Introduction

Oh Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Hope you all are doing well. Welcome back. Welcome back tonight's a banger folks I don't know how else to explain it other than it is a banger probably hands down the most important class that we'll have yeah I'm gonna say it's probably the most important class that we have it's time to start gearing up for the hunt to get into it to learn all the secrets that I've learned over the past 10 years they're gonna help you get a job I'm when I try my best to condense them into tonight and into Thursday's class. So I'm glad you're here. This is stuff, whew. This is stuff that's helped hundreds of folks get jobs. This is the stuff folks don't want you to know. It's folks, we're gonna make some folks mad tonight. I'm gonna get some emails after tonight. I'm gonna get a few calls. It's the secrets, I'm spilling it all. Everything I got, I'm putting into this.

So tonight, we got a lot of fun stuff to get into, a lot of wonderful tips and tricks for when it comes to how to interview, how to get a job, how to do all these things that are gonna open up as many doors as possible for you to get a wonderful job as a software engineer. No check-in tonight, no check-in tonight. If you read the Discord message, I just asked you to follow one of my dearest colleagues, Stephanie. We call them the fairy job mother at RC. A lot of what I've learned about how to interview and the process of working with so many hiring partners comes from what they what they've shared with me, what they've taught me and what I've seen them put into practice time and time again. So I just wanted to make sure that we made that known that this this is somebody I think you should definitely be following. and it's definitely someone that has helped so many folks get jobs. And so instead of a check-in, I said, let's just follow them. Cause I know that it'll be one of the better things you do this week. Alrighty, cool. We always like to start off with some questions. We always like to start off with some questions. And so my question of the day was, how many applications have you submitted it over your years, like job applications. How many 600 or so? What?

Wow. Dozens 40, 200 is 2000, thousand 50, 300, 500 ish. Three K four K. What? Wow. All right, folks. We've done a lot of applying in the past, but today we learn a slightly different way. This is wild. A lot. Too many to count. Hundreds. I love it. Wow, that's a lot, folks. Nah, I don't think so. I think this is real for a lot of folks.

This is a lot. Oh, that's a lot. All right, Chalcoats, hey, thank you for the raid. Hope you're doing well. Thanks for coming through. We're just getting started tonight. We're running a class on how to get a job, the dishing out all the secrets I've gotten over the past 10 years to help folks get jobs. Hope you had a good stream. Hope you're up to some good stuff tonight. Cool, all right, so we've had a lot of folks that have submitted a lot of applications, and unfortunately this is something that I've seen a lot with my students, and it's something that I've seen with folks that are trying to get jobs in tech. Melody Dev, hey, thank you for the gift of subs, thank you for being here, hope you're doing well. I've seen a lot of folks go into this process without a plan. I've seen a lot of folks go into this process with some hopes and some dreams. I've seen some folks go into this process and they wander for months with nothing happening. You can't go into this practice, you can't go into the hunt, you can't go into your interview season like an accident.

No wandering, no getting lost. We're gonna to have all the bangers, the tips, the tricks, the individual things that are gonna help you get a job and it starts today. It starts today. Meaning that we're gonna cover a lot of stuff. A lot of stuff that you're gonna have to start putting into practice. And this is the difference maker when it comes to getting a job. So many folks hyper focus on just the raw coding skills and I'm here to tell you that's not it. The things that we cover tonight are gonna be the things that actually help you secure a job. And this is not the ramblings of one person's perspective. This is something that I've learned, that I've learned through my work at Resilient Coders, my work at General Assembly, across thousands of companies. Thousands of companies we've talked to, thousands of companies that we've worked with, hundreds of folks that have gotten jobs. So I am gonna do my best to condense all that knowledge, all that learning, all the things and people that we've talked to into this one class. Now, I haven't done it alone. I have an amazing team at Resilient Coders that has helped me do all these things for the past five plus years. Stephanie, who I just shared with you all here, has put a lot of this work in, has worked tirelessly talking with hundreds of companies, figuring out what they want, what they need, and understanding their process.

That's the key here is that every company has a process of how you're going to move through the interviews, how you're going to pass what we're going to call the sniff test. And each company is different, but they share a lot of similarities. And so what we're doing tonight is we're saying, all right, we know that we're going to apply, nay, nay, get referred to these companies. And if we do all these things right, we stand a really good chance of getting through that interview process and getting an offer. So condensing what I've learned, condensing what my colleague Stephanie has learned, condensing what Lexi, another person on my team, whose sole job is just to get hiring partners in the door. They literally all day long talking to companies, talking to hiring partners, is getting them in the door, getting them to show up, to talk to our students at Resilient Coders. All that knowledge condensed into this class. And so I just wanna put that out there, right? That this is not just my, well, I guess this is what it's going, no. This is in the game, on the block, figuring this all out over the past 10 years into this class. So we're gonna have to cover a lot. It's a lot of stuff that we're going to, I'm going to start asking you to do, but know this is the real work. And so I have a, I have a quote on the slides today. Normally it's rap lyrics, but I got a quote on the slides and it's one of the most important quotes that I've shared with you. I share a lot of poetry with you.

I share a lot of rap lyrics with you. I share a lot of motivational videos with you, but this might be one of the most important ones. Uh, it comes from a Dr. Eric Thomas video that I've actually shared in the past. And they have a saying that's in this video and they said all men are created equal some work harder in preseason. So I'm going to change a little bit. All people are created equal some work harder in preseason. I can't tell you how many folks learn how to code and then get mad when they don't get a job because they didn't put in the work during the preseason. It's not about the code. It's about the work that you start doing tonight that lays the foundation that lays the springboard that's going to enable you to jump into a job. And if you do not do these things that we covered tonight, do not expect to get a job. I know it's a very bold statement, but it's something I believe in my heart of hearts. You might get lucky. Great if you do. But tonight we're talking about opening as many doors as possible so you can get those opportunities coming your way and lock down the job.

All people are created equals some work harder in preseason. This is your preseason. We got to put in the work and I've worked with a lot of different folks. I don't care if you don't have a degree. I don't care where you're coming from. I don't care if you're a returning citizen. I do not care who you are I've worked with a lot of different people and They've all been able to get jobs when they put in this work Some will listen to me tonight and You'll go on for the rest of your life not doing the things that we talked about tonight You'll see opportunity pass you by and I want you to remember I I want you to remember that I told you this if you do not do these things your chances of getting a job become way more difficult it's a lot of hard work we're about to sign up for but it makes it possible it makes it possible triple action clear eyes a thank Thank you for the five get the subs. Thank you for being here. All right. Harder than JS? Yes. It's harder than JS. It's harder than OOP, but it's not technical. I don't care how good you are at JavaScript. I don't care how good you are at OOP.

It doesn't matter when it comes time to get a job. It just doesn't. It's this work and it's not hard, it's a lot. That's it, it's not hard, it's a lot. It's things that we have to do every single day from now until we get the offer, right? It's the stuff that we have to do every single day from now until we get the offer that makes it so that we can get to the nerds and then have our JavaScript and OOP shine out. But I don't care how good you are at JavaScript. I don't care how good you are at the front end. I don't care how good you're at OOP. It doesn't matter What matters about getting the job and opening many doors as possible is this stuff tonight? Rock man, welcome. All right, let's get into I set the stage Let's get into it All right so this Friday just as a as a recap, we have a car class coming up, so Uh, at the end of today's class, we'll talk a little bit about it. And then on Thursday, uh, we will have everything that you need to know. Right. So on, on Thursday, everything else we'll finish up.

So we're going to hint at a lot of stuff tonight. And then Thursday, we're going to reinforce it and we're going to see some really important stuff. We're going to talk about behavioral questions tonight, questions that you're going to get asked during interviews, questions that we are going to practice. over and over until our lips are dry, right? And the way that we do our behavioral questions is with a method called CAR, cause, action, result. And so on Friday, I'm gonna do some of these questions live just to see, you can get the idea, just so you can get the idea of how you might actually start answering these questions in an actual interview scenario, cool? So, is it like Star? Yes, but it's one thing less you have to remember, which makes it better. So car is better than Star. So we're gonna talk about that end of tonight, but know that we have a class on Friday. Beautiful. Office hours, Sunday, 1 p.m., right? Office hours, 1 p.m. on Sunday. Now, this Sunday will be a big review.

Will be a big review. It'll be kind of everything we've covered in JavaScript. So that way we can jump into the backend, right? Everything that we've covered so far in JavaScript in one Sunday, we're going through it all again. However long it takes us, we're gonna get through it. So if you've been a little shaky on any of the JavaScript stuff, you're joining us a little bit later in the program, you're part of the Ketchup Crew, and you wanna review some JavaScript, that's gonna be this Sunday. So, Car Friday. Office hours, full super review on Sunday. And remember, you got a fresh start. Don't care if you submitted homework in the past, don't care if you forgot a few check-ins, don't care, the slate's been wiped clean. You start fresh today and part of that starting fresh is that your networking starts again today this week. I need you to have at least one coffee chat. That's the goal for this week. We're going to bring the networking back in, bring the networking back in, get up the speed a little bit, right? Getting back up the speed.

And so one coffee chat this week. Julia had to today Nice Do that we had a lot of new folks today Yes, things are recorded The VODs are available on twitch afterwards and they eventually get up on YouTube But there's a lot of perks to being live and then most of our like car classes and stuff like that will be on Discord because we're sharing a lot of personal stuff. So make sure in the discord exclamation point, discord, uh, every single time we go live, we put a message in discord. So you never have to miss anything. Cool. Alrighty. So networking starts again today. Client deadline, remember is pushed to May 17th. So you can get a paid client. You can volunteer for a grassroots organization or you can contribute to free software G weenie a thank you for the five get the cells. Appreciate you. Thank you for being here In quantum a thank you for the tier three. Appreciate you Cool Alrighty Now, two really important bits of information I just want to bring back to the top of your mind, things that we need to start incorporating because you should be still doing your Anki. Remember, when we go through the material, especially the material tonight, active recall and spaced repetition are your friends. When you're done with a class or you're done with reading, make sure you're actively recalling all the things that you just learned.

We know the science behind active recall. Make sure you're still using it to this day. Make sure you're still putting it to action. When we're done with a raid, make sure you ask yourself, wait, what did I learn tonight? Talk it out loud, say it out loud, grab a duck, do something that you can actively recall the things that you learn. and don't forget that you're going to have to constantly be resetting your forgetting curve. We know that we can reset our forgetting curve using a tool like Anki, and if we constantly reset our forgetting curve, we won't forget stuff. Software engineering is a cumulative career. You're gonna need to know this stuff for the rest of your life, and so don't slouch on your Anki. Anki's gonna become a crucial, crucial tool over the next three months that you can learn something that we're gonna talk about tonight called the bank. So please, if you've been slouching on your active recall and your space repetition, this is your wake up call to bring it back into your life. Cool. We know the science behind space repetition. We know why we do it. The idea that we can do something that could increase our retention, increase our ability to recall stuff is super important.

Async awaits, hey, thank you for the five gifted subs. Thank you for being here. Chart, thank you for the hydration, cheers to you. Or cart, sorry, thank you for the hydration, cheers to you. All right, now, Dennis, thank you for the posture check. Y'all splashing out with the channel points today, eh? Let me get the posture right. Cool. Now, the reason why I'm bringing this up and why this spaced repetition is so important is because as we go in to the hunt, as we actually start interviewing, well, guess what? You have to be able to recall all the knowledge that we've learned throughout the program. And so if you have not been doing your spaced repetition, It's gonna be harder to recall that information during the hunt. And so please Bring Anki back into the game. It's gonna make you more calm. It's gonna make you more confident It's gonna make it easier When you're in these interviews for things to flow like butter and for them to not have any doubt and have you pass that sniff test cool All righty. Now, a lot of folks think that getting the job comes down to your coding ability, and you hear me say over and over again that that's not the case.

