Interview Experience in American Startups

I lived a carefree life in warm Tashkent, worked as a freelancer, and suddenly it turned out that all carefree life was gone and I ended up in the States, all alone, without friends and relatives, but with straight arms and knowledge of Ruby. During the time that I am here (about six months), I have gained considerable experience in finding employment in IT offices, whom I wanted to share with the community

The post is published at the request of comrade sarvar.muminov, which unfortunately still does not have an account on Habré. Invites can be sent to sarvar.muminov@gmail.com
Transferred to Learn to Work

About me: I’m a developer, build sites on the ruby ​​on rails framework, 2+ years experience, there were no big projects, there is a little experience with python, and PostgreSql / Mysql databases, with all the consequences (I created functions, large selections, etc.).

Before you start a search, you should create your resume. The resume should be of high quality and should show your work experience, and what technologies / languages ​​were dealt with. The details of each project that you’ve worked on are not worth it, anyway during the interview you will be asked about your previous work experience.
To create a resume there are some good resources that I used:
1) a good selection of resumes
2) there is an old article about how to write a resume in American, article
3) visualcv.com
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The first swallows will start to come in the form of HR calls, sometimes the CTO itself can call, the main thing is to relax, be communicative, show a keen interest in the project and not straining to answer questions, they often talk about your previous working experience, about which platforms money you want, etc.

After, the first technical interview is appointed, the second is usually followed by the second immediately, with another developer, often they are identical in structure, but may differ in questions.

You need to prepare for them from the moment you decide to look for a new job, read a few books on the specialist, to update the memory, to learn something small, but new - this will greatly help during the interview.

Questions about either the language itself and its standard library, or general questions about how you would solve this or that problem. In both cases, if you do not know the answer, you do not need to panic, in the first case, you can try to answer "I do not remember exactly, but mine ...". In the second case, you need to show the process of analyzing the problem, that is, what steps you would take - as a rule, no clear solution is still required from them. As soon as the developer runs out of questions, it is your turn to ask questions, the main thing here is to show your communication skills, knowledge in your field. You can discuss about any problem in the language or new trends in the community as a whole. In general, create a positive impression of yourself, as a person, and as a specialist.

So, you successfully completed both technical interviews, what next? And then the solution of the problem using PL. There is usually a time from one to two hours, it’s also important to show the course of your thoughts, you can even use pseudo language, describe the algorithm. After you have passed the test task, they usually call you and ask you to walk through the code, and explain how it works, they will ask questions about refactoring, about adding new functionality, about the stages of product deployment, etc.

Here, perhaps this is all, the process of passing the interview is not complicated, but it requires some preparation, and calm, I was nervous at the beginning, I could not answer simple questions. But as the interview progresses, fears and tightness go away, and everything comes by itself. Good luck in your job search!