how i got 59 interviews w/o applying
I applied to 670 jobs and only got 4 interviews. so I stopped applying, and got 59 in five months.
I've been applying to swe internships my whole degree. same grind as every other cs major: hop on the pitt/simplify repo and refresh every day from july to february. I did 89 apps for my sophomore summer. zero interviews. 32 for junior summer. zero interviews. 354 for senior summer. one interview. 195 for new grad. three interviews.
for the last four years I did exactly what I was told would work. do a bunch of projects, fix your resume, apply to a ton of jobs, get a return offer. none of it worked. it pissed me off.
and so last fall I had the realization: the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over (or 670 times) and expecting different results.
what if, instead of begging companies for a job, I got the companies to beg for me? the thing is, companies still want to hire someone and candidates still want a job. there's a natural market transaction. what's the issue? well, I don't wanna send 1000 applications, and companies don't wanna read 1000 applications. 99% of apps for any public swe job posting is absolute slop (mine included): a generic react project, no experience, no-name colleges, and often not even in the right country. I had been falling into the same demographic. the only students that stand out are those that go to a t10 and/or already have a brand name on their resume.
the other problem is that the relationship between companies and candidates, at least in tech, is parasitic. you apply to them. and pray that they want you. then you do 10 oas and talk to ai before you even get a five minute phone call with an actual human. it's completely unequal. and it kinda makes sense. if you get 100 likes on tinder, you're not gonna care about ignoring one guy.
I first felt this about a year and a half ago. I was at probably the biggest student job fair in toronto, like 2000 people. any company I actually wanted to talk to, you'd wait 20 minutes. noone cared about you. if you said you went to waterloo, they'd take your email and give you an interview. otherwise they'd tell you to scan a qr code on a poster, which you could've done without waiting in line, and you'd never hear back. complete waste of time. you have no power in that relationship.
so I looked at all this and said I'm not playing this game. the game is broken and the relationship is bad. but companies still want to hire people, and I want to be hired. so I had two options: keep begging, or make them beg for me.
that's when I started focusing on personal branding and visibility. if you're doing cool stuff and are public about it, people will want you. jobs, relationships, opportunities, anything really. it doesn't matter how loud you scream. if you're in the middle of a forest, noone will hear you. visibility isn't about going viral, but I guess that can be part of it. and it's not random. it comes down to who you are, what you do, and how you tell people about it. I call these identity, substance, and distribution.
identity
I started with identity. you need to define the characteristics and topics that represent you, and that you want to represent you. I focused on confidence, agency, swe, and building, all things authentic to me. I rebranded my twitter, insta, linkedin, and website to align with that. it let me share genuine experiences, which is what humans actually connect with. you can use others for reference too. audrey chen: down-to-earth, meme-er, kind, personal growth. roy lee: bold, controversial, funny, high-agency.
substance
but an identity's useless if you don't have anything to show for it. you need to do unique, interesting things that fit that identity. activities that excite you. for me, it was hackathons. they're an easy place to meet cracked students, work on cool projects, and have unique experiences. so last fall semester I started skipping classes and flying to harvard, mit, berkeley, etc.
I made my first big linkedin post about one of these weeks. I was at harvard for a hackathon, flew back to canada for assignments and exams, had a faang interview pop up that week, then flew to berkeley for another hackathon. hella busy, but busy w all cool stuff. I wrote it down and posted it. it went viral: 330k views. I think im onto something.
the brand created other opportunities as well. e.g., at this one event, i met this girl who I chatted w for an hour, and she ended up flying me out to sf to shoot a video for a course. all of this naturally aligned with the brand, b/c the brand is just me.
distribution
which brings me to distribution. I know plenty of people doing way more impressive things than me. but no one knows them, b/c they don't post about it. even if you don't care about the attention, it's how people get to know you. one of my posts made 8500 people click on my linkedin profile. I can guarantee there were recruiters, investors, founders, and scientists in that 8500. plus, impressions tell the algorithm to recommend your profile more, which means even more companies checking you out.
so since december, 83 recruiters have reached out to me on linkedin. I still get a couple every week. that turned into 59 interviews, 10 at yc companies, 3 at unicorns, all nyc/sf, paying on average $140k usd ($192k cad). these are the same companies that used to ghost me, now reaching out to interview me. not b/c I got a better resume, and not b/c I became a better engineer. b/c they can finally see me. and now I'm the one choosing.
it taught me something simple. figure out who you are, do things you enjoy, and show the world. if something isn't working, don't do it 669 more times just b/c everyone tells you to. try something different. it might just work better than you imagined.