(click “see more”)
I’m happy to help
People running EA aligned software projects (about all the normal problems)
EA Software engineers (about.. all the normal problems)
Link to my coaching post.
I’d be happy for help from
People who think about global EA priorities:
Funding my work would be nice
My opinions about hiring
Common mistakes with hiring
An example hiring post I wrote (for CEA)
[more coming]
[please reach out if you’d like help with this]
A better job board
draft 1: 75% of 80k’s engineering jobs are unrelated to software development. This board is the other 25%.
Tech community building & outreach
(apparently I’m doing some of this?)
Some ideas I’m working on or strongly considering working on
Are you talking to someone about working on strange neglected problems? Here’s how I’d frame it
My opinions about EA software careers
An alternative career guide
Improving CVs (beyond what I saw any professional CV editor doing)
Getting your first paid software job
[more coming]
My personal fit for jobs
Owning the tech of a pre-production (helping with things around it, like some Product)
I really enjoy coaching, user research, explaining tech concepts and tradeoffs simply to non tech people, unclear if this will fit into some future job
Fun
I’m currently reading ProjectLawful and Worth A Candle [26-7-2022]
Big hpmor fan
I like VR
My shirts have cats on them
I have thoughts on how to deal with this. My priors are this won’t work if I communicate it through text (but I have no idea why). Still, seems like the friendly thing would be to write it down
My recommendation on how to read this:
If this advice fits you, it should read as “ah obviously, how didn’t I think of that?”. If it reads as “this is annoying, I guess I’ll do it, okay....”—then something doesn’t fit you well, I missed some preference of yours. Please don’t make me a source of annoying social pressure
Again, for some reason this works better when speaking than in writing. So, eh, … idk.. imagine me speaking?? get a friend to read this to you?
(whatever you chose, consider telling me how it went? this part is a mystery to me)
So,
TL;DR:
The goal of interviews is not to pass them (that’s the wrong goal, I claim). The goals I recommend are:
Reducing uncertainty regarding what places will accept you. (so you should get many rejections, it’s by-design, otherwise you’re not searching well)
Practicing interviews. Interviews are different than actual work, and there’s skill to build there. So after interviews, I’ll review stuff I didn’t know, and I’ll ask for feedback about my blind spots. I have some embarrassing stories about blind spots I had in interviews and would never notice without asking for feedback. Like, eh, taking off my shoes and walking around the room including the interviewer 🫣 these are actual blind spots I had which are absolutely unrelated to my profession of software development
Something about the framing of “people who interview a lot beat others in getting better jobs”—and motivation to be one of those
Get yourself ice cream or so after interviewing
Important sub point: Positive reinforcement should be for “doing good moves” (like scheduling an interview, or like reviewing what you could do better), and NOT for passing interviews (which imply to your brain that not-passing is negative, and so if your brain has uncertainty about this—it will want to avoid interviewing)
Asking a close friend / partner / roommate what they think could work for you. They might say something like “play beat saber, that always makes you feel good” which I couldn’t guess
Sometimes people spend a lot of time on things like writing cover letters (or other things that I think are a wrong use of time and frustrating (and in my model of people: some part of them knows this isn’t a good idea and it manifests as stress/avoidance, though I’m no therapist)). I’d just stop doing those things, few things are (imo) worth the tradeoff of having more stress from interviews. It’s a tradeoff, not a game of “do interviews perfectly and sacrafice everything else”