As a front-end team leader in a growing department, I have to interview a lot. Often some small details can make a big difference. And I’ll try to share some tips with you to help you get your dream job (you don’t need any other).
1. Modify your CV to fit position description
Of course, there are a lot of desriptions, that are written badly and you can see something like databases experience in front-end position. Or jQuery in 2019.
But let's imagine that description is written by somebody, who really wants a candidate like he or she described. It really saves time and makes you look more confident when interviewer looks at Summary section and first four rows are a perfect match. And in opposite, when I see CV and in first paragraph I read about one’s great DevOps experience when candidate applied to a Full-stack developer position it makes me Hmmmm... even if in front of me sits really great dev.
2. Let your CV be a two-page document
I have almost 10 year of experience in field of web development and it is really hard not to brag about it in 5 pages. But also I understand, that almost nobody cares about things I coded in 2012 with some fancy jQuery plugins and how my grid looked perfect with lots of float: left (though it wasn't always easy). Because technology have changed. Because I have changed. And simply because it is unrelevant to modern reality. Imagine that you are on a fast date party and you have to impress quickly.
3. Don't be afraid to say “I don't know”
Just because, if you speak with genuine confidence about some internal PHP method that doesn't exist, you lose your points. And the more you continue, the more it looks like stupidity. Lifehack to handle it: you always can say something like “oh, I forgot how it can be done in pure langName, but I’ve always used library X* earlier to achieve this — probably it’s not the best way”.
4. Discern general questions and specific questions
When I ask people to tell me everything they know about performance optimization, too often I hear 2 or 3 sentences. C’mon! This is SOOO big field to walk on. Just enumeration of tools and services can make interviewer’s heart melt. But what’s strange is that I hear 2 or 3 sentences with no clear answer when I ask how to clone an array (even from devs with over9000 years of experience).
5. Pay attention to “As a plus” section
It will take you about an hour to read a couple of articles — you’re already on DEV.to — about things that are mentioned there. Often interviewer asks about something from this section as a one of general questions. “As a plus” almost always means that it’s not your daily job to develop with these technologies or team just started to use them, but it’s a part of infrastructure, working environment etc. This is really low-hanging fruit, don’t miss it.
As always, thank you for reading and I hope this info will help you to be a developer that every company desires.
*lodash if you’re front-ender.
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