Discouraged in job hunting (update)

Career Advice
1

Just updating from my previous post.

Well surprise, I still haven’t landed a job. :slight_smile: I had a few technical interviews but I pretty much butchered all of them including triplebyte. It was definitely a good experience though.

I haven’t applied / responded to recruiters / coded in a month because it’s freaking exhausting sending out hundreds of applications while trying to improve and perfectly showcase yourself.

Well just an update from my previous post.

  • Salary expectation down to $45,000 / year.
  • Mostly applying for junior / entry-level positions.
  • Started attending regularly at ReactNYC meetups, although I don’t really know how to socialize. (Scored an interview on a good company though but their tech interview was beyond me)
  • Portfolio is now pretty basic and simple.
  • BetterWeb is currently pretty much dead.
  • Made 2 templates company and restaurant.
  • Finished phase 1 and got into phase 2 of Grow with Google Mobile Web Specialist Nanodegree Program.

Anyways, gonna start applying again. Hope you guys would have better luck than I do. :slight_smile:

2

Yeah. Sorry to hear about your luck. It’s really tough out here. But just keep networking and applying to jobs. It’s really a numbers game and being at the right place at the right time. I know a guy who failed a php technical interview and still got the job because they liked his attitude lol. I’m only now starting to see how unfair things can be. Don’t give up. And please keep coding. Do not go a month without it. There is always something to improve

Good luck

3

For your website design i noticed a issue:

People commonly just want to scroll down to see the entire website and use the navbar if they can’t find something. The image style you were going for wasn’t the best.

Go to https://kennethlumalicay.github.io/restaurant-template/about

That is not enough to have its own separate section for. That should be the first or second thing to read before even seeing the menu.

As for your company website, that was really good but needs a minimum width on the body of like 300 - 400px;

Instead of taking me to another webpage, try making the bottom part expand. You only have 3 things and a image on the front page, make the bottom expand, and have your content there when i click on a button.

Your better web website was really cool. The max image size is a big issue though. You ca’t find a detailed image below 1.5 mb.

I feel like your con with websites is functionality. People don’t want to click around to find stuff, they want it there for them just by scrolling. This wont be a issue as your websites have everything they need, just not in a correct place (sometimes)

You are pretty good, and i wish you the best :smiley:

I also posted something on your betterWeb website.

4

I would suggest finding an open-source project to get back into doing push/pull requests, look into doing bounties or review this list: https://alexiskold.net/jobs/

Notice which ones have the same basic requirements and focus your portfolio on that. Me personally is having more success in the open-source world. They tend to recruit from within the community. Find one focused on your passion, something you really have a burning interest in. Google “Breaking Into Startups” and do their 5 step challenge.

A career is work. A job is a paycheck. Everyone desires to have a moment… its how you get up afterwards that defines success!

Believe in yourself.

5

I took a look at your materials and here are my thoughts:

1: You don’t really list the technology used on each project.
At least, you don’t have them listed on your portfolio or linkedIn profile. I would list on each and every project every bit of tech you used. Recruiters love to see tech keywords littered around your portfolio, linkedIn, and resume. Managers would get a better sense of how much experience you have in each tech.

2. Some of your Github readmes are sparse.
Every readme on github projects should do 3 things. First, describe what the project actually does. Second, describe what tech stack you used. And finally, how to install and run your project, including where to get and put the necessary API keys and .env files.

3. You say very little about yourself
Since you have no experience in the industry, people are going to want to know a bit about you. Things like, why are you wanting to get into this industry, what other interests that you have (besides coding), and what your history is.

Frankly, I don’t believe that all you do in your free time is doing coding challenges. Instead, talk about your actual interests. For example: I am a huge Star Wars fan and I think Episode 8 was the best because…blah, blah, blah. Show some real personality!

(For the record: The Last Jedi is the worst.)

Anyways, hope that helps.