But over my 10 years, over the thousands of people I've seen learn how to code, and over the hundreds of folks that have gotten great jobs as software engineers that I've had a part in, and not like, oh, I talked to them once. Like, no, like they were in my classroom and I helped them get a job. There was only one thing that I've ever seen that has been the indicator as to whether or not someone is going to get a job. It's only one thing. And that one thing is that they made a decision that this is what they want. That's it. They woke up and they said, I'm going to get a job as a software engineer. Now, the problem is a lot of folks say they want it, but they kind of want it. They don't, they want it, but they just kinda want it. They want the salary, they want the slides in the office, they want the happy career, but they're not at the point where they're ready to put in the work to get it. And so I have a lot of folks that tell me, hey Leon, I want a job as a software engineer, and that's great, but I can tell that they just kinda want it. And then there's always a moment and a lot of my students and the favorite thing for me ever when I was in the classroom is one day I would come into the classroom and the person that was in the back is now in the front. And it's something I, I, I, I can't shake and I know how to explain it. I don't know how to like bottle it up. I just can just tell you what I see.

That person is now in the front and I can see it in their eyes. Something's different. A, a, a, a, a, a, a switch has flipped. Something's different. they're going to do the things that it takes to get the job. It's not about their coding ability. It's not about how good JavaScript it's a, it's a, it's a relentlessness. It's a resilience. It's a determination that says I'm going to do what it takes to get the job because getting the job is a hard fucking task. task and Some folks wake up the switch is flipped and they're ready To put in the work the hunger. Exactly the grit that it's gonna take to get the job is there and It's okay if you can't get there, but I'm telling you that's the only thing that ever matters right It's the only thing that I have ever seen across hundreds, hundreds of students. It's just that look. I don't know how to explain it. It's just the look that I see. It's someone that says, you know what, I'm going to do what it takes and I'm not gonna stop.

That's it It's a decision It really is just a decision And so I don't need you to make that decision tonight But I need you to make it soon Do you want this do you want a job as a software engineer? Do you want a job that is a good stable career that has a high growth ceiling? That is legitimately one of the happiest careers for the past five years running or do you kind of want it? If you kind of want it these next few months are gonna be really rough, but if you want it And you're not gonna take no for an answer. You're willing to sign up to the rejection. You're willing to to have 59 interviews go horribly wrong just to have the last one go, right? And you're in the right spot but it's a decision that you have to make. And a lot of folks that tell me right off the gate, Leon, I'm gonna do it, I want it. No, seriously, sit on this question. Like think about it, put your mind to it. Is it something that you really want? Is it something that you're willing to continue in this Trophistar 04, all right? Because if you kinda want it, this is not for you. Kinda want it is just going to cause you some pain and suffering. Kinda want it is gonna be a waste of the next few months.

Kinda want it is you're gonna be mad that in three months that you've learned all this code, but you're not closer to getting a job. Just make the decision. and if you want it and you know that you want it and you've made that switch the next few months there's a lot we got to do right a lot that we got to do and so tonight is about presenting those things to you so that when you make the decision you have this class to come back to you have all of these things right you have all of these things that you can rely on that, you know, are going to open up doors to get you closer to that job, but this is not a class for, and this is the rest of the program is not for folks that kind of want it. And I don't mean that in some like weird hustle culture bullshit. It's just something that I've seen time and time again. There are some folks at this point in the process that kind of want it and they're going to float for the next portion of program. They're gonna float through the job hunt. It's not gonna work out and then they're gonna disappear and be upset at themselves. No Make a decision. Do you want it or do you kind of one because if you want it? There's a lot of stuff you have to start doing every day for the next three months to make it happen And it's okay it's okay if you just kind of want it and this was a good experience and you're ready to dip fine I'll take it I'll take it. I It doesn't, it's a decision. It doesn't matter how good of an interviewer you are. It doesn't matter how good of a coder you are. It's just a decision.

Are you gonna stick it out? Are you gonna go through the trial and error? Are you gonna do all the things that suck? Because the next three months suck. They're not fun. I'm gonna try and make it as fun as possible, but they're not. And so I just wanna put that out there. Save yourself some pain. Cool. Axel, it doesn't matter. It works good for web dev. It also works good for general software development. Web dev just has a lot of jobs right now. Cool. All right.

I decided to put that out there. I have to put it out there. I know it's a doom gloom thing to say, but there's really no difference. I've worked with so many different students. I've worked with so many different students from all different walks of life that have had lots of privilege, no privilege, that have had tons of experience, no experience, and it doesn't matter when it comes to this next three months. These three months, these three next months, it just doesn't matter. It's a decision that you make that you're gonna put in the work to get this stuff done, and if you do, you open enough doors to get a job. That's it. That's all it is. Cool. All right, now. Now, I am based in the US and a lot of my getting a job experience comes from working with folks that are based in the US. Now, over the last year, I have been blessed to work with a lot of folks, specifically through 100 devs that are from all over the world. In fact, our first 10 or so jobs, most of them were for folks not in the US. I've worked really hard to understand the remote perspective, and I've worked really hard to understand folks that are applying in different countries, done a lot of different weird things.

I've gone through visa processes. I've helped people get sponsored visa. I've done a lot of things, but at the end of the day, most of my experience comes from the U S and I think it's worthwhile to name that because there might be things, little, little quirks that are different to your specific country or your specific region that might not perfectly align with the things that I covered tonight. That's okay, you can figure out those quirks and features of your area, but know I'm gonna take the perspective tonight that you are applying to a local area, and then we'll also take the perspective that you might be applying to remote companies. Tonight will be a little bit more geared towards folks that are applying to local companies, and then we'll have more and more stuff that covers about remote possibilities as well. Cool. Alrighty. Now. Here's another big thing. I tonight's a lot of caveats before we jump into. I told you these are all my secrets. I'm spilling everything, So I got to put some caveats on the class What we're about to cover tonight Is a lot of stuff that are probably Moral decisions like these some of the things I want to share tonight are legitimately moral decision I am a, if you haven't realized by now, a by any means necessary type of person. I don't care about companies, I care about y'all. I'm gonna show you how to play a game. It's gonna be up to you if you wanna play it, okay?

I get a lot of hate, a lot of weird stuff from these, these classes. Um, a lot of folks don't like the things I'm going to share tonight. That's okay. I really don't care. I felt a lot of folks get jobs. And at the end of the day, I don't care about some corporation and I don't care. About your company. I don't care about your culture. I don't care about anything about your organization because I saw what happened during the pandemic. I saw the companies that were, were a family that took care of their, that took care of their employees day in and day out that had all the fancy stuff. And as soon as the pandemic hit, whoop, new phone, who dis? Oh, I don't even know who you are. What? Do you want to get paid? No.

So quickly, some of the best companies turned on their employees and it got dirty real quick. So, it's not personal, it's business. I don't care about your org, I don't care about your company, I care about the people that I'm trying to help get jobs. And so, if your process is broken enough that I can game it, well, guess what? I'm gonna game it. Because I want my students, the folks that I work with, to have as many opportunities as possible. Now, I put my cards on the table. It's up to you if you want to play that game or not. And at the end of the day, I really do hope that you keep in mind that it really isn't personal, that it's all business, and that these companies don't care about you. I don't care if they say they care about you. I don't care if they promise that they care about you. When the chips are down and they could save a dollar by firing you, guess what's going to happen? and you're gonna get fired. And so I'm here to play a game that is gonna help me get the most opportunity and I don't have any love for these companies. Cool.

So, we got a lot of things on the table here. We know that we're signing up for a really hard process, a process where you have to make a decision that says, you know what? I'm willing to put in the work, I'm willing to go through this struggle so that I can one day wake up to a good job, a good paycheck, to good health insurance, to a happy career, to where a lot of your life could fundamentally change. And it comes down to a decision. It comes down to playing some things in a very specific order, doing a few things right. And if you do all these things, you can wind up with a great job. Corey, hey, thank you for the gift of subs. Thank you for being here. Cool. So I put that on the table. I really do hope that you take everything to heart tonight, that you make the decision, that you understand that the things we're covering tonight, people don't like me to share. They don't. They really don't like when I share some of these things. Some of these things are the opposite of what a lot of other folks will tell you to do. You're gonna have some other of your software engineering friends, they're gonna be mad.

I know I'm getting some emails, but you don't have to email me. You already know you're not getting a reply from me. We're gonna make some nerds angry. But at the end of the day, you're gonna have a lot of tools, a lot of systems that are gonna support you over the next three months. They're gonna make it easier for you to get a job. All right. So tonight we're gonna have kind of six main pieces. We're gonna have a crafting your story, which we've kind of already talked a little bit about. We had our first crafting the story. We're gonna talk about your online presence. We're gonna talk about the most important thing that you will ever do when it comes time to getting a job and that's your hit list. We're gonna talk about the interview process and what you can expect. And then we're gonna get into car and prep two systems. They're gonna make it easier, right? They're gonna make it easier for you to get through these interviews.

And then we're gonna talk about the actual interviewing process. There's a lot of stuff to get through tonight. There's a lot of meat here, but let's dive right into it. Malik hey Thanks 14, thank you for the 10 get the subs. That's wild. Thank you so much Thank you for being here. That's wild. Thank you so much Whoo The the subs have been wild tonight Thank you everybody for the gifted subs the subs the the prime subs and all the Jeff Bezos his money. I appreciate it Thank you for being here All right Before we jump into it, two things that I would appreciate if you did right away, first thing is grab the checklist. If you click the link here in the slides, you can always do exclamation point slides if you need the slides. All right. You need the slides, boom, you can grab, you can do exclamation point slides to get the slides. Um, they're also in the discord message. I didn't send them at the first, the first time we got pushed, you could check the discord, get the link there. Uh, you can always do exclamation point slide to get them.

I can always do I think it's exclamation point checklist for the checklist as well. I think that works as well and Make sure you have this checklist. It's the professional checklist that we've been using. It's been part of your homework We're gonna use it a lot tonight a lot of what comes from this checklist A lot of what comes from this checklist is the hard work of my colleague at RC Stephanie So if you haven't already, I really appreciate you just giving them a follow In fact, I'll give you a second to give them a follow on Twitter I've learned a lot from working with them. They've helped so many of the students that I work with get jobs. It's just really worthwhile to just give them a quick follow just as a thank you for putting together this checklist, putting together a lot of stuff we're gonna cover tonight. I'll drop their link in chat. Cool, all righty. Boom, we got the checklist because we're gonna be using it a lot tonight. Just have it pulled up so that you can reference it as I start talking through it. I'm actually gonna read through quite a few of the things that are in the checklist, so it's good to have it open for tonight. All right, first and most important thing that you need as we start gearing up for the hunt is this idea of crafting your story. So we had our one class on crafting your story, but the crafting your story is all about one really important thing. Why are you here? And when I say, why are you here?

I mean, it's more about like, why are you the best person for this job? And why are you applying for this software engineering position, right? It's thinking about all your highlights, It's thinking about yourself in the most positive light possible. We heard in the first crafting your story classes, folks with a range of different experiences. I only chose the best things from those experiences and we found a way to make it seem like a highlights reel of their life. And that is why you are here. Right. And so what is the reason? Like why do we invest so much time in crafting your story? Well, it's because you all smell, oh, that was bad. You all smell, right? You all smell. You have a bootcamp smell. It's okay, but you all have a smell. And it's not like a physical smell.

