in a biotechnology company for the past couple years, since a loved one of mine has been fighting cancer. I've also generally been interested in biology and healthcare for my whole life. I've been looking at a few biotechnology companies in Seattle, such as Juno, the Allen Institute, and NanoString. Has anyone been a dev at companies such as these? I have a couple questions:
[link] [comments] |
I am graduating with a CS degree, but do not want to be a software engineer. Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:54 PM PST I am graduating this spring with a CS degree. I have a ~3 gpa at a good but small school that is relatively unknown. I started my CS degree because I like math, robotics, logic, etc. But, then I took some CS classes, did "ok", kept with it, got past the point of no return, and now I'm graduating. I have no internship experience. I have a few small personal projects, but I don't feel like I can't talk about them in-depth enough for an interview. I know data structures, but I don't feel comfortable at all with technical interview questions. I know how to program, but it just doesn't really click for me like it does for my classmates. What types of jobs are out there for those of us that have CS degrees, but want to do a job that does not involve much programming? [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:22 PM PST Currently working with C#, which I feel I'm pretty decent at, but for every 30 minutes I spend working out the kinks in a piece of C# code, I'll spend 2-3 hours working out the kinks in some piece of shit webapp that uses 14 different frameworks and languages to add two ints together. Don't even get me started on Electron. Joking aside, even when the front-end is reasonably coded, I just really hate working with it. I'm just tired of websites in general. I'd even be fine with making a career change (so long as I could get similar pay and it wouldn't be too hard to find a position with no experience other than "coded for 4 years" and "has associates and most of a bachelors from no-name schools"). I know there are positions using C# that don't involve working with the web, but for every one of those, there are 1500 I need to wade through looking for someone to work on their web-based nightmare, so I'd prefer to just avoid trying to stick with the language at this point. Like I said - it's fun, but I have no strong attachments to it. Any advice? Thanks in advance. [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:39 PM PST I just wrote this blog post, thought it would be relevant on this sub! Without a doubt, the most grueling phase of my college career has been the job search. I had countless phone interviews (I was averaging ~5 a week at one point), and had to miss class several times for on-site interviews, most of which I had to fly to. When I wasn't interviewing, I was thinking about interviewing. Whether it was practicing algorithms (grinding Leetcode), reading Cracking the Coding Interview, or running mock interviews with friends, I barely had time for my classes during this time. And none of it even mattered. In the end, I had two fantastic offers and simply had to choose. Neither company required that I can reverse a linked list or solve some tricky algorithmic question. This was part of the reason I loved both of these companies so much. When I interviewed, I felt like they were getting to know me and learning about ACTUAL important qualities I possess, like my work ethic and my ability to learn new things quickly, not how fast I can whip up a solution to a coding problem on a white board. No matter how much I practiced on Leetcode, my technical skills were never enough to impress interviewers enough to get an offer. Sure, I got past some phone interviews (maybe by sheer luck) and even made it to the on-site final round for two companies. But I didn't make it to the offer stage for either; my luck ran out. But I knew that technical skills aren't all I had to offer, and I had to find a company whose values aligned with my own. I'm so glad I did, because those are rare to come by. My point is: the interviewing process should not be this way. Coding a solution on a whiteboard is extremely outdated for this day and age. A whiteboard strips away all the tools a programmer has- syntax checking, being able to look up libraries/classes, etc. Instead, it draws attention to things that don't matter, such as the ability to linearly write code. Every single programmer knows that no program is ever written from top to bottom; lines are cut out, moved, and added in. In a text editor, it doesn't matter, but on a white board it makes the interviewee look disorganized and it can make the solution unreadable. It also draws attention to syntax mistakes. Any IDE would catch a missing semicolon immediately, but in a whiteboard interview such a simple mistake could prove bad for the interviewee. Luckily, I only ever had one whiteboard interview (I didn't get the job, shocker), and most companies seem to be moving away from the whiteboard model and allowing interviewees to use laptops. However, even this is not an ideal solution. Most programmers aren't used to working with someone breathing down their neck, while also having to explain every part of their thought process. In my experience, it made me lose my train of thought and only made me more confused. It wasn't the way I was used to doing things, so it still drastically decreased my ability to perform well. But something I would like to talk about is the companies, in my experience at least, that interviewed WELL.
