Job search frustration

The fact that you choose now that you have a job to pull the ladder up behind you and side completely with your boss, instead of asking some really really really tough questions about the incongruencies between what the boss says in regards to the shortage and what the boss chooses to do when presented with hireable persons says everything there is to say.

They might very well need programmers. Senior programmers with at least 5 years of experience in their specific tech stack.

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So you are suggesting a guy who got through the grueling hiring process, worked long hours and poured everything into getting that first “foot in the door” position to confront his boss in order to debunk some questions about candidate shortage that you read online? And that way jeopardize his position?

Are you thinking this through ?

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I am suggesting he shows some of the understanding he claims to have, instead of going

the moment he got his. In fact, let me quote what was said in regards to his job situation.

Notice the plural form? Evidentely he is far from “foot-in-the-door”.

How about we, as a FCC community, focus on providing constructive advice to those who seek it and keep personal bitterness to a minimum?

The OP is understandably frustrated with the whole process and a lot of people are in the same boat, but we help each other by sharing experience and try to lift everybody up. The circular arguing about your point of view how people a pulling ladders up and not yelling at their bosses because you think it is a good idea gets us nowhere.

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We can also help each other by having the people who made it to the inside actually work to change things for the better.

The major thing is don’t be complacent as a CS student. The question are you actively contributing to your career path is very important. It is very easy to go through the motion of university without accomplishing anything worth noting. Internships, co-op, research, or even personal project goes a long way in helping you build a impressive resume before your actual job.

For the sheer fact that you are young and getting a degree on the subject, you are already more in demand than some other candidates. However, you are not unique in that respect, and it’s an upward struggle to rise above

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I should also note though, Im doing this without a cs degree…you having one will help by leaps and bounds. Also, dont miss out on the last thing I said, that I am not giving up. At the end of the day, what any of these companies want is to hire the best person they can find for the job…and best is a combination of education, experience, skills and culture fit. Whats most important to one company, may not be as important to another…its different for all of them.

Its a frustrating process…but just like I have faith that I’ll get there, have faith in yourself that you’ll get there too. The true reality is, acknowledging that its a frustrating process, but not letting that stop you.

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Hi Nick! I really like your thinking on your portfolio and I just wanted to say that I would love for your todo app to have inline editing! That would be fantastic! :slight_smile:

Regarding the commentary between Pethaf and kevinSmith (kevin I just caught your camel casing and laughed), imo soft skills are critical and so is not being bitter regardless of your background, because frankly it all boils down to portfolio and your ability to network.

I’ve worked 20 years as an illustrator and graphic designer and despite people saying how “talented I am” (not true…I’ve seen far better) I have trouble finding a job in my field. The one thing I can say is that I’m out because my portfolio and energy now cannot compete with some of the new talent these days(some who don’t even have a college degree). On this I’m not bitter about it, I’m realistic.

In the same way I realize I’m done with illustration, I have infinite energy with tech. If, keyword here is if, I am not crazy and I do have more potential in front end development than my 20 years of hard work and sweat as an illustrator, it is possible I will beat 4 year grads and some experienced coders who were frankly in the same position as me as a veteran illustrator: Tired, not in the mood to read tutorials to compete with fresh faced youths, and be either bitter or realistic about the situation.

TLDR, I lived being beaten by people who came from “nothing”. I lived and learned degrees and job experience mean absolutely nothing in terms of job security. Instead, it’s your portfolio, tenacity, network and passion that matters at the end of the day.

In any case, if i have a job before the end of this year, then I’m proof that what Kevin and I am saying is true.

And if your’e tired pethaf, consider what makes you feel alive. I lived falling out of love with a career that isn’t working for me.

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I keep hearing about the importance of “soft skills” and yet no one can give an objective definition of what the term means. And I have made enough observations of people, gainfully employed who are the very antethesesis of anything you would call soft skills. It’s just a rejection criteria that sounds objective but in reality it can mean anything whatsoever.

It is all manner of characteristic and trait that enables you to work well with others and in a professional settings. The very universal one are like communication, leadership, work ethic, flexibility…etc.

Some of these details comes through in a person’s resume, others in interviews. Like attention to details in their resume, how well and easy to understand their descriptions are, experience in a manager or organizer role, citing quantifiable metrics in previous roles.

In interviews, you are often judge on not just your answers but how you answer. Are you hesitating before you answer? Are you coming up with concise easy to understand answers to the question? Are you answering the question really? How well do you communicate your experiences? What’s your attitude towards unexpected questions and responsibilities?