It's a smell that when you are trying to go through the interview process, it's something that's going to stop you from getting to the nerds. We all have a smell that's going to stop us from getting to the nerds. A lot of times before we can actually interview at a company, there's a recruiter or someone standing in our way and they actually don't spend a lot of time with each candidate they take a quick look a quick breeze a quick sniff right a quick sniff and if you smell they don't let you continue on in the process and a lot of folks this is where their journey ends they never ever passed the sniff test I can't tell you how many folks I've worked with one-on-one that were flandering trying to get jobs and they just didn't pass a basic sniff test they didn't look like they didn't sound like they didn't smell like an engineer and when someone is only spending six seconds looking at your resume taking a quick peek at your LinkedIn and github if all your ducks are in a row you're not gonna pass the sniff test and you're not gonna make it to the next round of the interviews and so a lot of what we do in the beginning right we do a lot in the beginning is setting ourselves up so that we don't smell and we all come to this process with a lot of things that just when you start to think about it are some of the worst things you could ever do one of the worst things I see that gets my goat where I get so mad is folks that have junior or aspiring all all over their socials, on their Twitter, on their LinkedIn, it says junior engineer or aspiring software engineer. No one wants to hire an aspiring software engineer. If you still have junior, you still have aspiring, get it off your profiles right now, please. Delete it, get rid of it, it's out of here. That's the smell I'm talking about. Yeet. That's the smell. We all come into this process, right? We all come into this process, doing things that make us stink. And so tonight is about identifying those things, removing them from our life. That we can get past this initial sniff. Now, once you get past this initial sniff, you can make it to the nerds, right? You can make it to the nerds.

And once you get to the nerds, the folks that are actually on the engineering teams, well then it comes down to two things. It comes down to, can you code? and do I want to work with you for the next two years? And I've seen students game one of these really, really well and get a job, right? But if you can pass that first sniff test, you can get to the actual engineers where you're doing actual engineering interviews. It really comes down to two things. Can you code? And do I want to work with you for the next two years? Both of these there is a game to be played. Can you code? Well, we can do a lot of stuff That tips it in our favor There's a reason why there's so many things that we do at a hundred devs. Can you code? Well, yes talk to my previous clients. Boom. You now know I know how to code.

Can you code? Yes, look at my hundred hours project It's a project. I sunk a hundred hours into oh, you do know how to code. Can you code? Yes, look at all the projects. I built as part of my teams at a hundred devs. Can you code? Yes Look at my github profile. Look at all my green squares. I code every day. I push code every day. Can you code? Yes Look at me solve these coding challenges because I've been doing a code wars every day for the past six months So the can you code question, we got that on lock. And we're going to continue to have this on lock. There's a reason why we do the things that we do because it all is leading up to this process where we have to pass this initial sniff and we're gonna talk about how to do that tonight.

And then once we make it to the actual engineers, there's two questions we have to pass in the can you code. If you just do the things that I'm asking, you're gonna be able to say yes to all those can you code questions. And you're gonna have proof that shows you can code. Real clients, real projects, real GitHub history that when they have to ask, they're doing a little sniff of their own, they go, oh yeah, this person knows how to code. And then we're gonna talk a lot about this. And do I wanna work with you for the next two years? Like I said, there's a game to be played. It's up to you if you want to play it. We're going to talk about a hit list. We're going to talk about getting to know folks that are at the companies where we are getting referred into. And when I show up to that interview, you know, when I show up to that interview, I know who I'm talking to. I scoped them out on Twitter. I looked at all their tweets. I read their blog. I saw in 19, I saw in 2019 that they went to a magic, the gathering convention or a tournament.

And when I sit down to that interview and I have my notebook with me, as my notebook hits the table, oops, my magic, the gathering card falls out of my book. And I go, Ooh, sorry, I got to grab that card and put it back into my notebook here. It was an accident, right? And now they see, Oh, you play magic. Oh, yeah, I love playing Magic the Gathering play Magic the Gathering since I was little This is just one of my favorite cards here, by the way, put it back into my notebook. I'm here to interview. How are you today? They got got So now not only will they know that you know how to code But this person's gonna want to work with you for the next two years. They want to play some Magic the Gathering over lunch so like I said There's some games to be played. I'm gonna show you how to play them It's up to you. If you want to play them this way. So tonight we're gonna talk a lot about passing that Can you code sniff test? We're gonna talk about this other part. I Want to work with the next two years because that's just equally as important I've had some students that didn't do too hot with the code part But they played the social game and they still got the offer So different things for different folks here all the fun stuff. We're gonna get into all right, so Now, when you're trying to get past this sniff test, you all are labeled right now with a boot camper smell.

And when you are labeled with that boot camper smell, one of the very first things you can do to get past that smell is to have a well-crafted story that does not mention anything about a bootcamp. I know it sounds really kind of wild, but that's it. Somebody sent a mod mail the other day. I forget what it was about. They were talking about something about and applying somewhere. And one of our mods, OCC Jennifer, they said, I applied to 20 companies and never once did it come up that I was in a bootcamp. I applied to 20 companies before they got their job and never once did I utter the word bootcamp, right? Your story is so much more than a bootcamp. You have so many more things that you can mention, that you could bring up that are highlights to your life that lead into why you're showing up for that job today and that bootcamp has nothing to do with it. Self-taught has nothing to do with it. None of these words are things that help you pass the sniff test. Nobody wants to hire a boot camper. Nobody wants to hire a self-taught engineer. We don't have to snitch on ourselves out the gate. We don't have to shoot ourselves in the foot when this gatekeeper with their magical list of gatekeeping bullshit doesn't care.

They just don't care. Now we're going to present our story in the best possible light. We're going to present our, our truth in the most possible, best possible light. And if they want to dig, we let them dig. We let them dig. It's okay to let them dig. But what I'm saying is that coming out the gate, you don't have to snitch on yourself, let them dig, right? Let them dig. Exactly. He's let them dig. Don't dig yourself in a hole. Exactly. Let them dig if they want to dig, but you don't need to come out the gate saying, Oh, well, I just started coding three months ago. I did a bootcamp and I have some projects. You wanna see my projects?

No. Stop it. Stop it. Nobody cares. You got six seconds to impress them. They don't need to hear that you just started or whatever. No. Talk about your wins. Highlight your experiences and talk about how they lead to where you are today. I don't care what your background is, there is a way to craft your story. And the crafting the story classes that we're doing are going to help you recognize that, and I'm going to share a link after class on discord. We recorded a session with alumni, uh, helping them craft their story. And so I'll share that as well. So you can see more examples, but talk about your wins. Let's say you were a server in a restaurant for 10 years.

You can craft a story beautifully. For 10 years, I worked in the services industry, working with a wide range of different tools and technologies. At my previous employer, I had to use a POS system that was a POS piece of shit. And I realized that I probably could write better software. And so I took it upon myself to learn JavaScript. And while I was working that industry, I was also writing code to make the industry better. The pandemic hit, as you know, the service industry was devastated. So I leaned into my engineering skill set. I leaned into freelancing and working with several wonderful clients. But I'm tired of the agency life. I'm tired of working with clients and always having to chase the next meal. So I'm ready to join a product team such as yours that builds software that people love because my roots is working with software that I hate it. And so I'm really excited to be interviewing with your company today. Boom, that's it. That's someone's story that has been a waiter or a waitress for the past 10 years.

At no point did I say I did a bootcamp. At no point did I snitch on myself. At no point did I not talk about myself in the best light possible. There is always a way. So, I've asked you to do it and we're going to take some time to do it tonight as well. So we are going to take five minutes to craft our stories. Five minutes to craft our stories. I want you to think about your previous experience in the best light possible Just the wins Easy transitions are this is what I was doing. I didn't like doing it Here's how I tried to fix it started freelancing and now I'm trying to join your company So I want you to take five minutes to think through your story All right, I think through your story to write out your highlights. And don't you dare mention a bootcamp. You don't even need a hundred devs in that story at all. You can say a hundred devs was an agency where you got your first clients. If you got a paid client, boom, but you don't need it to be there. All right, let's go ahead. Five minutes on the clock.

If you finish your story, I want you to put it in chat. You don't, don't type it in chat, type it yourself. but I want you to put it in chat. Okay? Take five minutes. Five minutes to craft your story in the best light possible. I'll put some musics on. And we're gonna come back. Conchipazo, hey, thank you for the raid. Thank you for bringing the crew back. I appreciate it. Thank you for coming through. We are talking about how to get a job tonight. talking about how to get a job in tech, condensing 10 years of helping folks get jobs as software engineers into two classes. And this is the first one.

And right now we're talking about crafting our story. When you craft a story, it's the reason why you're showing up for the job tonight because most folks, specifically folks that are getting their first job in tech have a smell. They smell, we can smell the bootcamp on them and we're trying to think about just our highlights, our positives, the things that are explaining why we're showing up for the job. Because if you can craft that story, you can get past that initial gatekeeper, you can get to the engineers, and then once you get to the engineers, it's can you code? Do I wanna work with you for the next two years? So we're taking a few minutes just to craft our story. You see some folks throwing their stories into chat. You finish early and you feel comfortable through your story in chat so other folks can get some inspiration from it. Five minutes is way too short. Now, three sentences, if that's all you got, three sentences. Don't don't you don't have to. You don't have to give me the whole story. No need for loquaciousness tonight. Give me the bangers only. Alright, come on through folks.

Three minutes, think through it, you got this. Conchipazo A, thank you for the raid, I appreciate you always bringing the crew by. Hope you had a good stream, hope you're doing well. Thank you everybody for stopping by. Look at these stories folks, they're good. and I self in your stories. You don't have to say you were fired. You don't have to say you were let go. Just say you transitioned. So many good ones, folks. Well done everybody Peace Beautiful Minute left, minute 15. My speeches as a follower of Ganshi, I can with everything. How would you word being a stay-at-home mom? We actually did that in our crafting our story class. There are a lot of things that you run into as a stay-at-home mom that can be challenges and say you were working on those challenges, decided to write software to help with those Challenges you start at freelancing and now you're looking for a job on a product team All righty folks Welcome back, come on back.

Let's take a look at this. A lot of folks, a lot of good ones here. I love seeing them all. Is there a limit for the blurb? You wanna keep it like three to five sentences. I think three sentences is where you start. Then you add another two of like the filler and you're in a good spot, right? Something I noticed as I was reading a lot of these is a lot of you are still snitching on yourselves, right? Like we, we understand like a lot of us are here, like, like a lot of us are here because food tastes good and jobs give us money to buy food. And like, that's why we're here. We can't say that in an interview, but I mean, realistically, that's why we're here. Food is helpful. Right? Like that's why I'm an engineer. Like literally why I'm an engineer, because I needed food.

And so I built a website, got money and then was able to eat food. Right. But we can't say that in an interview. Uh, so the, the idea of like saying like, I'm here because of money. Like, that's why we're all there, probably a big portion of us, but we can't put that in our stories because we're playing the game, right? I'm also seeing a lot of you that are still kind of snitching on yourself a little bit. I said it kind of while you were working, but there's no need to say I was let go, that I was laid off, that I was fired. It's always that you were transitioning. And really, as long as you're identifying something that was wrong that you or didn't like and you built solutions to fix it and you started freelancing and now you're looking for a role in a product team, that can be your story for most of these. But these look amazing so far, it's a good start. Keep working on this, keep crafting. We're gonna have nights where we're gonna craft stories live, we're gonna have places to workshop them with others, so this is a good start. I'm glad we're thinking about this, our mind's in the right spot. We're at the top of the hour, So we're gonna take our break when we come back from the break. We're gonna keep pushing a lot of stuff to get to tonight All right Should our blurb be what we strive to provide what we currently provide that's up to you how you want to stretch that word What you strive could also be what you currently provide if you if you if you word it correctly Well All righty folks, let's go and put our timer up here for our break, five minutes on the clock.

