I had a couple of conversations last week with some students that went something like this ..
“Sir, I’m currently learning DSA but I’m stuck and don’t know how to progress”
So I asked these students, “why do you want to learn DSA? why do you want to code?”
And the replies came “for placements!”.
Here’s what I said after that ..
If you were a 5-star hotel looking for a chef, who would you hire?
Someone who cooks for themselves, their friends or family on a regular basis.
Or someone who practices cooking just to get through the job application process.
Whose food would you like to eat?
Please pause and think about that for a second.
If you find yourself doing something just for placements, that’s similar to the story of the second chef.
You may land a job in the short term. But sooner or later you will face challenges in your career.
The solution to these challenges won’t be easily available on Youtube or anywhere else.
And there will be fewer people if anyone to help you, because your workplace expects you to figure it out yourself (even if they don’t tell you that directly).
Down the line your career growth will stall.
So what can you do to avoid this situation in the first place?
The most happy and successful employees I have seen, just seem to glide through their work every day. It is almost as if they are not working, but playing!
In fact we are all fundamentally motivated by play. We all want to do fun things.
What many people get wrong in their careers, is that they spend most of their time playing the wrong game.
The game of entrance exams. The game of placements. The game of office politics.
Instead of playing games that are more rewarding to their self development.
Like the game of upskilling. The game of networking. The game of working on passion projects.
So why not pick a better game to play? Even better, design your own game!
What would you like to do differently than everyone else out there?
What are the skills you lack to reach this goal?
Who are the people you need to connect with to advance your journey?
Because the most rewarding games are the ones made specially for YOU.
Those are games where only YOU can win.
Because nobody else has the motivation, skillset or connections to beat YOU at it.
Over the years I have seen many people stuck in an endless cycle of frustration with their professional life. Some of them make dramatic career changes to fix things, and go through quite a bit of stress in the process of finding something they like to do. I wrote this post hoping it will help some of you avoid this situation altogether.
For the record, I have never studied any new programming languages or DSA (data structures and algorithms) when applying for a job. Most of my preparation happened long before I applied for the job - when I’m upskilling, networking or just working on something fun!
RESPONSES TO LAST WEEK’S SURVEY
Last week I asked you …
If you had one week to apply for jobs, where would you spend most of your time:
Practicing for interviews
Drafting your resume
Researching the job market
Applying to as many jobs as possible
Here are the results:
Almost half of you would practice for interviews. This is actually the option I would recommend the least - you’re assuming you can easily land an interview!
The recruitment process is a pipeline. It starts with discovering job opportunities, followed by drafting a resume and cover letter, then applying, then interviewing, tests, etc.
The earlier stages of the pipeline are easily accessible to you. Anyone can discover job opportunities, draft a resume and apply.
The later stages only become accessible if your application passes the prior stages.
So in one week I would put all my efforts in the earlier stages, with the goal being to maximise the number of job applications getting converted into interviews.
This is a better position to be in, than the other way around. Who wants to be prepared for interviews, but never get any callbacks?
In fact the best way to prepare for interviews in my experience, is by attending real interviews. So you really want to maximise the number of interviews you get shortlisted for.
I also wouldn’t spam all job postings I find in a week.
Personally I would spend most of my time researching the job market and finding suitable roles for myself. The rest of my time would go in drafting a first resume and applying to a few open positions.
The following week I would follow up with recruiters (if I haven’t heard back), tweak the process and repeat!
THIS WEEK’S QUESTION
What would you prefer having a decade into your career?
Lots of money
Lots of experience / skills
Lots of social media followers / connections
Lots of knowledge
Click here to submit your answer anonymously.
THIS WEEK’S QUEST
Have you ever purchased a domain name? Do you have one for your personal brand?
If the answer to either question is no, you should get yourself a personal domain name!
It is your own private address in the digital world, and you can use it to build a portfolio website to showcase your work.
Here are some tips when choosing a personal brand domain name:
try searching for your own name as the domain name
if you don’t have an international credit card, use GoDaddy to purchase your domain using UPI / NetBanking; all of their domain purchases come with an important feature included for free (read more about Domain Privacy here)
if you have access to an international credit card, Namecheap offers better customer service and is my preferred choice; they too include Domain Privacy for free
if possible, go for a .com as it is globally popular; it is also relatively cheaper to renew in the future
disable any paid add-ons like hosting, premium DNS, email, SSL certificates, etc.; all of these can be setup later, usually for free
Even if you are on a tight budget, you should be able to purchase a domain to play around with for under 200 Rs. (check out .live domains on GoDaddy)
Once you purchase your domain, you can play around with its DNS records to learn how that works. For example, try re-routing your domain to your LinkedIn or other social profile (visit renzil.com as an example).
If you do complete this quest, please post your domain in the comment section of this newsletter. You can also add it to your LinkedIn profile and resume.
In next week’s quest, I will show how you can build a personal portfolio website at your domain name.
OPPORTUNITIES
Open-source Kickstarter
Last week I identified the initial team for the Kickstarter project and will be kicking things off this weekend!
Thank you to all who applied for the roles. I have evaluated each of your applications and have detailed feedback to share. I hope you take this as a mini learning experience for job applications in the real-world.
For those who didn’t make the cut, this project will be open-source. Plus the goal of the project is to connect students with projects. So there will be plenty more opportunities once it goes up!
Mentorship
This week I am offering 1:1 mentoring to anyone who needs a little help with their career.
Please click here to book a slot.
Thanks for reading!
If you liked this newsletter, please share it with all of your friends.
You can reach me by simply replying to this email. You can also catch me on LinkedIn or Twitter.
See you next week!
~Renzil
Sir, thank you for your article. In one of your earlier posts, one thing stood out while I was reading this post: "Like most of you, I never had a strong desire to build a career in the tech industry." Here you mention "The most happy and successful employees I have seen, just seem to glide through their work every day. It is almost as if they are not working, but playing!"
I'm sure you're successful in your craft. What motivated you enough for so many years to keep upskilling even with the explicit intention of not further building your career in this industry? Surely it can't just be the monetary aspect, one would only burn out in time. Would love to hear from you.