Interview preparation and attitude

Welcome to Building Better Developers, the Developer podcast, where we work on getting better step by step professionally and personally. Let's get started. Well, hello and welcome back. We are continuing looking at a season full of errors, mistakes and other issues. This time around, we're actually going to get out of some of the childhood mistakes and talk about a professional type of situation. This one is the first real interview that I had. I've had a few. It was what you do when you come out of college where you have sort of a sort of a flurry, I guess, you know, you have multiple interviews that that come in a very short period of time. So it's hard for me to remember if this was exactly my first, but it's definitely my first that felt like a real interview that felt like I had a chance, I guess we'll say. Now, this situation is one where it also goes to the idea of, you know, it helps who you know can make a difference. So I had a good friend that had graduated a year before me. Got to know him really well his senior year. I think we had some classes together and things like that and had kept in touch once he graduated because he was basically an hour away, something like that, where he was working. And when his company, the company he was at, which was a small company, I think was a half dozen, maybe a dozen people. When they got to a point where they were expanding and wanted to hire again, because he was the most recent hire, they talked to him and said, hey, do you, you know, somebody, is there maybe somebody that's like you or has some of a similar background or somebody that you work well with that you'd be interested in us interviewing? And he recommended me. And so I managed to, you know, I got a call from him or an email or whatever it was, you know, however he communicated with me and said, hey, you know, I've got an opportunity for you. I want you to get your resume together, send it to these guys and see what happens. And I did so. And we were, you know, had some sort of interview scheduled and it wasn't immediately. It was, and it was in person, probably a couple of weeks out from when I first was notified of it. Now during that time, and I think it was like the weekend before I was going in for the interview, I got to, it was, I think it was for some reason my buddy was, was on campus, was back at the school campus, whether it was a homecoming or graduation, whatever it was. And so I got to spend a lot of time talking to him and going over what's company like, what's the job like, what are they looking for, what's the skill set, all that kind of stuff. I mean, we spent a couple of hours, probably just sort of talking about it. Talking about the job and the people and all that kind of stuff. So when I went into the interview, I had a real good idea of what it was going to be like as far as what the, the environment, the projects and things like that, which in this case turned out to be a problem. So flash forward, you know, step forward a little bit. I have all this information and now I'm going for the interview. And it was one where there was, I don't know, it was an hour or two, talked to the, the owners and the manager that would be, you know, that would be my direct boss. It was a great conversation. And we talked about, you know, what they, what they wanted to do. They, they spent as typical in a, an interview situation where they spent it, you know, the initial part was them effectively selling it to me, saying, this is our company, this is what we're doing, this is where we're going, this is our technology stack, this is the kind of skillset we're looking for, that kind of stuff. It was a good, a good portion of it was a here is us introducing ourselves to you portion of the interview. And there were some, you know, there's a little back and forth. And then they asked me about myself. And so I said, you know, here's what I've done. Here's the kind of work I do. These are the kinds of things I like to do. It was, I didn't have a much of a professional resume at that point. I'd worked at like a help center, you know, help desk center at a college and some things like that. But I highlighted those said, here's some of the classes I've taken. Some of the ones, the ones that I enjoy versus the ones that were not so much as not as enjoyable. You know, the kind of here's where I am. Here's where I want to be in five or 10 years. This is the kind of work I want to do. And that was great. You know, that's your typically how a interview should go. And then as happens in most of them, it got to the point, you know, it's you introduce yourself, I introduce myself. And now we talk, you know, it's a question kind of thing. And they had some questions for me. They got some more clarifications and got a little deeper. And then when they asked me about questions, I had a couple. Yeah, it wasn't a lot because had done my research in a sense. I spent a lot of time talking with my friend and understanding what the job was going to entail. Just a lot of stuff about it. My mistake was there is that I assumed that by me not having questions, it communicated to them that I knew what was going on, that I had a solid grasp, you know, knowledge and grasp of what what they were about and where they were headed. That did not that's not necessarily it actually is not what got communicated. Because I went through this thing and everything seemed great. Hit it off with everybody, got along with everybody. Everything felt awesome. I walked out of there thinking I'm going to get an offer. This is great. This is a company I want to go to this. I was already in my head making plans for how I was going to move there and get all my stuff together, all that kind of stuff. Well, it didn't, you know, a couple of days later go by and I get the feedback and it was a thanks, but no thanks. You know, we had a good time talking to you, but we're going to keep looking. I was shocked and I don't know if devastated is the word, but I was definitely shocked and a little bit hurt, I guess, because I was like, wow, that seemed to go well. And yet no job, no offer. And I ended up not too long after that, I was able to talk to my friend again. And I said, hey, what helped me out? Well, what was what was the deal here? And the feedback, because he talked to him and I can't remember if he was, you know, they included him a little bit in the conversation or what, but he was able to get good information back, which was awesome for me because he said, hey, you know, they liked you, everything worked