If you're able, please get up, move around, hydrate. Look out the window if you have one to see something that's not your screen. Let your eyes focus on something that's in the distance and we'll be back in five minutes to keep pushing. The best is yet to come, folks. This is just a taste. We got a lot of stuff to get into tonight. All right, five minutes on the clock. See you in 5. You You You Hey Leonkey, how have you been crafting my story, I'm an engineering student. Students are easy, right? You just talk about your projects, right? Especially if you're coming right out of university. I was in university, I built some amazing stuff, worked some amazing companies and internships chips and boom. All righty folks come on back come on back All right, I know the folks kind of get a little a little nervous about the crafting your story. That's okay.

We're gonna have lots of classes on crafting your story. Remember, this is this is the start, right? This is the beginning. This is us gearing up for the hunt. A lot of this stuff we're gonna go deeper on, but tonight's a lot of the things I need you thinking about the things I need you to start putting these gears into motion. And so we're gonna have full classes on kind of more crafting the story kind of more of those like Friday sessions where we spend Time doing it. So this won't be our first and last time talking about it Hey Coco All right And then we'll actually have a whole like class night where we're on remote on discord helping each other with this stuff So, like I said, these are first passes. We have nights where we work together to get these things done, where we can come together as a community, help folks that are not feeling too great about how they're crafting their story. But you got to start getting the wheels turning. Remember, it's a decision. You want it or do you not? That's it. Make the decision. Well, all right. Next, we got to talk about our online persona.

Remember, if we're going to pass this sniff test, a lot of passing that sniff test is what you put out there publicly for these interviewers, these recruiters to see. And so this online persona begins with kind of three key things. And some of these things we've already talked about, but we're going to bring them up again, your portfolio, your Twitter, and your LinkedIn. So Twitter is an amazing resource. It is one of the best tools that you will have when it comes time to getting a job. And so I'm gonna jump ahead a little bit here to explain why. When you are trying to get a job, we do not apply. Let me say that one more time. Let me get big here for a second. When it comes time to get a job, we never click apply. We will get referred into these jobs. Here's what happens. at most tech companies, at most tech companies, engineers get referral bonuses. So if they refer another engineer, they get a check. I've seen the checks anywhere from like 2K to 30 grand per referral, right?

And so if you cannot get referred, you don't stand a chance right so many companies have referral fees and if you can't get a referral and the engineers are getting five ten grand for each referral it's a wrap you might as well just go home also when you just click apply and you don't get referred it is the equivalent of printing out your resume, crumpling it up and throwing it in the trash can. Every time you click apply, just imagine somewhere there's a printer that prints out your resume, crumples it up and throws it in the trash can. If you can't get referred, you are going up against folks that are getting referred because so many of these companies have referral fees. And if somebody is getting referred, that means that there's someone that's vouching for them. And that's why the referral is so important. with the referral, it will help you typically skip one of the first rounds of the interview, which we'll talk about in a bit, but it is something that immediately, immediately helps you get past the sniff test. Somebody on the team, right, right, someone that was on the team said that you should be on the team. Right someone on the team said that you should be on the team That carries more weight than anything that you could do It carries more weight than your your github it carries more weight than your portfolio It carries more weight than your LinkedIn carries more weight than your coding ability When someone on the team says that this person should be on the team, too right So if you're not getting a referral and you're going up against other folks that already have the referral, your resume is getting crumpled up and thrown in the trash can. In fact, you printing out your resume, crumpling up and throwing it in the trash can probably has a better probability of you getting a job than clicking apply because when you take out the trash and you throw it into the larger garbage can, a raccoon's gonna come along at night, dig through the trash, pull out your resume, run into the street with the resume, get hit by a car. The person gets out the car, oh my God, I just hit this raccoon, and notices in the raccoon's mouth that there's a piece of paper. And that piece of paper has your name on it. It is your resume. And this hiring manager is so overwhelmed with grief from having run over the raccoon that they decide that they have to give you an interview. And you do well in the interview because you have an amazing portfolio, amazing GitHub, amazing projects. You've been doing code wars every day for the past four months.

So you get the job. That was way more likely than you clicking apply and getting a job. Okay, just so that we understand that. And so in a world where referrals are so important, Twitter can be a really good tool. Because when you have a well manicured Twitter, which we'll talk about in a second, there's something that you can do, a cheat code. One of the biggest cheat codes I got, right? To get referrals, we have to know someone. And to get to know someone, We have to turn them from an acquaintance into our friend. Well, if you have a good Twitter where you set it up, right, where you set it up so that you come across as another fellow engineer. Hello, fellow engineers. I love Nia's Twitter. They talk about themselves in the best positive light. Right. Hey, Nia's in chat. There you go.

Nia's original Twitter. Your inclusive tech leader, founder, CTO, Afros and AI, software engineer, does it say anything other than I am a badass software engineer? No, that's it, that's all it is. Their newer one, software engineer, abolitionist, community builder, right? Talking their talk about who they are. This is a phenomenal Twitter. I believe we also have Sam in chat as well. Do exclamation point Sam if you wanna learn more about Sam. Talks about who they are, developer advocate. They're a developer, 100 devs a month. Like they're talking their talk in their lovely Twitter profiles, right? Hey, Sam is here. What's good on Sam? And so you build a good Twitter profile that where you come across as the software engineer that you are and then follow 50 engineers where you will be applying. So if you are in Boston, follow 50 engineers in Boston.

If you are in Austin, Texas, follow 50 engineers in Austin, Texas. It might take you a while to find those engineers, but you're gonna find them. If you know that you're gonna be applying remote, look for remote developer hashtags and follow 50 engineers that are using those hashtags. Put them in a Twitter list. and then every day just interact with their content. Like it. Retweet it. That's, I mean, you don't have to go much further than that. Like it, retweet it. Do that every day for a month or two. If they don't have that many followers, but there's a person that's constantly liking, engaging with their posts, maybe you leave a comment every once in a while. Oh, you're talking about TypeScript. I just started learning TypeScript. Here's a tutorial I found that I really, really like. Right?

It's just simple engagement. Not anything hard. You can just start by liking, right? Just by liking and retweeting. And then as you get more comfortable, right? As you start to get more comfortable and you see little places to interject, boom. You're not worried about everything on Twitter. You're talking about the 50 engineers that you found that are in your area, that you've added to a private list. So when you go on Twitter, you're not looking at all the crap on Twitter. You're just looking at your list of 50 engineers. Right. 50 engineers, and you're focused on engaging with them, liking their content, leaving little comments. And guess what? You do that for a month. You're now acquaintances.

They know you. They only got 300 followers. And so if you're liking everything, engaging with them, you just made a friend, boom. Boom, cheat code, right? And then when it comes time to get a job and you need a referral, the person that you've just been casually talking to on Twitter, hey, been following your content for a really long time. I love the things that you've been sharing. would you be willing to give me a coffee chat? Just 10, 15 minutes of your time so I can hear about how you got to where you are or how you like working at such and such company. Right? Little, little, little, little things. Right? And I know a lot of folks get really uncomfortable with the networking, but this is easy. This is just liking and retweeting until you get comfortable. And then once you get comfortable, you can start engaging a little bit more, right? Do you have any tips on how to find them?

Just go on Twitter. You gotta be willing to put in the work, right? You gotta be willing to put in the work. Anyone can go on Twitter, start looking for engineers, start looking for folks that are using certain hashtags that are looking for certain cities, right? You can go on AngelList, there's some other places to get it, but it's gonna take you a little while to find them, right? But you wanna find engineers that are in the city, right? Use city hashtags, use things that are relevant to that area, look up specific companies that are in that area, right? It's gonna take you a little while, but you can find them. If you're in a bigger city, it's probably easier to just like Google it. It takes a little while, put in that work, and then do that engagement, right? So Twitter can be a phenomenal tool to build those very simple relationships to lay down that groundwork of you being perceived as a fellow engineer. Not only are you engaging with other engineers, but you could also start sharing content that that makes you look like an engineer, right? You could every day tweet something technical. You could literally read hacker news and then tweet about something you read on hacker news. That's it.

Or if you're someone that doesn't like social media, grab a free buffer account, spend one day a month just putting in tweets that are gonna be sent out automatically, right? All right, put it into Buffer. Buffer's an app that'll automatically tweet for you. Right? And then you don't have to worry about it. You maybe, you put time into it once a month. It does its thing. Now you're looking like an engineer talking about the engineering topics. You're engaging with the other engineers. You're building some acquaintances with engineers in your city. Boom. Something slightly small that you're doing every day to build those relationships. Oh, what did you tweet about every day that's a little too much for me Mind blown, yeah, it's not, it's not, it's not wild, but small list, focus on engaging. It's going to help you pass the sniff test and it's going to build some simple relationships for you when it comes time to referrals. Cool.

All right. LinkedIn and AngelList. You want to make sure that you're setting up your LinkedIn and AngelList correctly. When it comes to the LinkedIn and AngelList, if you read the professional checklist, there's a lot of things on this checklist that are going to help you with this, right? Some people are saying, how long should the blurb be? Boom, tells you how long it should be. When it comes time to your portfolio, which we'll talk about in a second, there it is. LinkedIn and AngelList, there's a few things you want to start setting up these profiles. If you don't have the profile now, you want to make sure that you are setting it up Now so they can marinate. So by the time you're ready for a job These profiles have been marinating for you Right. And so these profiles are just gonna help recruiters find you help people that are trying to hire you find you and so following this checklist for LinkedIn and AngelList could be a Really good thing to start immediately. That's why I asked you to do as part of the professional checklist So you'll notice one of the first things is to get a professional headshot. You don't need to pay for headshots, right? Go near an open window take a good Selfie, right and then remove the background of your selfie. I use remove BG You can drop your image in here and remove the background for you automatically and there you go Now you have a nice headshot that you can use Maybe you want to put a little bit fancier of a background, maybe like a brick wall or something behind you, but that's it.

Go in front of a window with some nice natural light. Remove the background in case there's something weird in the background. And that's it. Cool. Cool. Um, I recommend setting up your current role as software engineer at a hundred devs, right? Just so that you can start the the the internal recruiter clock of you being a software engineer Set your location so that folks that are local to you can find you and make sure your contact info is updated Make sure you've linked your stuff together Make sure that once you set up your Twitter your portfolio your github you're linking all these things together Because that's gonna help the SEO so that when someone googles you right so when someone googles you Right, they can find all your related information so you can pass that sniff test All right, cool What if we want to move that's a really good question You should be targeting these locations and things for the place where you want to work So a lot of folks might be in like a smaller city But they're open to moving to a bigger city put that bigger city on all your stuff Yeah. What if they asked what you did at 100 devs? You got clients. What if they asked current slot salary? No, you're a freelancer. You worked with clients, clients that you got and eventually clients that also 100 devs provided as well. So it is contract work as a lot of agencies already are. Mm-hmm. Cool.

