One of the best and most helpful videos I've watched in recent months. I was thinking to my self that only I fail interviews and it was so depressing, thinking that I am not good enough, even though I know I am not that bad. Thank you for this amazing content and for helping the youngsters of our community!

100% agree 🙂 There is no shame in failing interviews and there is no shame in doing a lot of them. In the end it’s just business and we look for the best alignment between both parties

Coming back to this video when I fail my first interview

I spent 6 years building up an amazing engineering team and culture, then when my engineering manager resigned I interviewed for his position, but I bombed the interview and one of my more junior tech leads who I mentored for 2 years got the job over me. It wasn't about skill or ability, it was about what the interviewers wanted to hear. I moved on to better things.

My interview with Amazon was by far the worst experience i've had, period. The woman who talked to me was a recent hire, and you could clearly tell that she has INSANE god complex from her new job. I have never once talked to anyone who felt this entitled, in my entire life. The interview itself was a complete joke too. I wouldn't have wanted to work there even if they just gave me the job

"He interpreted my excitement as someone who needs mentorship." You just gave me an idea on why my passionate interviews flunked and my dispassionate ones succeeded. I'll certainly drill this in my head so I can adjust my strategies on my future interviews. Thank you!

I can't agree more with your last point about being rejected for reasons that are outside your control. I've had everything go right on an interview and still be rejected. I've even had positions simple just closed by HR after completing final round interviews. Failing dozens and dozens of interviews is what made me good at interviewing. After about the 6th or 7th failed interview I adjusted my attitude to make it as much of a learning process as possible. That shift in attitude allowed me to relax more during the interview and made the experience more of a two way street where I would ask my interviewer to explain concepts with production use cases to. That being said, this approach can backfire sometimes. One point I'll add about the interviewing process for pre-senior level engineers is apply to everything. I landed my first engineering position (at Tesla!) after applying to over 1600 jobs which took 8 months of daily grinding. Ya'll stay positive and persistent and it'll pay off.

Don't ever forget that interviews aren't just hoops for you to jump through out of desperation; having a job you hate will be a miserable experience. Use the interview to thoroughly figure out whether you even want it. If you get rejected because you were 'too you', because your actual needs and wants didn't align with theirs, then rejection is a great thing. You won't end up resenting where you are. It'll force you to keep going until you find somewhere that suits both of you.

Recently found (and subscribed) to your channel, great stuff here! This may be my favorite one of your videos yet. I don't say I look forward to failure, I don't set out to fail....but I do think there is great value and experience that comes from failing.

I failed an interview for being too ambitious, another for having an independent thinking, another for lacking soft skills and yet another frontend theory interview. Failed but passed for Twitch like the guy here. Nowadays I interview people with my own interview questions and problems, no whiteboard nonsense and algorithms. I don't know if preparing for tech company interviews is useful or not. I know I appreciate people more when I can see what they've built on their own and the real growth they can achieve from that.

I had a similar experience interviewing at Sharpist. I was too excited to work with Joshua Hoffman and this was interpreted as flattery. I had seen his talks and was looking forward to joining the company. But I was disappointed by the outcome as it was the final stage of the interview and the feedback was that he found my comments flattery. I never show excitement anymore since then. I keep things professional, ignore all the personalities involved and focus on the job.

Thanks Theo, love the content you put out.

Love this type of content. You smashed this video Theo ❤️❤️❤️

Super helpful and encouraging. Thank you, Theo

I feel like this is the kind of video I would have really appreciated when I was a less experienced engineer. It’s really important to remind people that everyone goes through the grind of interviewing and self-advocacy. It’s important to learn how to do it, but it’s good to remember that everyone has done it, and you’re not alone.

IT SOUNDS LIKE ONE TALENTED PROGRAMMER WHO KNEW HE WAS BETTER THAN OTHERS BOMBED A DOZEN OF JOB INTERVIEWS JUST BECAUSE HE KNEW HE COULD DO WAY BETTER.

This was VERRYYY helpful, thank you so much for this

I failed a bunch, and sometimes I was trying to get contracts for freelance and losing those as well, it builds character! :D and also you get a lot of experience at explaining yourself, being talkative, opening topics, learning what people want or don't want. Surprisingly it's actually amazing at helping you to know how to talk with strangers and that helps you a lot in your social life too.

Yes, Totally agree with you, there is no shame in failing interviews or doing lots of them. Thanks for this video, I was really seeking some motivation for my upcoming interviews...

That sucks about Linear. One of my goals is to always be surrounded by people I can learn from -- even if I'm the principal engineer. Everyone can grow faster when surrounded by people of that same mindset. It's a shame that got interpreted as the need for mentorship.

thanks man, I very much needed this input ❤

Thanks for sharing this bud!

Thanks for sharing, really appreciated

Good stuff, thanks for sharing your experiences.

"Fail fast."

I watched this just in time. Thanks, Theo.

I basically like all your videos, as ever: It was perfect ⭐

Hearing this after applying to Linear last week and explaining to them how super excited I would be to join such a talented team.

Back in 2020 I interviewed for Amazon's compiler team. The guy interviewing me was a living and breathing embodiment of the TechLead's full-throttle arrogance. One of those work 18 hour days, no fun, only work, excel or die types of people. I won't fault the guy for not speaking native English, but he got mad about me interpreting his ambiguous questions in ways he didn't expect or not knowing non-standard jargon. He asked me how to solve some mathematically impossible compilation strategies and got upset that I couldn't offer him answers or alternatives he liked. Toward the end of the interview I learned that he was trying to solve it himself lol. Anyway the entire interview was pointlessly combative. Within minutes after the interview, I sent him an email saying I wouldn't pursue it any longer and that even after a hours we still failed to communicate properly with one another.

Great message Theo

Every "no" is one closer to your "yes"

It's an interview, not a test. So if you don't get the job, it's a mismatch, not a fail. this little insight can help bring about a mental state where you feel you're assessing the company as much as they're assessing you.

Very informative and reassuring

100% this is such good advice.

i interviewed at a company and got an A score, HR rejected me because my salary expectation is lower than my current salary. This was a shock to me and the team i interviewed with. They appeal but no avail. Another interview rejected me and the feedback I got was I talked too much about my experience in my previous company and what I did, they are looking for someone who wants to talk about what my ideal way of doing things if i have it my way. I think they weren't listening because I am the only senior frontend engineer on my previous company, that means that was my ideal way of doing things my way. I basically develop and architect the whole frontend

Wow, that was very interesting, especially the part at 7:03. It certainly helps to prevent possible future frustration :D

I passed 6 technical screens with flying colors before I met the CEO of one company. She asked me 'what is something you're bad at, that's a core part of you that you can't get rid of'. I tried to say something about my ADHD, and said something about the distraction/obsession cycles make my development speed vary greatly, even if on average i get more done per week than usual. She interpreted that as if I was 'easily distracted, and would simply quit', and rejected me. My first point of contact, who was the director of engineering and the hiring manager called me on the phone off the record to apologize, and told me that he and 5 other engineers literally begged her to reconsider but she wouldn't budge. Your linear story reminded me of this. I keep thinking about what lesson to take from that, but just like you all I have is that sometimes it's just bullshit.

I was about to type “mad respect” and then less than 20 seconds in “although I haven’t failed as many interviews as most engineers” Take a moment to actually think about why you felt the need to say that statement. Id retitle as “tech bro does a fake vulnerability for totally selfless reasons”

I've bombed interviews and I've aced interviews, and sometimes when you walk out of the the interview you just don't know which one it was

I remember my first interview for network infra company, I had to drive for like 3.5 hours, and got stuck in jammed traffic, I reached (I AM NOT KIDDING) 5-6 minutes late, and the scene in spider man 1 movie happened to me where the (receptionist) looked at the clock and looked at me and told me to leave the company

It would be good to hear your take on what is a good programming interview and how much code testing or on paper testing etc you would put in the mix.

I learn alot from your videos theo also using t3 stack its awesome, for my production apps in enterprise. please make a video on becoming irreplaceable by odds, like we starting learning blockchain and after some time it just got off, now ai should we start learning it and is it secure for next 20 to 30 years, or should we stick to our basic programming languages like javascript, typescript, rust, go, C++, flutter. and good to go learning from you lets us think we are learning some special please mention this because its an paradim shift and a confusion for many developers

Thanks!

My current IT job exposed me to so much iOS where I somehow became in charge of adding all 30+ ipads to our MDM from a MacBook, also troubleshooting issues in iOS itself. And I may have to do it ALL OVER AGAIN to Azure... yaaaay. Guess I better grind leetcode and pray the market fixes itself by the time I'm ready.

I interviewed with meta a year and a half ago and barely passed round 1, then failed round 2. Definitely the hardest coding interview I’ve had.

Great stuff

All tech related jobs I landed (apart from the very first one) I got thanks to a personal reference followed by extremely short interview and I can say this is the 2nd most valuable thing my university gave me after the general IT basics knowledge on which I could build on. Even if you can be a self taught React Developer in matter of few months, those 2 things I mentioned are still huge benefits that university will give you.

Well, Theo is being Theo. One of the most honest guys in tech. Cheers

I'd like to add that if you fail an interview, ALWAYS ask for feedback. You may not get feedback (especially if you weren't in the final round) but ask anyways. For the last rejection in my job search, I asked the hiring manager for feedback and he said this (I've copied this exactly from the email): *_"I'm sorry it didn't work out, man. Your interview really well and you have an impressive portfolio, your [project name] really stood out for me. All of us recommended yes on hire, but on a different project - we're heading into bugfix and polish on this one, and don't really have enough time left to ramp you up to be effective there. I was really hoping we had room on one of the other teams._* *_I'm bummed your search has been going on for so long. All I can say is that you can be confident in your skills, and your interview presentation is extremely polished. Keep at it, I don't think you're the problem you've been running into. We'll definitely check back in if a spot opens up."_* Before I got this feedback, I thought I was the problem for every failed interview but hearing this from the hiring manager confirmed to me that I've been doing everything well. It was only a matter of time before I got an offer, and two months later I did. ALWAYS ask for feedback but do not expect a response in return; Out of dozens of interview loops I've been in, only this one person gave me feedback, but it made all the difference.