The biggest thing I learned from my job search is this: Your technical skills may not be up to bar with Google, Microsoft, or Amazon. And that's okay. Those are not the only companies in the tech world, and only a very specific type of person is cut out to be one of those engineers. But technical skills are NOT all you have to offer, and for a lot of companies, they are not the only thing they're looking for. Never underestimate the power of soft skills. If you are fun to be around, genuine, and likable, I guarantee you those qualities are far more important in ANY job than whether you can find the longest subsequence in a set of strings. In my time doing interviews I encountered countless people (usually other interviewees at companies, or in some cases, my interviewers (looking at you, Google)) that were anti-social, quiet, or straight up WEIRD. I could tell they were extremely smart, and they probably had the technical skills you need to be an engineer at the tech giants, but they were really severely lacking in soft skills. One of the interview questions I had at Company A was "what are the top 3 things you are looking for in a job?" This was my answer:
I think about these 3 things every day, and I am so thrilled that I get to work at a company where I genuinely believe I will find each of them. I think about what my career goals were a year ago (work at a Big N), and I don't know if I would find these 3 things at a company like that. I thank God that I was rejected from Google, because I know that I would not find these things there, yet I without a doubt would have taken that job and been miserable. Maybe, just maybe, your happiness is more important than being able to write "Software Engineer at Google" on your LinkedIn profile. [link] [comments] |
Is it bad to say I'm leaving because of my manager? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 05:34 PM PST I said I was leaving because of career growth. But then I was asked how I can say that after six months. I didn't have a good reply. Would it be ok to say I didn't get the chance to meet my manager before I joined and we don't get along as the reason? [link] [comments] |
New grad and supervisor is draining my patience! What should I do? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 03:47 PM PST Hi Everyone! On a throwaway since I know a few of my colleagues peruse this sub. Please forgive the length. A little back story. I graduated with my Bachelors in CS last year and quickly got a job as a QA software tester at a small development company close to where I grew up. During the interview it was discussed that I would be expected to manually test their software with 2 other testes and possibly learn an automation tool that was recently purchased. I would also need to learn their web based project management tool, JIRA. Shortly after I start, they hire a QA Test Lead with about 6 years of experience in web application testing and JIRA. Six months down the road, is clear that he has no idea what he is doing. I am even suspicious he lied on his resume to get the job. There is no way that he can be this incompetent otherwise... He has learned nothing about our solution, does not follow up with anybody, and fails to organize and LEAD our team by any means. Im at my wits end. Myself and the rest of the team are drowning in work while he is searching for a new car on the net. We can't make great software while he is still a part of our team. I was hoping I could learn the skills needed to succeed from a mentor with experience to share. My question is, how should I handle this? I fear bringing it up to him directly in case he decides to retaliate. Im not sure about bringing it up to the Director of Quality, since I would be jumping the chain of command (possibly jeopardizing my employment). Should I just put my head down and let the department burn? Six months at my first job out of college doesn't look that great on paper... Edit: Formatting [link] [comments] |
What is a reasonable salary for an Associate Software Developer new grad in Austin, TX? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 05:16 PM PST |
Difficult situation regarding my upcoming review. Posted: 30 Jan 2018 07:26 PM PST I have an upcoming annual review. In my year at the company the senior front end developer was promoted to our overall team lead a few months in, making me the defacto front end lead on our team for the past 6 months. I have performed very well and exceeded expectations in that time, and I have accomplished a lot of significant things. I feel I deserve a raise because I have taken on a lot more responsibility and done well doing so. The problem is I am undergoing a tremendous extesential crisis and depressive episode and have been for the last two weeks to a month. My work output has dramatically dropped and while nothing has been said in our 1:1's, I know I'm not the same developer I was the rest of the year. It's hard to write good code and close issues when you are thinking about ending your life sometimes and breaking down crying every day (i am getting help, please let's just keep this discussion to career questions please) I planned to go in asking for a 10% raise a day hoping I could come out with a 6-8% raise based on my increased responsibilities. I'm just afraid my current slump will offset the work I did the rest of the year. Is there anything i can counter this with? Is a serious depressive short term episode enough to offset 11 months of exceeding expectations? [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 06:24 PM PST I've been working at my large company for a year now. Originally I was brought in as an intern, and then software engineer. The problem is that I in my opionion go way outside the scope of my duties as a developer. I built the high level plans, decide on coding standards, manage QA, pick the technologies we use, I build our 3d art assets, I'm our only VR programmer, and I have 100% ownership of the codebase since I wrote it all. When we discuss new features or approaches, I'm the one that gives the ok on if it's possible, or if there's better alternatives and I have occasional meetings with management. Right now I feel like my job is essentially lead dev in practice but just SWE in name. In a few months I have a meeting coming up where I can discuss my career. I would like to be a software architect because it's a mix of high and low level implementation which is what I already do. Would that seem appropriate? [link] [comments] |