Make sure you personalize your LinkedIn URL. You can actually get your first name, last name. Please make sure you have like your first name, last name as your actual URL. Basically, we're trying to make it so that people can find you. And anything that you can get first name, last name on is gonna help have all that good stuff pop up when people look for you. About section, you're gonna put your blurb in there. There's a lot of these different things that we're gonna ask you to do that are all part of this checklist. And so like I said, a lot of hard work, But if you can do all these little things, it all starts to tip the odds in your favor Now the last thing I'll ask you to do is to join the hundred devs LinkedIn group and We have hundreds of people in that LinkedIn group already One thing I'm gonna do is I'm gonna ask you to all join tonight. I have to approve you I will not approve you if you do not have your LinkedIn profile filled out So if you don't have a photo and you don't have like your role list it I'm not going to approve you All right, so you mesh you must have like an actual photo Yeah, you have to have like your role list it and if you don't have those things list it you're not gonna get accepted into the LinkedIn group, but I want everyone to go ahead and sign up for it and And then once you are approved, so I'll approve everyone tonight, tomorrow, depending on how many folks sign up initially, right? Once you get approved, I want you to do something. I want you to find five individuals that are in the group and connect with them. Right? Five individuals that are already in the group and connect with them. Once you connect with them, I want you to endorse them for JavaScript, Node, and React. So that means everyone tonight needs to have those skills on their LinkedIn profile.

I want you to have JavaScript, Node, and React. So once you get approved to the 100 Devs group, find five folks, connect with them, and then endorse JavaScript, Node, and React, right? And so we're gonna have a couple nights where I ask you to do this, And we're gonna keep the circle going and so by the end of 100 devs. We should have I don't know 10 to 20 kind of Endorsements that way that the recruiters that use that stuff, right? Right the when the recruiters start to add that stuff look at that stuff You start to show up in the searches for those skills now remember when you connect with folks What do we always do whenever we connect with someone on LinkedIn? What is absolutely? imperative that you do when you connect with someone. You add a message, you send a note exactly. If anyone from a hundred devs sends you a connection without a message, ignore, just ignore them. Always, always introduce yourself. Always send a message, right? Always send a message. and if you get one that doesn't, boop, disappear. Cool. The link to the group is in the slides.

I believe we also have a command for it as well. Might be LinkedIn, let's see. Yep, we have exclamation point LinkedIn is the command and this is the group, I'll spam it in chat. Yeah. Like I said, I won't add you unless you got your, your photo and your role and everything on there. So make sure you fill it out before you join beautiful. So you set up your Twitter, you have set up your LinkedIn, your angel list. You have set up a portfolio, right? You set up a portfolio and we've talked about the portfolio. We've talked about the resume. We have a whole class on how to set up your resume. So I'm kind of going quickly through these little bits because we've already covered a lot of it in our resume class. Um, but the thing I'll show you about the portfolio, if we look at, uh, Sean's portfolio, Sean's portfolio was a beautiful HTML five up template. it, they listed their, their projects and they wound up getting a job at Amazon. Uh, their original profile didn't even have a URL.

It was just a Netlify URL. And so you don't need to go out there and spend a bunch of money on a domain name. You don't need to have custom design. You can have a template and focus your energy on doing all the stuff that really moves the needle. where it moves the needle when it comes time to getting a job. Can you host your site on GitHub? Yeah, you can, GitHub Pages is cool, but I just have a preference for Netlify, I use them for everything. Cool, all right. The rule of thumb is if you're a designer, go ahead and design your portfolio. Otherwise, if you are not a designer, go ahead and use a template. The templates that we shared in the past were HTML5Up. Pretty much all of my students use HTML5Up templates and they've all gotten wonderful jobs. After you get your first client, sometimes folks like to upgrade to use more fancy templates or custom design, But right out the gate you can get non shady templates to use cool Hosting for your portfolio I just use netlify netlify.com slash drop is super easy. Just drag your portfolio Onto it. It'll host it for you.

You can use an actual domain or you can set up a netlify domain for free Uh, so you don't need to do anything that costs money for this whole process Cool. Domains, if you do decide that you want to buy like your first name, last name, or something like that, my two go-tos are name cheap and I want my name. They're the only domain registrars that I kind of use and trust. We covered a lot of this in the resume class. And then we do have the resume template that is linked in both the professional checklist and here in the slides. And so for your resume, you definitely want to make sure that you are using the Bob Coder template. Just use the template, please just use my template. It works, it's worked time and time again with so many different students. And remember, we are not applying, we are not applying. We're not clicking apply, we're not clicking apply. All right, we are not clicking apply. So does it matter if our template is readable by the robots? Does it matter if our resume is crafted perfectly so the robots pick it up and take it, and no, it just doesn't matter. no it doesn't this this template is pretty damn good it's pretty damn good it's gonna work pretty well with most of the like auto reading resume programs right it's gonna it's gonna help with most of the auto reading programs but this one works better for passing the sniff test so i've done things in a slightly different way that helps it so that folks that are spending six seconds actually reading the resume, right? Get the stuff that they need so they can make their decision and pass you on to the nerds.

I'm not interested in competing against the computer. I'm trying to game a human to getting me to talk to the next person in the lit in the chain, right, of getting the interview. Right. That's the goal. This template works. It's helped hundreds of people get jobs, use it. You're going to notice some things in here that we talked about during our resume class. I recommend having software engineer at a hundred devs, your big projects and the client work that you did, if you did other client work having kind of a section for your client work and then like one other role for folks that have more history that have done more stuff this might slightly change to where you're just going to roll your freelancing into your experience at 100 devs right and then you might have more space down here for your other roles that's it right and so it's up to you to take a look at this but it should be one page, and you should stick to conveying everything in that one page. Uh, if you're, if you're kind of hung up, you don't know what to put on your resume. We have a full class on just the resume that you can come back and watch. Remember tonight, we have a lot of stuff to get through, so go back and watch that full class. If you're like Leon, why do I put a hundred devs? How do I, how do I talk about myself? What skills do I put? How do I talk about my education?

Go back and watch that resume class. We cover everything about the resume. Cool. So we've now built out a beautiful, beautiful Twitter. We've built out a beautiful LinkedIn and AngelList. We have our beautiful portfolio. We have it fully hosted. We have a beautiful built out resume. All right, built out resume. Nope, the resume class is on YouTube. We just cut off the part where we had, where we shared other folks resumes. It's class 25 on YouTube. Yep, cool. Beautiful resume. We have all these things that we've now worked on that are manicured, that are perfect.

They're gonna help us pass the sniff test. And you're like, well, how do I make it perfect? What do I have to do for LinkedIn? What do I have to do? It's all in the checklist, baby. It's all in the checklist. It's a checklist. Literally, just go through and do the checklist. Woo! Woo! Come on now. I got you. I got you. It's a checklist. Just follow the checklist.

All right. Also, once we get to the hit list, just know that we'll be making a lot of different versions of our resume. I think where a lot of folks mess up when it comes to the hunt, is they think that one size fits all and it doesn't. So we're gonna do a lot of customization, a lot of customization to our resumes, and you're gonna wind up with like 30 different versions of your resume. So get your first version done, make sure that it looks good through CV compiler, don't pay for anything, and know that we're gonna kind of have a lot of different versions of our resume. It's like, we're gonna have a lot of different versions of our cover letter. Um, cover letters kind of aren't super, super important anymore. There are still a lot of places that ask for them. So it's worthwhile to have your version of the cover letter. And you know how I do, I've given you an example. So you're going to take this example and you're going to plug in the pieces that make sense for you. You're going to take out the stuff that doesn't make sense to you. Right. And you're gonna have just something to work with, right? Something to start with.

And then once we get into the hunt, we're gonna make lots of different versions of this, right? Yeah. So for now, just have a basic one as we get deeper into the hunt, right? As we get deeper into the hunt, we'll spend more time on this, we'll have multiple versions of it, right? Tonight is about seeing all the things that you have to prepare, right? in the slides, all the slides are linked. So if you click the Bob Bobberson, it'll take you to the cover letter. All this stuff is stuff you have to start working on that you have to start crafting, right? Like I said, a lot of work. And so now you have examples for everything. You gotta start tweaking it to yourself. All right. Gotta have your GitHub set up. Remember, this is all just for that first sniff test. That first sniff test.

I can't message someone, I can only connect. Yeah, when you connect, you can include a message. Yeah, when you connect with someone, you can include a message as you're connecting. You can't just send someone a message, you have a note as you connect with someone. So yeah, you don't need premium, you don't have to pay anything on LinkedIn. When you connect with them, you add a note, right? It's called add a note. And so you add the note and that's how you do it, that's it. You don't need to send like a separate message. It's just add a note as you are connecting with them Cool All right, github super important. Don't pay exactly well said it do not pay you don't have to pay for anything You don't have to pay for anything In this whole entire process this whole entire journey The whole point is that we do it for free You don't have to pay for any of this stuff. Anything I ever show you, do not pay. There's nothing to be paid here. What should the note say? You should introduce yourself and let them know the reason why you're connected.

Blah said, I invested time and then $8 for my domain name, that's it. Now they have a beautiful, wonderful job. Hey. Okay, cool. Now, GitHub, you don't want some crummy GitHub, you want a good GitHub. Let's look at Charles's GitHub. I love Charles, they're one of my students at RC. They grinded it out, they grinded it out. Like, hold on, I just need you to think about, let's just see this, I gotta say something about Sean. I said Charles, Sean, I gotta talk about something. I gotta talk Sean's talk, all right? But let's look at their GitHub. Look at this beautiful GitHub. Their beautiful name, links to all their beautiful stuff. Right?

Links to their website, links to their projects, and look at the links to their projects. Look, there's two different kinds of people in this world. There are some people that just put images, and there's some people that put GIFs. You know what I'm saying? There's some people that just put images and then there are some people that put GIFs. That take that extra step, that go that little extra mile, right? Come on now. Go to connect. Oh, look at their code wars. They keep it public. They keep it public, they keep it public. Oh, whoo, I'm still scrolling, baby. Whoo, whoo, oh, look at the flex at the end, too. Completed over 1,000 plus challenges and pushed five solutions every week. The recruiter that just came to this page, they saw, oh, the recruiter's just like, oh.

that's what the recruiter did they got hit with the gifts they're like oh then they got hit with the codewords repo they scrolled to the bottom and then they got hit come on now come on now now see some people some people some people say Leon I applied to all these jobs I didn't get a job and then And there are some people that are out here doing this. They put in the work, this is what I'm talking, when I say you got to put in the work, right? All men are created equal, some work harder in preseason. This is what I'm talking about. This isn't hard, but it's work. It's not hard, but it's work. They were not happy to just put basic stuff on their profile. They were not happy to just have all their code wars in a repo. They had to go and fill out the full template. And what I want you to note, I want you to note, look, look, look, look, look. Look at the format here. How it's made, optimizations, lessons learned. Where'd they get that? Where'd they get that from? Oh.

The readme template that I gave you in the slides. That's part of the checklist. Would you imagine? Look at this. So this is a template that Alec Ortega, one of our longest standing mentors at Resilient Coders, they put this together. Look at this. Name of the project, brief sentence or two about it, link to where it's hosted, an image of it, how it's made, optimizations you would make, lessons learned, examples. Every single thing you put on GitHub needs to have this template, full stop. Every project you put on GitHub needs to have this template. And here's why. It looks great. Recruiters that are just taking a look through your GitHub, they see this. Oh, you smell great, right? You smell great. You're going to the next round, right?