good, but they just didn't feel like you were enough of a go getter, that you were the type of person they needed because they didn't hear enough. They didn't get enough questions from you. So, you know, so they were. Looking to evaluate me based on some of the questions I asked. And while I had spent time, you know, talking through all of this, they didn't know that they had no idea all the questions that I had asked in the conversation that I'd had in the prior. Of, you know, pre interview discussion with my friend. So all this information I had, all that work that I had done was meaningless because they didn't see the fruits of that. They didn't see the. I guess we'll say the attitude that drove me to ask questions, the curiosity that, you know, sparked numerous questions and covered actually some pretty nice conversations about that. They just saw this guy that was, you know, seemed pretty had very to them sort of minimal, but had a fair amount of information and decided, OK, that's good. As opposed to what they were looking for, somebody that had a little bit of information but was curious and wanted to learn more, because that was which makes sense. That was the type of attitude they're looking for. And that is sort of what we talk about now. We talk about developers versus coders and things like that. Those distinctions. Do often come down to having that drive to to learn more, to do to not only solve a problem, but solve it better. Those are the I'll say the intangibles, but they are about your drive, your personality, your a little bit, your desire for your your job and your career. And it can make a big difference in being a very effective and valuable employee versus just, you know, feeling it, filling a seat, basically, or, you know, just cranking out code. And so there are there are a couple of lessons learned here that I think are important, particularly in the interview world. The one. I don't want to make it sound like that pre interview was a problem. Knowing all of that information going into the interview was actually very useful. It helps a lot. It was just how I put it to use that became a problem. And sort of blocked me. Now, before I get into that, I do want to say that with the interview. More often than not, this situation I ran into is exactly what is expected or what a good interviewer is looking for. Yes, they're going to ask you specifics maybe about a, you know, about a technology. They may do a tech interview where they test you on some things. But really, if they're a good interviewer, what they want to do is they want to figure out how do you think, how do you solve problems? And some of the best interviews I've been in, that is exactly what they do, is they they present a problem and then ask you to talk through a solution. And so the solving the problem is not so much the the interview. It's not what's important, I guess, to them as far as much as how do you think, how do you approach problem solving? And so when we have a lot of information, which we should, like I did, I was able to interview my friend. But these days you can use Glassdoor, you can use Google, you can do all kinds of stuff. LinkedIn, there's a lot of different ways to research people you're going to interview with and organizations you're interviewing for that have the positions you're interviewing for. There's a lot of ways to research that these days. So you can actually walk in and interview, in some cases, knowing more about the company than the people interviewing you do. There's there's a lot of stuff out there. So it depends on what what your approach is. But while that knowledge is very useful, you should be using that knowledge to. Build a list of questions as opposed to answering your questions. I mean, yeah, you want to be able to answer your basic questions. You know, is this is is it a strong company? Is it somebody that is this company that I want to work for? Is it appropriate for my career? All that kind of stuff. You want to answer those questions. But while you're doing that research, you also want to be building for yourself a list of I'll call intelligent questions to ask. Probing kinds of questions to ask, because while yes, you should be in some cases, you're going to be able to get a lot of information about the organization and the people from your external searches and things like that. They should be able to also lead you to deeper questions. And if all your questions are answered, then review it again and figure out where you're going to ask deeper questions, because it's OK. And it's probably not a bad thing at all to walk in an interview and have knowledge about the organization, the job, maybe even the people that are interviewing you. But that should be leading you to ask deeper, more well-informed questions. Because those well-informed, deeper questions are going to be what will impress and remind you, put you in the memory of those people. So when they are going through all of the candidates and evaluating them, they're going to say, hey, this person asked some really awesome questions. Some of the best ones are the ones where you are, at least that I found, are where you ask them about a problem that they're solving. And you maybe sort of help them a little bit. It's like, hey, you know, have you guys run into this sort of problem? That seems like something that would make, you know, would be applicable to your your application, your line of business. And when you do something like that, it's it's not uncommon to see them. Particularly, there's multiple interviewers sort of look at each other and like, well, actually, yeah, that's something we work on a lot. That's something we're trying to figure out, because that is an important part of our solution. For example, if you go into a health care company and you're dealing with patient data, then it doesn't hurt to say, you know, hey, but it's important to maintain privacy for your patients. And yet still be able to have the data from a medical point of view, maybe, or from a billing point of view. How do you guys handle HIPAA regulations and privacy, you know, data privacy and things like that? How do you ensure that, you know, how do you guys build a solution that ensures that you you have the data you need, but also it's not overly accessible? Maybe how do you guys handle even internally? So that employees that don't need to see data don't see data. You know, simple things like that show that you you comprehend what they're doing and that you see where some of the problems are that they're, you know, they're going to deal