I’ve been hard on myself these last few months as I haven’t made a lot of progress on my habits or goals. Reflecting, that shouldn’t be a surprise as I’ve been putting a tonne of energy into my job hunt. Here is a reminder of the effort required, which will aid setting realistic expectations during the job hunt.
All of this time and energy for the job hunt is on top of existing commitments like work, health, and family.
Time for technical practice:
- 3 hours of coding interview practice most days, including weekends.
- A few full days of coding practice trying to grind through especially hard topics.
Time to practice behavioral stories:
- Remembering the stories
- Re-writing the stories so they sound good.
- Practicing in front of others and tuning so the stories sound good, and they come through well.
Energy to deal with the psychic Weight:
- The fear that while there are lots of jobs, you only get “one shot” to interview with each company, and it’s easy to blow it.
- The fear that your career hasn’t been as successful as you want, and that you’re an imposter
- The fear that you won’t be able to remember the technical questions.
- The fear that you won’t be able to impress the interviewers.
- The fear that you’ll be discovered at work.
- The suffering when you fail an interview, tech screen, etc.
Time for informationals, technical screens and interviews. Not just the scheduled time, but preparation time, post interview emotional draining time, travel travel time, and buffer time.
Interviews are especially expensive as you need:
- Time to get up early and get psyched
- 8 hours for the actual interview.
- Emotional processing after the interview
Once you have a few offers rolling in, then there’s the energy required to make one of the biggest decisions in your life.