And I'll tell you why. Because even if they're a little bit more technical, right? Even if they're a little bit more technical, they see it, what you built. They see it live. They see the technologies. You're hitting that SEO stuff. You're hitting that SEO game. But here's my favorite part. I got two favorite parts here, the optimizations. Leon, I don't have enough time to do everything I wanted to do. Great, put it in the optimizations because when the engineers coming to your site and they're like, well, it would have been really great if they would have done this or it would have been really good if they'd done that. Well, guess what? You don't have to do it. Just put it in the optimizations, right? Now the engineer that's looking at this will go, oh if they had more time they would have used TypeScript or they did have more time they would have used SQL instead right so now you put your optimizations in there and now the engineers think that you know what the heck you're talking about and you didn't have to put in the work Boom, and then I want recruiters to get lost in my stuff.

I want them to be like, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh. And so at the end, you link to all your other repos. Right, you link to all your other repos so they can go from one repo to the next, to the next, get lost in it. They just can't wait to send you to the next round of the interview, right? So we'll notice that Sean, the thing that I loved about Sean is they always did it. They just put in the work, right? They didn't have just a regular GitHub, right? They didn't just have a regular, oh man, I gotta scroll so far. Boom. They didn't just scroll, they just didn't have a regular GitHub. They built it out. They used, I don't know, maybe like a generator that I linked here in the slides. I don't know, maybe they used the profile generator, like Leon, how do I make a beautiful profile? Wow, boom. Generator, fill out your stuff.

It'll give you the readme file that you can put on your GitHub. Done. I hope that you're seeing tonight that I'm not just telling you to do stuff. I'm literally giving you exactly how to do it. You want a resume? Resume example. Want a cover letter? Cover letter example. You want a GitHub? Not only will I give you examples, I will give you the generator to generate it. Some folks might have told you go build a GitHub. Some folks might have told you go build a resume. Nah, I'm giving you the examples that you can use that have helped hundreds of other folks. You just gotta do the work. So your GitHub, you use a profile generator to make a beautiful profile, just like Sean.

Take it that extra step. Don't be happy with just regular images, make GIFs. Make sure your content is linked. Oh! Oh, baby. Woo! I need to take a walk, I'll be right back. You I need some water Joe blow said me versus the guy the recruiter tells me not to worry about All right, so I'm gonna ask you a question here Let's forget that Sean went to Amazon and did their thing there. Without knowing that Sean went to Amazon and was an engineer there for a while, just by looking at what you see here, does Sean know how to code? Yes. There's not a single thing that the gatekeeping assholes could say to Sean. They've pushed code every single day. They made all the code that they pushed public. You can see their coding challenges. If I'm interviewing Sean, think about this, think about this, hold on, this is really, really important.

Focus on this, this is super important. I need you to think about this. I need you to think about this. Please, please focus on this. Put the wrong headphones in, sorry. I need you to focus on this. One second, one second. Think about this. I have interviewed hundreds of people, right? Hundreds of engineers. I personally have interviewed engineers, right? Sometimes great engineers fumble during coding challenges. Coding challenges suck. Sometimes you could be a great engineer, but mess up a coding challenge. It's not your day and it would be horrible if I let a great engineer go because the stress of the technical interview got them on that day.

But if I looked at someone's profile and I saw that they publicly pushed a thousand coding challenges, right? And I saw that their get hub, they've pushed a challenge every day for a year. Plus am I likely to give them a second shot? Am I likely to think and say, you know what? It might've been me and not them. Yes. Fuck. Yes. Hell yes. Abso-fricking-lutely. There's no way as someone that was hiring engineers that I could look at this GitHub and not think it might've been an off day. Or better yet, if they sent me an email saying, hey Leon, I really appreciate you taking the time to interview me. I really appreciate getting to know you and the team. I just wanna let you know that it wasn't my best day. I had some really rough stuff happen in the morning.

I just wasn't in my element for these coding challenges. I know I can do a much better job. Is there any chance that you can give me a second shot at the technical interview? I know on a good day, I could really rock it. You can see my coding challenges in this repo. I really do live this life. I would really appreciate a second shot. All day long, I'm giving that person a second shot. All day long. Right? So, is this, and let's think about this for a second. Is this hard? I don't think so. I think every single person here could do this. I think every single person here could use the literal generator I've given you, and then do a code war as a day.

I think you could. Now, not everyone has the super privilege of time, but barring that aside, I think every single person here, it's not a hard thing, it's a making it work thing, right? And putting in that little extra bit of work, right? And so if you have the privilege of time, please don't waste it, please don't, right? Because this is just one Code Wars a day consistently. And if you do this, if you do all the little things that we've talked about, right? If you do all the little things that we've talked about, you're setting yourself up for a phenomenal career. There's not many things that we can do in life where at the end of the day, someone's gonna give us 80 grand, right? There's not too many things that we could do at the end of the day, where if we do these things, these little things, right? We do these little things every day, it could lead to a phenomenal career that's high paid, that has really good growth, that enables us to be happy, that has really good benefits, right? Like there's not many things in life where if we just do these little things every day that we could lead to something like that, right? And so I just hope that you see that there's a way to do something and then there's a way to do something. And what I'm asking you to do is to do something, right? I'm giving you all this stuff. And the reason why I'm giving it to you, the reason why I'm asking you to do these things that seem silly, adding 50 people on Twitter, engaging with their posts, having a good LinkedIn angel list, having a good portfolio, having a good, a good well-hosted portfolio, having a good resume, having a good cover letter, having a good GitHub, doing your code wars daily, it's because if you do all these things in aggregate, it, you become a beast, an unstoppable job getting beast.

And it's just doing these little things that no one else wants to do. I'm telling you, other folks do not want to put in this work. Tell me how I know. Tell me how I know that other folks aren't putting in this work. Look at this slide. Having trouble finding a job out of college, 400 plus applications with no luck. Nah son. Not luck you need. You haven't been doing it right. You haven't been doing it right. Honestly, you haven't been doing it right. You didn't realize that you smelled and you fucked up. That's it. There's a process to get a job. Some folks put in the work to do that process and other folks write these kinds of posts on Reddit.

That's it, that's all it is to it. We don't apply. We never click apply. There's never gonna be a post from somebody from 100 devs doing this because we don't apply. We get networked in, we get referred in, and we're gonna talk about how to do that. We're gonna talk about how to get referred into these jobs so that you are not making one of these posts. So, we're at the top of the hour. We're gonna put five minutes on the clock. When we come back from our break, I'm gonna talk to you about how to get referred into positions so that you are not applying because we do not click apply. All right folks, five minutes on the clock. We're gonna take a break. When we come back from break, we're going to talk through how to get referred, but I hope that you're taking everything in the heart so far. you understand there's a lot of little things to be done. And if you do these things, you're opening door after door after door, that's gonna help you pass that sniff test and get a job. All right, we had somebody redeem Jet Eternal, added two minutes to the timer.

So this five minute break is now a seven minute break. I will see you all in seven minutes. With your extra two minutes, I recommend making sure that you join the LinkedIn group, maybe think a little bit about your story, and then if you're able, get up, move around, hydrate, look out the window, do something that's going to enable you to take some stress off your Eyeballs I just really like this gift. There we go. All right, we're back You You You You You Yep, Project Everything is available immediately on Twitch as a VOD and then on YouTube. If you're new here, make sure you join our discord, that's where you'll get all the goods. If you're new, we're running a 30-week software engineering bootcamp, exclamation point 100 Devs to learn more About minute left folks And here at Storm, welcome. Should we stop posting 100 days of code? Does that give us away as students too much? No, you can you can you can be doing all that stuff and then once we get deeper into the hunt We'll slow down with the the boot camper ish stuff, but we're not at that point yet You can still be doing all your stuff on Twitter all that fun stuff. Yeah I'm gonna show you pushing private or public. It's up to you recruiters are gonna dig through each repo It's up to you though. Yeah, I keep everything Most of my stuff is public stuff that is private Make sure you have the setting where when you contribute to a private repo you still get credit with your green squares But you saw how impressive it was for Sean have all of their coding challenges there to have that growth to be visible. That's pretty damn impressive All right, folks come on back come on back Time for a different Twitter. Yeah, definitely some folks if you just have wild Twitters having like a professional Twitter could be helpful I don't mean like the setting where you turn your Twitter into a professional one.

I don't I don't use that I just mean that like if you have like Something where you just been while in on socials and it might behoove you to start a new social Also, remember that a lot of people signed up for Twitter with their phone number So I've had employers like put in people's phone numbers on Twitter and that's how they got got so be careful I deleted my OG Twitter, it went too wild on that one. Yeah, yeah, I see that. All right, so remember, we're not clicking apply, folks. Clicking apply does not work. Clicking apply does not work. Okay, you're saying, Leon, clicking apply doesn't work. What do we do? We get referred. Remember how I said that every single my everything, but most companies have referral programs. If you are not getting referrals, you are going up against folks that are getting referrals. You are not going to make it past that first round because you're not getting referred and you're going up against people that are getting referred. It's a fool's errand, and so the referral process is super important because it gives you an evil play, even playing field, but it also typically helps you skip one of the first rounds of the interview process. And so when we talk about the interview process as a whole, we'll notice that if you're getting referred, you'll often skip that first phone screen or that first kind of thing that's in your path of getting to the actual technical interview. Cool. So, the hit list, AKA probably the most important thing that you will ever do for your career.

It's not learning Node, it's not learning JavaScript. Your hit list, hit list is probably the most important thing you will ever do for your career. So what is a hit list? A hit list is taking individuals that you're meeting or sorry, individuals that you want to interact with for a job, literally adding them to a list and networking and reaching out to them. So what we're gonna wind up doing is using the sheet. So you can do exclamation point sheet in chat or click the link in the slides. And when you pull up the sheet, you'll notice there is two tabs. we have been using this, how can I do this without me being in the way? Hold on. We have been using the first tab for our networking, but there is a second tab for the hit list, right? And so if we look at the hit list, we'll notice that there are quite a few things on here. you're gonna see company name, date added to spreadsheet, URL, role position, type of position, source, name, visitor at company, email, applied, date application, coffee chat. Thank you, date coffee chat, interview date. So there's a lot of stuff here. And what we are doing is identifying companies that we want to work at adding these companies to our hit list and then finding the points of contact at those companies to reach out to.

None of these are editable you have to make your own copy you have to do file make a copy this is my copy I don't need you riff-raff putting nonsense in here so you make your you make your own copy and and then you can edit your own copy. so your hit list is legitimately a list and what do I mean by list well you are going to network your way in to 60 applications we say again you are going to network your way in to 60 applications that means for 60 applications you are going to be recommended. Not click apply, you literally get a referral into that open position. 60. Not 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 50, 51, 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 60, that you get recommended into. So, we're gonna have classes on how we do this properly, but the gist is find open roles that are in your area that are things that are in your scope of possibility. Entry-level software engineering roles, roles that require one to three years of experience, right? You're gonna add these roles to your sheet, And then you're going to start finding people that actually work at these companies. Now, what people are we targeting? Well, first we're going to find a hiring manager. All right. So if there is a company that we're interested in that has an open opportunity, we're going to find the hiring manager at that company. Now, typically, if you're like a really big company, this is gonna be hard to find, but most of us are not gonna be applying to like big thousand, 2000 plus companies. We're probably gonna be applying to like a hundred to 500 person companies. And so the first person you wanna try and find is the hiring manager that's responsible for that role.