with. And it may even give you an opportunity to provide for them your thoughts on a solution or an approach that will help them realize that, yeah, this, you know, this person knows how to they know their stuff and they know how to solve problems or they think in a way that is going to be helpful to us and our team. That can be a big, I will say that can be a game changer effectively. That's one of those things where, you know, somebody that's. Yeah, they've got an OK, you know, resume and background of experience and stuff like that, they've done things that are. Suitable, but they need to be. We don't see what distinguishes them from the pack. And that's the kind of stuff that you want to do. That's what you want to have as part of your your interview is that you're not just sufficient, but that you find a way to distinguish yourself from from the pack. Now, the other thing here is that when they when we got to the, you know, hey, do you have any questions kind of stuff? I basically said something simple on the lines of like, no, I think, you know, after listening, you guys have a pretty good idea of where you're at and where you're going. A short answer in an interview. Sometimes that's required, but more often than not, in wherever you can. Don't give a short answer. An interview is not or at least should not be a series of yes, no questions or multiple choice, and then just boom, you're done. They need to get to know you. So even if it's a simple yes or no answer. Feel free to add some content to that instead of just like in this case, instead of a simply, no, I don't have any further questions. It would have helped me immensely, I think. May have made the difference in in that job to say, no, you have answered question. You know, the data you've given me today, plus I spent a couple of hours talking with, you know, my friend over the weekend. And we discussed, you know, this and this and this and this. And so I have a real I'm really confident in my understanding of what you guys are doing, how you guys approach stuff. What's your technology stack where you're going? You know, I could instead of a a five second answer. Maybe just turning that into a 30, you know, 30 second, one minute answer may have been the difference between an offer and not an offer. Now, you don't necessarily to have need to have like diarrhea in the mouth, you don't need to just drag stuff out. But you do you will find it, I think, very helpful, particularly with good interviewers, that when you give an answer, particularly a simple answer that you don't just give the answer, but you also provide either essentially like show your work or give some additional information around that answer to help them understand why it is what it is. You know, if it's something, you know, sometimes it's it's super obvious, like, you know, are you tall or short? Well, you know, if you're tall, you're tall. If you're short, you're short. But even there, you could say, well, you know, if somebody asks you, are you taller or are you short? You can say, well, I'm I don't know, pick it up, you know, whatever your height is. I'm five foot ten, which is considered tall for, you know, my people or my race or my, you know, the era that I'm in. Or it's short. I consider it short because everybody else in my family is six inches taller than me or, you know, whatever it is, is it could be very simple. They can give a very simple answer. But sometimes you can add some, we'll call it some, you know, some color or some more information to that that will one, make you stick out a little bit more. I mean, and think about that. If you got 10 people that are interviewed and they're all asked 10 multiple choice questions and you have all these different answers based on the, you know, the respondees. But you happen to be the one person that in going through all of those, you actually had a story for each of those answers. You are going to be much more memorable when you can put a story together. This is one of those communicating ideas. When you can do it in a story format, it is much easier to remember, much more likely to stick in the the mind of your audience. And so I think that's one of the big things here. Probably the biggest, although it wasn't it was a smaller portion of what went wrong. I think the bigger lesson is that when you are trying to impress others, like in an interview, short answers are are not as likely to be useful as give a full answer. You know, you don't need to just run off your mouth, but giving a full, more complete answer. Don't leave them hanging because they're probably asking those questions in a leading fashion so that you have an opportunity to share with them and they can get to know a little bit more about you. That being said, I think that's enough for you to know about me for today. We're not done yet. We're going to continue talking about errors and mistakes and things that we've run into. And we'll come back next episode to hit the ground running again. But until then, go out there and have yourself a great day, a great week. And we will talk to you. Thank you for listening to Building Better Developers, the Develop-a-Nor Podcast. You can subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon, anywhere that you can find podcasts. We are there. And remember, just a little bit of effort every day ends up adding into great momentum and great success. There are two things I want to mention to help you get a little further along in your embracing of the content of Develop-a-Nor. One is the book, The Source Code of Happiness. You can find links to it on our page out on the Develop-a-Nor site. You can also find it on Amazon, search for Rob Rodhead or Source Code of Happiness. You can get it on Kindle. If you're a developer, you can find it on Google. You can find it on Google Play, Google Play Store, Google Play Store, Google Play Store. You can get it on Kindle. If you're an Amazon Prime member, you can read it free. A lot of good information there. That'll be a lot easier than trying to dig through all of our past blog posts. The other thing is our mastermind slash mentor group. We meet roughly every other week. And this is an opportunity to meet with some other people from a lot of different areas of IT. We have a presentation every time we talk about some cool tools and features and things that we've come across, things that we've learned, things that you can use to advance your career today. Just shoot us an email at info at Develop-a-Nor dot com if you would like more information. Now go out there and have yourself a great one.