How to become a "sensible junior". Personal experience

On Habré there are already quite a lot of articles from juniors and for juniors. Some people are amazed by the degree of ignorance of young professionals who, at the very beginning of their career path, are ready to give advice to corporations. Some, on the contrary, are surprised by some puppy enthusiasm: “Oh, they took me to a company as a real programmer, now I'm ready to work, albeit for free. And yesterday, the team leader looked at me - I'm sure my future is arranged. ” Such articles are mainly in corporate blogs. Well, so I decided to talk about my experience of starting a junior work in Moscow, because why am I worse? Grandma told me that nothing. As you probably noticed, I love long digressions and spread the thought over the tree, but there are fans of this style - so pour a big cup of tea - and let's go.

So, a few years ago: I am at the 4th course of the polytechnic in my quiet provincial region center. I do practice in a dilapidated (at the physical level) research institute. I “program” on XML. My work is very important for the process of import substitution in the instrument-making industry. Probably not. I hope no. I hope that all the XML that I’ve been filling up in a sleepy state on the machine in this scientific research institute went to the basket immediately after I left. But basically, I read dvci and Habr. They write about the full life of programmers in the capitals, who sit in comfortable and bright offices, earn 300K / sec. and choose which model to buy for the Bentley February salary. “To Moscow, to Moscow” becomes my motto, “Three Sisters” - a favorite work (okay, I mean the BG song, I did not read Chekhov, of course, it’s some kind of gall).

I am writing to my virtual friend Moscow programmer:

- Listen, are junior programmers in Moscow needed at all?
- Well, intelligent, needed, stupid nafig nobody needs (there was another word, if that)
- And what is “sensible” and what is “stupid”. And how can I understand, what am I?
- Chuvaaaaaak, damn it, the first rule of the juna is not to be stuffy. Intelligent - this is sensible, what is not clear here.
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Well, what can I say - the Muscovites, they will not say a word in simplicity. But at least I learned the first rule of the junior.

However, I really wanted to become a “sensible junior”. And he began to carefully prepare for the move in a year. Naturally, I prepared myself in my practice at the research institutes to the detriment of my “work”, so that if the project of import substitution fails, then you know who is to blame. Of the minuses I had a so-so education - I lost my enthusiasm for studying after the first three in the exam (that is, after the first exam of the first semester). And also ... this ... I'm not very smart. High-schooled scientists and software architects have been silently admiring me. But still I want the same!

So, during the preparation I:

• I learned the syntax of my main programming languages. So, it happened that I have C / C ++, but if I were to start over, I would choose others. I have not mastered Stroustrup, soryan, sir, but this is beyond my strength, but Lippmann is the thing. Kernigan and Ritchie - on the contrary an excellent tutorial on language - respect for such guys. In general, in any language there are usually several thick books, of which a junior is enough to read one
• Learned algorithms. I didn’t master Korman, but Sedgwick and courses on the cursor are the most. Simple, affordable and transparent. I also stupidly solved puzzles on leetcode.com. I have mastered all the easy-tasks, I can say it was a game on the easy-difficulty level, hehe.
• Squeezed out a pet project on github. It was difficult and boring for me to write a project “just like that, for the future,” but I understood that it was necessary, they ask this at interviews. This is a torrent client. When I got a job, I with great pleasure removed it from the githab. A year after writing, I was already ashamed to look at its code.
• I memorized a mountain of idiotic logical tasks. Now I know exactly how to count the number of turned on lights in the looped car, find out the colors of the caps on the gnomes and whether the fox will eat a duck. But this is so useless knowledge ... But now it’s very funny when a team leads out “I have a special secret task that determines whether a person can think” and gives out one of the accordion tasks that the entire Internet knows about.
• I read a bunch of articles about what hr-young ladies want to hear at the interview. Now I know for sure what my flaws are, what development plans I have for 5 years and why I chose your company.

So, I graduated from the institute and began to implement the plan of moving to Moscow. I posted a resume on hh.ru, place of residence, naturally indicated Moscow and responded to all the vacancies, even remotely resembling my profile. I did not indicate the desired salary, because I had no idea how much they were paying. But in principle - I did not want to work for food. Grandma told me that money is a measure of respect for you as an employer, but it’s impossible to work with those who do not respect you.