So if it's a software engineering role on a certain team, you're gonna try and find the person who has authority on that team. You're going to add them to your hit list. You're going to follow them on Twitter. You're going to find their email using Hunter IO and you're going to ask for a coffee chat. Now we're going to have a whole class on this process. Like if you're freaking out and panicking about how you do this, don't worry. I'm going to walk you through it. If you go to our YouTube, we literally have three classes where I do this live, like finding the opportunity, finding the person at the opportunity, figuring out how to contact them, adding them to my hit list. Like, this is gonna be a whole class. I'll give you a taste, give you a taste, but we're gonna literally have three classes where all I do is put on hard EDM music and do this live, right? And so don't worry, we're gonna do it together, but it's something you need to start thinking about right now, because this is how you get a job. Cool, so you found a role, you added that role to your hit list, you put the name, when you added it to the hit list, the URL for the role probably on something like angel list or something like that, you put the title of the role, software engineer, type of position, front end, source, right, like where you found it, angel list or whatever. And this is where you're gonna put your points of contact. You're gonna find the hiring manager first and your goal is to get a coffee chat with that hiring manager right and Most of the time you're not gonna be like hey, I want to work at your company. Can we talk?

No, most of the time you're gonna say hey, I saw that you work in Boston and that you're really into typescript. It's something I've been getting more into would you be up to having a coffee chat? I would love to learn more about kind of how you got to where you are and your, your career as a software engineer, right? So kind of, wait a minute, hold on Leon, you mean that all the networking that you've made us do, right? All the networking made us do all that outreach and getting coffee chats. You mean to tell me that was all preparing us to do that in a more targeted way for the hit list? Yes. That's what it was. The reason why we did all of the networking and practice before was because we're getting practice to make this part a little bit easier for us. Cool. So you're gonna ask for a coffee chat. You're not gonna be upfront. You're not gonna say like, you have a job, I wanna talk to you about the job. You're gonna try and get to know them a little bit. Schmooze a little bit.

And then if it comes up, and a lot of times it does come up, Like probably 70% of the time they'll say hey, we have an open role at the company. Would you be interested and you'll go? Oh You do have an open role you say Okay. Yeah, would you mind referring me for that role and they'll go? Yeah. Sure. I'll happily refer you Open role you say exactly right, but if it doesn't come up during your conversation be smooth play it cool follow up the coffee chat, say thank them for their time, provide a little bit of value. Hey, you told me that you really like Pokemon. I don't know if you saw they released some new information about Violet coming out soon. Like, here you go. Have a great rest of your week. Then two weeks later, right? Two weeks later, after you've been liking their stuff on Twitter, right? You've been retweeting some stuff here or there, send them another email. Hey, I see that there's an open role at your company.

If you remember, we talked two weeks ago, I really enjoyed our conversation. Would you mind referring me for this open role? And they'll go, yeah, of course, sure, why not? We met, you're a normal human being, you're a software engineer, why not? It's an easy 5K for me if it works out. All right. It's not creepy folks, it's networking, right? Cool, so 99% of the time, they're gonna say yes because they want the referral bonus, it's how it works, right? And so you've reached out to the hiring manager, you added them to the hit list, you followed them on Twitter, you found their email, you asked for a coffee chat, either it came up during the chat or after two weeks of kind of letting the word simmer and you kind of engaging with their content online, you get the recommendation. Right. It's not creepy. You know why? Because folks that get jobs do this and folks that don't understand how folks get jobs think it's creepy. I know it's weird and I know it's kind of a harsh thing to say, but blossom at best. It's only weird if you make it weird, right?

Like being good at your career and networking and getting to know folks so that you can progress your career is not weird unless you make it weird. And a lot of folks that think it's weird is because they're not good at the process. And we're here to get good at the process, right? Just because it's effective doesn't mean it's not creepy. No, it is effective. It's not creepy. networking is a big part of how we operate in getting jobs right and so if you are not doing this know that the tide is against you and a lot of folks that don't get jobs that wallow around is because they never get good at this process because they're going up against folks that are doing this process. If there's anything that I can get into your brain is that there are people out there doing this process and they're doing it really well. And the excuses you come up with to not do this process is what's gonna hold you back from getting better and better jobs. And so I need you to take that to heart, right? I need you to take that to heart that there are folks that are playing this game and getting phenomenal jobs And if you're not playing this game, you are at a severe disadvantage And folks that are Professionals, especially folks that are in hiring positions. They know how this game is being played right? As someone that hired a lot of folks, I expect people to be playing this game. If you're not playing this game, you're at a disadvantage. It's not creepy.

It's networking. Don't make it creepy though. Don't be the weird person doing this. Keep it professional. right, keep it professional, no one wants to date you, right, no one wants to date you, keep it professional, provide value, right, provide value, and this is how it works. Won't they feel used? No, they're getting, they're getting 10k, they're getting five, $10,000 because you did this. Most places have referral bonuses. So literally by you reaching out to them and going through this process, they're getting $10,000. I'll take a coffee chat for $10,000. You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours, exactly. But notice how I always said provide value. Even if someone's giving your time, notice the very first thing I say, send them a thank you, thank them for their time. Provide value in that moment, right? It doesn't have to be a lot of value, but something that they mentioned, give them some value.

Make it worth having talked to you, right? And then stay in contact. Once you get the job, it doesn't mean that this process stops. Remember, software engineering is a cumulative career, right? Meaning that you're going to keep growing. You're going to switch jobs. Maybe, maybe for your first kind of few years, every two years, one year, you're switching to a new role. Well, guess what? You're going to stay in touch with these people, maybe a little less frequently, right? A little less frequently, but you stay in touch that you can keep up this and keep getting new opportunities. If I wanted a new opportunity, I'm never applying anywhere. Like if I wanted a new job, I wanted to make this clear, like I'm not applying anywhere. Every week for years, I went to networking events. I built up my network. I had hundreds of coffee chats and I still do coffee chats with folks all the time.

When I need a new role, I'm never applying anywhere. I'm just going to talk to someone in my network and say, Hey, I saw you have an open role. Do you mind giving me the referral? And so if you don't have that network yet, this is when it starts. And we're doing it in a targeted way where we're targeting 60 companies that we know have open roles that are in our area, right, that are in our area or remote, if you're going remote, and we're building this foundation for your network for the rest of your life. Don't see this as a small transaction. See, this is a transaction for the span of your 20 to 40 year career. Cool. All right. Now you talk to the hiring manager. Then find an engineer on the team and do the same thing, right? Find an engineer on the team and then do the same thing. Add them to your hit list. Follow them on Twitter, find their email. Now, ask for a coffee chat, say thank you, provide value, get the recommendation, right?

If it doesn't come up, if it doesn't come up, right? If it doesn't come up in that initial coffee chat, wait your two weeks and then shoot your shot for the recommendation, right? So you've talked to the engineering manager, you talk to the engineer on the team, then you talk to the recruiter. You're like, Leon, why don't you talk to the recruiter first? Well, I'll tell you why why do you think I didn't talk to the recruiter first? Yeah, now I got some names to drop When I talk to the recruiter, I'm gonna say hey, I talked to John I talked to Bob. They're amazing people I really had a good time getting to know them me and Bob went out for coffee last week. Great guy I saw that you have an open role and I just wanted to see if there's anything I could do to kind of push my application along And the recruiters gonna go wait a minute You know Bob You know John Met you met Jane for coffee last week and they like you they already like you Oh, they like you? Okay, well, let's set up the interview. Let's get you through to the next round then. Right, if Bob, John, and Jane all know you already, the recruiter would be kind of not a good recruiter to send you to the next round. Right, it'd be kind of wild to not send you to the next round, right? And so, of course, you're like, oh, you know Bob, you know Johnny, you know Jane, all right, boom, next round. Okay. And then when you get to the next round, who's gonna interview you?

Probably Bob, probably Jane, probably John, the folks you already talked to. So can you see how this process might open a few more doors if you can get this, This thing going right because if you've already talked to these people You've already had coffee chats with them the recruiter already knows that you've talked to them and know them maybe they even referred you and then the recruiter goes and looks at your github and sees this It's over, it's over, it's a wrap, it's a cut, they're not even gonna interview other people. And so the thing I'll tell you about last cohort is that half of the folks that got jobs last cohort did not have technical interviews. Let me say that one more time for the folks in the back. Half the folks that got jobs last cohort did not have technical interviews. And when I say technical interviews, I mean like they didn't do coding challenges. Right. I mean, they didn't do coding challenges, meaning that they talked to real living, breathing humans, they showed them their GitHub, they showed them the projects that they built, they had real conversations with them about meaty technical topics and that was enough because remember if you can make it to the nerds it's really two questions can you code and do I want to work with you for the next two years right and so if you do all these things if all your stuff is set up correctly and and you do the hit list process and you get recommended it's a wrap it's a game over you might not even make it to the technical interviews. Now we're gonna talk about technical interviews because we're all about open as many doors as possible, but I have had hundreds of students, hundreds of students, hundreds of students get jobs without technical interviews because they balled out on this process. They took their hit list very, very seriously. This was their life for three months. This is it, this is the big secret. It's the hit list. Is it 60 people for 20 companies? No, it's 60 companies.

That means you might be talking to 180 people across these 60 companies. We don't get got, we go get, right? So you found the hiring manager, boom. You found the engineer on the team, boom. You found the recruiter, boom. You found their mama, boom. All on the hit list. Right, you add them to hit list, you follow them on Twitter, you find their email, you ask for a coffee chat, you send a thank you note, and then you get the recommendation. Betty, it's been amazing playing bridge with you these past two weeks. You mentioned that your son, John, works at such and such company. Could you give me a connection to John, please? I would love to to join an amazing company, uh, such as your son, John's right now. Now this part's a little, this might be the creepy part. Yeah. This is the creepy part.

Sorry, this, this is where it gets a little creepy. So maybe, maybe, maybe not their mama, but definitely the hiring manager, the, the engineers on the team, the recruiter, uh, maybe, maybe we leave the mama out of it. I don't know. Like I said, I'm going to show you how to play the game. It's up to you. If you want to play, I'm just saying moms are kind of soft. All right, they, they, they, they, they just want their, their children to have more friends. And uh, if you come along and want to be their, their child's friend, it might work. I don't know. Mom sees mom sees their, their child in you and they're more likely. I don't know. Like I said, how you play the game, it's up to you. Cool. But, at the end of the day, please don't ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever. does this work ever does this work ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever ever You're wasting your time, you're wasting your time.

You might as well print out your resume, throw it in a trash can, have a car hit a raccoon. Way more likely than you clicking apply. Please don't do it, it doesn't work, get referred. All right, now I said 60 networked recommend, So click apply. How do I, how do I time out a mod? Let me see here. I'm sorry. Never click apply. So if we're talking about 60 well-networked applications, right? We're talking about 60 well-networked applications. It does break down into some simple numbers, right? It does break down into some simple numbers. First, you're gonna have 30 high value applications, right? Where for 30 of those 60 companies, you're gonna have custom resumes, cover letters, and a story that matches why you are showing up there. Somebody give me a type of company, give me a company, I don't care.

A company that does something. Airbnb, all right, Airbnb, cool. So we were a server at a restaurant for 10 years. That was a story we had earlier. For 10 years, I worked in the service industry. Every day I used software that I hated, working on POS systems that really just didn't work. And so I committed my nights to learning how to code and started building software that I would love to use on the job. Eventually I started taking on clients when the pandemic hit, I realized two things were happening. One, the service industry was being hit, but also industries like Airbnb were being hit as well. And so I started to build tools that would help folks during these difficult times and started to take on more and more clients, eventually get tired with the agency life. And now I want to join a product team such as yours at Airbnb, where I can work on products that increase everyone's lives, but also continue the work I did during the pandemic to help folks find easier accommodations and restaurants that were COVID safe, right? I don't know, like right off the dome, right? Like just like you tie whatever it was your story into where you're applying, right? And so if you know you're applying to Airbnb and you know that you're in a service industry, you would build a small app, right? Or tie your story into how that service industry was, uh, equally wrecked as the Airbnb industry.