It can be a lot of things and it can also be very specific. Some jobs can very much value flexibility, and if you seem unwilling to expand your role during your interview, like say the job involves testing and product support on top of development, and you just want to do development, then you are not a good fit.

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Soft skills are the skills that make you a culture fit.

For example out of the box questions and things that weed you out because of softskills:

Resume from a word template - this person doesn’t bother to learn new things to stand out
Portfolio comes from a template - Okay if you’re not looking for a design / front end job but no okay otherwise
Portfolio lacks new projects, or lacks customized projects
How would define the color blue to a blind person
what color would you be
duck sized horse or horse sized duck
dog or cat
etc

Balking when you interview, lacking passion for the subject, bursting into tears when you find that they are going to talk about you later to compare notes, not taking weird questions in stride.

You’re right it can mean anything but it can mean everything. No one wants to work with someone that will be burden or not fit with the culture. and in my years doing this, when this is compromised, the team will dissolve.

So softskills > how you present yourself means something. And if they don’t think you’ll fit in say a company that takes days off for skiing or one that has trekathons…well they are going to give you glance no matter how many skills you list because working with someone that may not understand those things destroys a job already high in stress and work.

*the examples I’ve given are all real world

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Are you here just to troll people? So far you haven’t contributed anything to this thread, other than your ranting and non-constructive argumentative posts. And if you really wanted to know what soft skills are, you could Google it yourself instead of using that as an excuse to bait people here into an attack.

Can an admin get in here?

Petlaugh pretty much derailed Nick’s own thread and went off on his own tangent about his conspiracy theories about how the dev world works.

Very sorry about Petlaugh, Nick. Your portfolio looks great keep at it and I’m sure you’ll get there soon.

Your wild conspiracy theories about how the dev world works doesn’t help OP. It just confuses him. OP wanted feedback on how to do better. He didn’t want his thread hijacked by someone that literally has 0 experience successfully finding dev work.

Just because you had a bad time finding work doesn’t correlate to OP not being able to find work. Stop trying to spread bs about the dev world when you literally don’t know anything about finding work.

Last I checked this thread was about how to help OP find work not the Pethaf show about his woes. Go make your own thread for that.

That’s because it’s business jargon. However I think you know this and are smart enough to know what people are referring to when they talk about soft skills.

And I have made enough observations of people, gainfully employed who are the very antethesesis of anything you would call soft skills.

Guaranteed that you have no idea of the specific reasons why they were hired, what they actually did in the interview room, or what they personally went through to get there. They may well have not deserved to be hired in your eyes, but you are not the judge. Please stay on topic.

And now to pull this back on topic. @Nicknyr - how much networking are you doing? The easiest way to get past the gatekeepers, is to know more people. A few things to try:

Dev slacks in your area - look for Dev Slack groups specific to NYE…get to know other devs.
Go to dev happy hours. You don’t have to drink but get to know people.
Meetup.com - join coding groups and attend code alongs, hackathons, etc

These things really do help you stand out and if you have someone at the company looking for your resume, HR/recruiters will be quicker to move you on up the ladder. I can tell you ins such as this helped me get my foot in the door for most of my jobs.

Keep working on your portfolio, update it with new products or other updates regularly. You can do this. I’m in my 40s and the age barrier is real but you can get past it. Know what your talking about. If recruiters are contacting you and not getting you to an interview that’s on them, not you. A good recruiter can get you in the door for interviews.

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You are getting a lot of attention from recruiters because you have a nice looking portfolio with in-demand skills. The reason you are not getting interviews is most likely because your technical level is not high enough. Not yet.

Take a break from job applications. Do the full stack projects on FCC. Then try again. By that time, you will have learned about databases, RESTful APIs and authentication, and you will be in a much stronger situation.

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Thank you for the information. I am very interested in Microsoft’s LEAP program. I look forward to reading your post. :grinning:

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Thanks for the input everyone.

Learn fullstack/backend, network at events, look into modern tools like GraphQL, refine/customize the resume depending on the position, do some free work for businesses and get testimonials. All sounds like good advice.

And just for kicks let me tell you about my phone interview yesterday:

I had a recruiter initiate with me on LinkedIn. Contacted me multiple times telling me I’m perfect for the position. We texted and then had a phone interview. He was clueless about programming/web dev, told me he doesn’t know anything about tech, and asked me “How fast can you program?”. You can’t make this shit up! :joy: