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Showing posts from November, 2023

Lessons

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When you're 11 years younger than your oldest brother, you get to learn a lot through them. You learn how to blow air through blades of grass and make it squeal. You learn the hilariously reckless fun of riding your bike around in circles while he tries to knock you off by throwing a basketball at you. You learn the right way to make a snowball. How to eat cherry tomatoes. You learn how going fishing isn't about the fishing but about the sandwiches you pack. You learn how to code. As you grow into adulthood the 11 year gap narrows. You learn how you can help in ways you couldn't before. You can help him move into his first house, tile his bathroom, grow cherry tomatoes... And yet you're still learning from him. How to get a job, prioritize what's important, how to be a dad. And as the years go on, the gap continues to narrow until one day it's no more. He relies on you as much as you him. But he's still not done teaching you things. One day, he t...
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Jam on Toast

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6 years ago I went for brunch at a small cafe in Cambridge, MA. I took a picture of the jam & toast I was served. It's hard to get jam & toast wrong but as simple as it can be, it can still be taken to new heights. The right bread, the right fruit. This was a memorable encounter.  People will forget the texture of the toast, they'll forget the sweetness of the jam, but people will never forget how jam & toast makes them feel. I'm sure there's a lesson in here somewhere - maybe about the work we deliver, the infinite possibility for improvement... or maybe it's just as simple as making sure you always make time to enjoy some jam on toast. Trust me on the last one - you'll thank yourself (and me) in 6 years.
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null

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Seeing a null in a very large tech company's app is a nice reminder that small but obvious mistakes can slip past even the best of them.
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Emily.

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When my daughter was 2 she began telling us of an imaginary friend "Emily." Emily was imaginary friend who'd show up whenever she was feeling lonely - if she was playing by herself at preschool or, in particular, at naptime when she was trying to get herself to sleep. One day, when she was 3, I was asking her more about Emily and she told me how Emily "lives in her heart." She told me how, at nap time, she'd ask Emily to visit the hearts of the people she was missing - her mom's heart, her baby brother's heart, mine heart, and then hearts of the rest of her family and her friends. When she reached the end of her list of people, she could then fall asleep while hugging Emily's heart, and with Emily hugging hers. About 6 months later, my daughter announced one day that she no longer 'needed' Emily, and that she'd made her up to help her feel less afraid. There's no metaphor here, no deeper meaning, connection back to careers, growth...
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Popular

Work Experience vs Professional Experience

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In reviewing a bunch of resumes this week, I noticed quite a lot of resumes with a  "Work Experience"  section. In each of those resumes, people had de-valuing some very valuable  experience - and I write that with no exaggeration. The problem is people were looking at their experience purely through the "Job Title/Relevancy" lens and had reduced their experience down to a list of discrete, random, disconnected jobs. No interconnectedness, no narrative thread weaving through it all. As much as you may feel some jobs have no way of being connected, the reality is  you   are always the connection . To not connect them on your resume is to lose all that growth, knowledge, skills, impact, value, and trajectory. In other words - you lose the " You " in the resume. I recommended they start with a small change. Reword "Work Experience" to "Professional Experience" because, ultimately, every single job they had was in service of building their ...
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Let's Clear Up The Ambiguity!

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Job seeking is hard - especially when you factor the ambiguity around expectations, the lack of transparency and consistency around process. It's frustrating dealing with the sheer subjectivity of everyone's opinions. Just think of even the basics: How long should your resume really be? Traditional black and white, or modern? Should you include a headshot? Oh - and cover letters - are those needed? Is anyone actually reading the cover letter? What are they looking for? Is there a bias for people with a more traditional background? Worst of all: The dreaded typo  that you catch only after applying to your dream job.  Are typos really going to cost you the opportunity??? To help bring some clarity to the process, I surveyed a bunch of hiring managers. The results were really interesting, and very illuminating.     If you're on the job hunt, I hope this information helps out! One final note: My recent post,  7 Steps to Writing an Amazing Resume , factors a lot of...
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FAQs for a Software Engineering Hiring Manager

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Technical Interviews have evolved a lot since the early I transitioned from being a Software Engineer to an Engineering Manager. Particularly in the post-Covid era, there's been a greater emphasis on the person, which I think is an important and welcome change. Over the decade of interviewing hundreds of coders, I've also had the pleasure of working with various bootcamps, colleges, and hundreds of individual job seekers on LinkedIn. Across all the changes over the past years, across the various locations and mediums, something remained consistent throughout: The questions I get asked.  With that in mind, I thought - why not make a FAQ from my perspective as a hiring manager? While this is my perspective, it's based off years of observation and supporting data. But that being said, advice is not fact. You may disagree with certain points, and that's OK. Opinions we disagree with allow us to better understand our own views. At best, I hope these responses help you...
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7 Steps to Writing an Amazing Resume

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  Since sharing my resume template  I've received plenty of feedback from job seekers, HR and hiring managers - all of whom value its purpose. Two (now former!) jobseekers even shared that as soon as they used my template, they were getting calls. Something about this template works, and given the traction it's getting others, I wanted to share - in more detail - why  this approach works so well.  Before continuing, let me give an important disclaimer: This resume isn't a miracle cure that's going to land anyone their dream job. Unless they're filled with lies, resumes are only as good as the candidate themselves. But they can also be a whole lot worse. This template and approach are all about maximizing the potential candidates have by highlighting and summarizing key areas.  Last point before beginning: If you don't know me, it's worth stating this advice comes from more than a decade of having hiring a broad range of coders: straight out of college, hig...
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7 Steps to Building your Portfolio MVP

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Often when I suggest to coders that they build a portfolio, I'll hear back: "I don't need one..." "With all the effort it takes to apply, where will I find the time?" Simply put, having a portfolio's never going to hurt your chances at landing a job - it can only help. That second question is where a lot of struggle - because applying to jobs can be time consuming. Especially if you're wrapping up a bootcamp, or having to manually type in your resume info after uploading your resume. That's why I made these 7 steps which, when done correctly, can really help you stand out with a hiring manager. And, the best part is, it should only take you 2 days. Being the Agile-Obsessive that I am, it's all about maximizing value while minimizing effort. Fix links to your Resume, GitHub, LinkedIn, etc. at the top where they're always accessible. Link to everything here - and then remove all other links on your Resume except your Portfolio link . It sa...
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