Right. And you can bring that up as part of your story. So somebody that's Airbnb is like, Oh yeah, we did have a rough time during COVID, right. Did have a rough time at COVID. I see kind of like why you made that transition. That makes sense. Right. And so we can find a way for 30 of our applications to have a custom resume, a custom cover letter, and a custom story that matches that, that company. Oh, somebody come through with, um, Ewan, hey, thank you for the five, get the subs. Hope you're doing well. Thank you for being here. Right? And so, for 30s applications, not only are we networking in, right? Right, not only are we networking in, but we're also doing a lot of custom stuff for those, those applications. Then, we're gonna have 10 premium applications.

10 premium applications where we do all of that. Plus we build a custom landing page on our portfolio for that company. Plus we probably tweet something in relation to that company. Maybe we make a blog post about something in relation to that company. And we have a small project that took like a day or two. Right? Right? A day or two. Right? Right? a day or two on that application, right? So 10 of them are gonna be pretty serious applications where when you're talking to these engineers, when you're talking to the hiring manager, when you're talking to these folks that we're talking to, right? Now you have some more stuff to talk about. Oh, you're Airbnb, well, I did make this little quick kind of like reservation app. I felt like most booking sites have a really bad user experience.

So here's my booking flow that I think works best for a lot of folks, right? So there's something really small. Maybe took you a day or two to build out a small little app, right? And so that is 30 well networked, recommended applications, 10 super premium applications where you've gone the extra mile. You built a little bit, something that you can bring up during those interviews. and then that leaves 20 others. 20 others are just our generic interviews. You're gonna have 20 just generic interviews where you try to get recommended, you go through that first, you make all your mistakes, and then you hit up your 30, and then you hit up your 10. All right? All right? Can you talk about what do you mean by a landing page? It's just a, it's just a part of your portfolio that's geared towards that company. That's all it is. Yeah. Ooh, Danny dropping some heat about the resumes and we gotta, we gotta, we gotta get you on stream so we can, we can dig into resumes a little bit with you.

That'd be cool. I'll reach out to you on Twitter. So we talked about 60, 60 well-networked recommended applications, right? 60. 30 are going to be our high value apps. We're doing individual work for each of them. 10 premium and then 20 where we were testing the water because out of 60, and this is where we take some of the stress off of our shoulder, out of the 60 networked, hey, I appreciate it, I appreciate it, I'll reach out to you. Cool. Out of the 60, you have to understand, no matter how well we do this process, no matter how well we network our way in, no matter how well we do this entire process, we're gonna have 10 interviews that just go horribly wrong. Like, just slap their mama by accident wrong, right? Just, you just sneeze and snot goes all over the interviewer, right? Bad. Right? We just know. We're going to have 10 of them.

Right? Leave the mommas alone. You're calling them, you're doing the, yeah, all right, we'll leave the mommas alone, right? That just go absolutely horrendous. And that's okay. That's why we do 60. Right? that's why we do 60. 10 are gonna go absolutely horrendously wrong. 40 are gonna go okay and 10 are where the magic happens. Where all the little things we talked about tonight come together in just that perfect way. You hit it off with the interviewer in the right way and it leads to passing that sniff test with flying colors, it leads into an interview process that just works. Right. And so we got to give ourself the 60 so we can get through 10 that go really bad. 40 where we learn our lessons and 10 that just goes really well.

Should we dress for an interview in the suit? Uh, so the thing I always like is you dress one level above the folks that you're interviewing with. So if they wear t-shirts and shorts, you wear a nice pants and a button up or a nice blouse, right? And so just, I always say like one level over, um, if you're at a FinTech company and they're all wearing like button ups and, and, and like a tie, then you, then you wear a suit, right? Um, but you can ask, and a lot of this, right, a lot of this, a lot of this, like interviewing, and we're going to talk about this when we get a little bit further in, a lot of it is, is just going into this with a game plan. You can always ask. I don't know why nobody talks about this. You can always ask your interview what you're, what you're going into. You can always ask your interview interviewer. Hey, I have an interview set up for Friday. What is that interview going to be like? Is it behavioral? Is it technical? And should I, what's the dress code like at the office? Should, is there something I should be wearing?

what a normal folks interview wear, right? You should always ask, always ask, right? FinTech is financial technology, right? You can always ask. And so you should always ask what the interview is gonna be like. You should always ask what you're walking into. So it's not a guess. Cool. Don't worry, we haven't gotten to behavioral interviews. We haven't gotten into like the actual process yet. That's coming up. So that doesn't make too much sense. Don't worry, we're gonna get there. All right. Some other things we have to add to our list.

Folks, I told you there's a lot of work to be done. A lot of work to be done. Well, not only do we have all of our professional stuff in a line, all of our online presence in a line, not only have we invested time into our hit list, finding great opportunities, getting referrals into these opportunities, but we're also going to have a hundred hours project. A hundred hours project is the culmination of everything that we learn here at 100Devs, and we put all of that knowledge into one project. A project that you've built on your own, that you've built from scratch, that you've loved and nurtured across 100 hours, so that when you're in an interview, right, when you're in an interview, you can show this project off. This project is what has gotten in people jobs. When they say, what, show me that you can code. When you're trying to pass that coding sniff test, they can look at your $100 project and see, oh, they know how to code. Not only have they been pushing a code wars every day, not only do they have amazing stuff on their GitHub portfolio, but they have this project that they know intimately that they've built over the course of 100 hours, right? that you can bring up during your interviews, that can highlight all the things that you know and all the things that you learned. It's really important. The other point of a hundred hours project is tying your past into your current reality, right? So whatever you did in the past, right? Whatever you did in the past, we can ease the story to where you are now with the 100 Hours Project. It's a way of tying what you were doing before to what you are doing now.

If you were a server, you could build a point of sale system. If you were a teacher, you could build tools for the classroom. If you were a janitor, you could build a mapping system for the building so you can clean more efficiently. It doesn't matter. You can tie what you did before into your abilities as a software engineer to show that progression and make it so that it seems like you've been writing that code with a purpose and a point, right? To get to where you are now. So not only does it stand as a thing that you can use to help you during interviews, but it helps you tie up all those loose ends as to why you are here right now. And why you're a phenomenal software engineer and highlighting your past experiences to make you a better engineer. Cool. So next week, next week, I want to know what your a hundred dollars project is, Which means you got a week, a good, a good weekend to think through it, right? A good weekend to think through it. I want a quick description and a wireframe. A wireframe is just like a high level drawing, right? A high level drawing of what you're going to build. Uh, it doesn't have to be fancy.

If you want to be fancy, you can use things like wireframe.cc, Figma, which are both free. I think Bosomic is paid now. or you could just literally draw it and take a photo. I don't care, right? You just draw it and take a photo. That's good enough for me. Very, very simple, but think through what you want to build. Give me a description and then give me a quick wireframe. Break out your nuns, exactly. And we're going to talk more about these projects, of course, as the time goes on, but just think of an idea. And then over the next couple of weeks, I'll help you mold that idea and it's something that's practical and doable for your $100 project. We're gonna start what are called MVPs, minimum viable products, like the simplest thing we can do to prove our point, right? And as we get better at the backend and we learn more, we'll be able to flesh out better what's more and more doable. But I want the idea, what's the angle you're going for? I need that next week.

All right now this is a lot covered a lot tonight a lot of things and we're not done yet we still got like we still got like 12 minutes or so normal class time and we still got a lot more to cover we haven't we haven't even gotten to the interviews yet we haven't even gotten to how to interview yet. I told you it was a lot. I told you all have a decision to make. You all have a decision to make. And for those that make the decision that they want to go on this process, go on this journey, once you make that decision, the rest of your life can change. in so many phenomenal, wonderful ways, it can just change. And so we're talking about three months of hard work, three months of lots of little things to get done, lots of things. We talked about so many different pieces tonight, so many little things to do, but I'm telling you, three months of hard work of going beast mode can change your whole life it's the best thing about working in this space is to see folks that when they showed up they have that fire in their eye they know nothing's gonna stop themselves they put in the work They put in the work and at the end they get a phenomenal job. So like I said, I've never, I've taught thousands of people. There's nothing that I've ever been able to point to that aptitude wise told me if they were going to get a job or not. Like when they came in, they were really good at JavaScript and like that's no, it's never been how good they were at code. It was never really what they did before. There have been some weird things. Teachers do really well and Uber drivers. I said this before, I've never had an Uber driver that didn't make it.

There's something about the hustle and I think teachers know the grind more than anyone else. And so they've always done really well. So maybe that's the way those two other things I look for. But the only other thing I've ever seen across thousands of students is folks that made that decision. they said hey Leon I want it and I'm gonna do what it takes to get there because it's a lot it's a lot it's gonna be a lot of rejection there's gonna be a lot of doubt there's gonna be a lot of muck to get through in the trough of sorrow that we have left but the folks that made that decision that came in the class the next day is that Leon I want it they all fucking got it It's beautiful, it really is beautiful. And so I hope, I really do, that everyone today makes that decision and realizes that it's not enough to want it, it's not enough to kinda want it, you gotta really want it. You gotta know that you gotta flip that switch in your brain that says the next three months are gonna be hard, I'm gonna have stuff to do every single day, I might not be privileged with a lot of time, but I'm going to figure out how to make it work. The folks that make that decision, they get jobs. But you can't kind of want it. So I hope I really do. Got a lot of people here tonight. I'm so happy that you're all here. But I hope that you make that decision. You decide to go beast mode for a few months because the grass is so much prettier. To have a job that you know is high paid, high growth, super in demand, phenomenal benefits, year after year is one of the happiest careers that can support you and a family that you don't need a degree and you can learn it for free.

It's magic. There's a window open right now. I have no idea how long that window will be open for, but let's get as many of us through it as possible. Word. All right. So on Thursday, we're going to talk about interviewing, right? We're going to talk about interviewing because there's a lot of secrets about how to do the interview process. Everything we talked about tonight was passing that initial sniff test so we can get to the interview stage, right? So we can get to the interview stage and then we have to cover all this wonderful stuff about the process. How do you interview? How do you prepare? How do you get better at behavioral questions, technical questions? How do you do technical whiteboarding? How do you prepare for the whiteboard? How do you go through the whiteboarding skills?

All this stuff that we have to get through. So when we come back on Thursday, we got some bangers to get through. Some more of the pure heat that I have, that I've learned over the years, right? To help folks do well during the interview process. So if you have any anxiety, if you're worried about how to do well in the actual interview, you're gonna come back on Thursday and I'm gonna give you all the secrets I got. because I have had folks that literally could not solve the simplest of code wars, that after they kind of get these tips and tricks in their brain, things change. They get better at coding challenges. They go on to do well during technical interviews. And so please start putting into practice the things that we talked about tonight and then get ready to come back on Thursday because I got a lot, a lot of heat to bring on Thursday. I just, it's, it's a, it's a whole other ballpark that we got to get through. But once you know how to interview well, the world changes, right? So we got a lot of stuff to get to on Thursday. I want to do a raid. Let's go ahead and do a raid. Let's spread some love and positivity like we always do.

If you're not followed, give them a follow. Let's go over to Juicebox and say hello. Go to the Juicebox hero. Hope you had some fun tonight. Hope you learned some things. We're gonna get a little bit of review in tomorrow, on Thursday, but then we will get to so much more stuff. There's still so much more stuff to do. You'll notice that there is some homework in Discord. Please take a look at that homework. Make sure that you're starting to think through your your your professional stuff Watch this back if you need to and I will see all you wonderful folks on Thursday Let's read Issue tube

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