I arrived in Moscow and threw a backpack at my bed room. Over the next month I had a huge number of interviews, often several per day. If I did not keep a diary, I would have forgotten everything, but I wrote everything down, so here are a few categories of companies and interviews with them from the junior point of view:

• Russian IT giants. Well, you all know them. They can send an invitation to "talk" even if you did not post a resume, such as we are still watching you and we already know everything. At the interview - the subtleties of the language and algorithms. I saw how the face of one tmlid there brightened, when I gracefully turned a binary tree on a leaflet. So I wanted to say " izi , izi , ryltok litkod". For money 50-60, it is assumed that for the “great honor” to work in a company with a big name, you will be modest in your salary.
• Foreign IT giants. In Moscow, there are several offices of large foreign firms. It sounds very cool, but I can only describe my experience as an interview there: WTF ?! In one, I was interviewed for a long time by psychological pens such as “What do you think, why do people work? And for what minimum amount would you work at a dream job? ” After the degree of idiocy peaked I was offered to take a couple of integrals. I can integrate only e to the degree x, which I told the interviewer. Most likely, after parting, we both considered each other to be fools, but he is an old fool and no longer wiser, hehe. In another company they said that I was very cool, they sent a vacancy for approval to America and disappeared. Perhaps the carrier pigeon across the ocean has not flown. In another firm offered an internship for 40. Nuneznaaaaa.
• Russian state offices. State offices love graduates from steep high schools (what I have a problem with). State offices love academic knowledge (with which I also have a problem). Well, plus state firms are very different. In one lady who looked like a school teacher, she suggested 15,000 with confidence in her voice. I even asked again - really 15. In the other 60-70 without problems.
• Geymdev. Here, as in the joke "everyone is talking about a film for fools, but I liked it." Despite the bad reputation of the industry, for me it is so normal - interesting people, 40-70 for the money, noach, rules.
• Every thrash. In the natural basement, 5-10-15 developers are sitting and turning off and sawing the blockchain / messenger / delivery of toys / hardware / browser / their follach. Interviews are different - from a close look to the language test for 50 questions. Money is also different: 30 thousand, 50 thousand, “first 20, then 70,” $ 2,100. The common one is dark perspectives and a dark layout. And my grandmother said to me that in Moscow everyone still strives to deceive such a little sparrow as I am.
• Adequate middle peasants. There are middle-class offices that do not have a loud brand, but there are no pens about their exclusivity. They are very tough competing for personnel, so they do not have 5-stage interviews and attempts to deliberately hurt the interview. They are well aware that in addition to salary and cool projects - the other motivators, they are additional. Interviews are adequate - in terms of language, what is / what you want, what are the paths of development. For the money 70-130. I chose one of these offices and successfully work in it to this day.

Okay, if someone read this far I congratulate you - you are cool. You deserve another piece of junior councils:

• Know the syntax of your language well. They ask all sorts of rarities.
• Do not panic if the interview was unsuccessful. I had an interview in which, after almost every replica of mine, the interviewers began to laugh loudly and make fun of my answer. When I left the room, I really wanted to cry. But then I remembered that I have the next interview in two hours, and with this #### I wish for subtle bugs in production.
• Do not be on interviews with hr-kami. Tell the girls what they want from you and move on to technical specialists. At interviews I repeatedly assured hr-ok that I just dream of working in telecom / game development / finance, developing microcontrollers and advertising networks. Money for me, of course, is not important, only pure knowledge. Yes, yes, yes, I treat processing normally, I am ready to obey my boss as a mother, and devote my free time to additional product testing. yeah-yeah, whatever.
• Write a normal resume. Clearly state what technologies you own and what you want. Any kind of “communication skills and stress tolerance” is superfluous, especially if you are totally uncommunicative and not stress resistant like me.

It is necessary to finish the article with something, so good luck to the junas, signora-tomatoes do not get angry and do not hurt the youth, all pis!