I've been well enough connected locally that at 54 I've only had 3 interviews and got 2 of the jobs. All my other jobs were by referral and had no interview. Going to meetups and maintaining connections with past co-workers and managers is perhaps more important that interviewing and interviewing skills.

It's hard to even get an interview nowadays lol. It's either take home tests or one-way interview which are just pure garbage.

Inspiring video. 🤙🏼

I failed an interview a week ago, it was terrible, but I learnt what I needed to know more about

This video will save lives

much respect

If you never failed an interview, chances are you only interviewed for roles you're (probably over)qualified for. In which case you're leaving good career opportunities (and probably money) on the table

Failing interviews in itself is useless. Self-reflection and asking for feedback is the tool to recalibrate and learn to move forward.

These stories are important

The first person you mentioned in the amazon lecture hall is the type of person that will evaluate your skills for tech roles... Just let that sink in.

Insane content, so sincere and direct, you're really good at KZfaq don't stop ever

Theo introducing Bombing as a Service

This is so true! Unfortunately interviewers are making arbitrary decisions about signals they think they're seeing when they're actually not seeing a signal

You rule, dude. More to come...

Great Vid.

There's a saying in baseball that "if you ain't cheatin you ain't tryin", the broader principle highlighted here is "if you ain't failing you coastin". Don't settle.

My problem is I want my answers to be perfect. So I have this fear of failure. This leads to me not even taking interviews sometimes

- failed interview. Offered unpaid internship. - failed interview with bandwidh in north carolina - got offer to small michigan firm - got amazon offer keep going

you'd think with how much you love excalidraw now that you would've been fine with whiteboarding for interviews... things change so much :)

You can't take these failures personally. The process is unfair, and in many places, just downright toxic. The technical interview process in many places is poorly designed, and these companies lose because they screen out very solid candidates. The BEST experiences I had, and the ones that lead to great real opportunities came from conversations about past work, real challenges and problems that I solved, and just vibing with the team that was going to hire me. If you're getting shut down, keep at it, and know that you are not at all the only person getting stepped on, and you were probably stepped on unfairly.

I failed a Google interview last year. Right now they have 0 positions open at the moment... Bad timing

Hey you steaming today, any thoughts on stepzen acquisition

I think I failed one because I brought up mentorship as well. lol I was just very excited to be developed with what looked like a solid team. Oh well.

More important problem here is how to get called for Interviews. I have been trying to apply for jobs (via companies job portal). None of them replied back. I managed to get interviews at 3 companies only since 4 months.

I bombed my internship too, yay! Except mine was at an outsource company.

Cool, you went to RPI!

I honestly feel like even your bombed interviews were probably still pretty good lol

man. I wish this is the case now a days. Seems like they're expecting us to ace everything now.

Any tips on getting to the interview stage and past countless email rejections stage as a self-taught junior developer?

It would be nice if I could even get to the interview phase :)

Another time I failed the interview because they decided to ask math/probability/statistical questions in a coding question interview!! The interviewer was a college student I think and I think they are just using interview as a way to flex their current courses curriculum which is very stupid.

How did you get an interview in the first place at Twitch?

summary: theo's struggles to get a decent laptop

Hey guys, who was he talking about while talking about Linear? I didn't catch the name :(. Jori?

Ironic that I have a interview in 20 mins and this video just came out 😂

Can’t even get interviews even though my resume good (showed to many)

I thought I bombed the job I currently have. I was hired. You are your own worst enemy.

Go and fail more interviews? 😱 I Cant even get an interview.

I can't even get initial interviews to even fail :( what am i doing wrong

Just after getting laid off i had a interview where he asked me basic HTML , CSS then jumped into in depth JS which i nailed then asked me react then asked me to screen share and make a component which will fetch data and show loading and error states. I cleared then in the next round i was asked to do the same thing but with the pagination i already built something like that so i wasn't in mood and was sick. I told the interviewer can i get something different as its already boring. he said no. so i built that and still got rejected lmao

I cant even get the interview

Just got rejected by google tonight …. Really deflated …. I nerd out to Hr and she didn’t pass me

are you still doing interviews?

"Bombed"

Damn Twitch really wanted you

💕

Same goes for dating.

interviews make me realize that both sides (interviewers and interviewees) are just blind as fuck and really it's about hitting some unspoken combination of sounds, gestures and vibe that reminds the interviewers of home. We're still monkeys goddamnit, prove me wrong.

imagine working for Jeff...

Wait. How is this possible ? You're telling me that you received feedback from the failed interviews ? That's a first time i heard of it.

Rpi no shit hello from class of 2003