Getting invited to a technical interview

25 September 2020

In accordance with the famous philosopher Mike Shinoda, to ace a tech interview, the following ingredients are required: 10% luck, 20% skill, 15% concentrated power of will... The list goes on. But how to make sure that you're going to stand out in a sea of candidates?

Resume

First off - resume. Unless you're talented in the field of arts, I do not recommend designing your resume from scratch - there are so many aspects you need to be aware of that it is easier to use a template. There are immense numbers of them available online, but I recommend starting with free Google docs resume templates.

Linkedin profile

Recruiters use LinkedIn extensively to source promising candidates, so to stand out also on that platform, you need to fine-tune your profile page (not to mention keeping your profile up-to-date). I used to think my profile page was OK until I watched a couple of live-streams where HR specialists reviewed other people's profiles. Their feedback allowed me to improve my profile drastically.

Github profile

Another place to shine is your Github profile. Until recently, there weren't many ways to advertise yourself on Github, but that has changed with the introduction of the Profile READMEs. That's right. You can now create a README in markdown, which will be displayed on your profile page. As you can expect, the choice of information to put there is limitless. Here are some fun examples as well as a step by step guide on how to make one yourself.

Clonclusion

That's it. It isn't much, and it certainly won't help you pass any interview, but it will (or at least I hope it will) increase you chances of getting that interview in the first place. The rest is up to you. Good luck!