How difficult is it to find an internship in New York City? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 05:21 PM PST Im a second semester junior in college and I must find an internship this summer in order to take one of the classes I need to take to graduate next semester. How difficult is it to find an internship for an informatics major with a concentration in software development? [link] [comments] |
Why is nobody talking about the new H1-B I-Squared bill? Posted: 29 Jan 2018 09:00 PM PST This bill, which passed a Senate committee, would more than double the H1-B visa cap while raising the minimum salary to 100k. Because this income is already below entry level for large tech companies, the floodgates will open and new grad positions will become more competitive. I can't see any positive effect for US workers in an increasingly competitive field. Is congress selling out to tech company lobbyists? The talent crisis is already being fixed by cs enrollment boosts. Edit: After analyzing the economic data in this thread and gaining a better understanding of how H1-Bs work, I have changed my view on this bill. Although inconclusive, the evidence shows this will be hugely positive for tech companies and probably net neutral (or slightly positive) to native workers. Thanks all for helping my understanding. [link] [comments] |
Finding a software engineer internship in Montréal Posted: 30 Jan 2018 02:28 PM PST I am a CS student currently on an exchange program in Montreal, and I would like to extend my stay here by finding a summer internship. Does anyone know any good sites to find internships in Montreal, or just Quebec in general? Thanks in advacme [link] [comments] |
Requesting information on the cost of building a website. Posted: 30 Jan 2018 08:08 PM PST I am new to the scene of computer science/engineering with some basic knowledge of HTML as a background but that is about it. My education resides in biochemistry and business. I am looking to start my own business that will be in an online website format with a downloadable app, similar to Grammarly in the regards to accessibility. I am inquiring prices that it would take to make a professional functional website and downloadable computer app for my business. The business is called Studybooks. An online customizable study tool and is in very early stages of development but is looking at being launched sometime next year. [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 08:05 PM PST About to graduate this May with a B.S. in CSE. Just got an invite for a phone interview for an AWS cloud support associate position. A quick search tells me it's kind of a customer support role that won't properly use my degree. Thoughts? [link] [comments] |
Does “x” years of experience really matter? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 07:59 PM PST Applied for a job recently that requires two years of experience, but i only have one. Do recruiters usually write applications like this off? What are my chances of getting an interview? [link] [comments] |
Advice for early CS grad- full-time job or grad school? Posted: 30 Jan 2018 11:10 AM PST I'm in kind of a weird situation and I'd appreciate any advice y'all could offer. I've just graduated a semester early from college, and I have my bachelor's in computer science now, as well as a ~6 month head start on the job market. However, I'd ideally like to go to grad school and study computational linguistics, artificial intelligence, or something in a related field and get my master's to help increase employability long-term. I'm not sure if I could afford grad school at the moment though, as I've already racked up a lot of student loan debt for my undergraduate degree. I've applied to a couple different grad schools and I intend to go if I get enough scholarship offers or a work study or something. I definitely don't want to take out any more loans (at least not a lot), and everyone I know has advised me against that. In the meantime, though, I'll need a job for about 8 months before the fall semester starts. Since I'm not even sure if I'm going to grad school yet, I'm in a weird situation where I don't know whether I need to look for a part-time job, or just go ahead and look for full-time employment and delay grad school until I can afford it. I really need a source of income, so I don't want to wait until I get admission offers from the schools, as that could take a few months. Also, I'll probably need to move pretty far away for grad school if I do end up going, so I'd have to quit whatever job I do get around where I currently live, unless they allow me to work remotely. What course of action would you recommend? [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 07:52 PM PST It seems like this tool (or something like it) will make a ton of developer work obsolete. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=j9H3t3l1En0 [link] [comments] |
Posted: 30 Jan 2018 07:46 PM PST |
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