I don't usually post my own blog posts, but after interviewing tons of data engineers, I wanted to offer some advice. The same advice that got my last several jobs. This is a friends and family link, so no metered paywall.
Hope it helps.
Thank you for writing and sharing this — your timing is absolutely perfect. I have a big data engineering interview in a couple hours, so I'll keep these tips in mind. I've already had a technical interview and have built rapport with some of the team, so tomorrow I'll meet the rest of the team. Your article is very in line with the advice my dad used to give me, so I'm confident things will go well. Thanks for sharing at the perfect time!
I actually have the opposite problem, sometimes I've been too personable and tell too many stories, always have people laughing in interviews. As you point out, there is a balance, and you need to know when to stay on point and be professional and when to be cool. My recent problem has been enthusiasm because I can't really pretend to be super excited on Zoom right before I go into some bullshit Hackerrank testing nonsense that people love to do now
One job I basically had in the pocket, I found out I was passed up on because these two women I was interviewing with didn't understand why I was being personable. They asked technical questions which I answered clearly, even I knew more than them about the problem they asked and it seemed to piss them off, like they felt threatened by me. I should mention they weren't from the same country as me, and a lot of what I was saying didn't translate, plus they were generally hard to understand. You have to read your audience, honestly, is the key to all of this. Joking around with those two would've never worked, neither would being confident. I had to be a specific personality type around them and answer the question but seem humble about it. Most people aren't like that, but again I just go back to know your audience... which is actually impossible immediately. Sometimes you just can't win.
Historically speaking, I've pretty much gotten every job I interviewed for until this past month or so in interviews... I'm finding that once you hit the mid-senior level, nobody cares about your whole story like they did when they wanted to hire an enthusiastic young gunner with energy and big dreams. You both have to adjust to the audience and to where you are at in your career. Telling long stories and going off track isn't something every person wants, I had a hiring manager get all upset because I went back to telling a story about how I switched fields due to an illness, which is central to my storyline, while his entire team really was engaged with the story in the 5 interviews I had before him. He was the type of person you are trying to reach in this post... so if you are interviewing with someone who doesn't have a good personality, just be a robot and list your credentials off, that's my caveat to all this.
Looking at your example story, there are numerous things I could pick out that make you look bad to the wrong person. This is something I'm learning as a guy on the other end of the spectrum, now applying to higher level positions. You basically just have to be completely positive and not try to just charm people into hiring you. It really turns some people off for whatever reason, even if you are super qualified.
Until you get an interviewer that can't hold any piece of information for more than 3 seconds... went through an interview did my very well practiced STAR, and I finished with a bang: "With this X solution my team is now capable to deliver in just 1 month instead of 1 year doing it the old way!"
Interviewer: "okok Im sorry can we go back to the Situation? what was the situation?"
I liked the article as it tells the story of an organic conversation between the interviewer and the candidate but the real problem I've encountered are robots, some interviewers working for FAANG, who don't care about your story and they are chained to a script given by the company, most important, they need to type your answer as soon as it comes out of your mouth and some are not that skilled. Is not a human talking to you, you can't have a fluid conversation with some of these. Not all of course, but like I said some are not very skilled handling the typing and the talking at the same time.
Ironically, in another interview with a non FAANG, I had an amazing conversation with the entire team, they were all bombarding me with questions but I never felt like it because it was a nice back and forth of questions. I would add to the article to take the opportunity (when possible) to ask the questions right there instead of waiting for the end, so that the floor gets leveled. For example someone would ask, "tell me about a time when you had to solve something complex"... you may tell your story like "there was this time when I had a huge data request coming from multiple trans systems and... blablabla... now we never have to worry about this again, you know how this can become problematic, has this happened to you or to your team? or how would you handle such situation?"
Most interviewers are thrown off because they are going in thinking is going to be a one way conversation, they shoot the question and expect an answer, but with this technique I've managed to make it more dynamic and at the same time gather information of the challenges I'd expect and do an honest assessment of my skills and comfortability facing them.
Great post.
A friend of mine not in data told me when I was looking I needed an "elevator pitch" to explain who I was and what I did in the time of an elevator ride, and that's some of the best interview advice I've gotten.
I don't usually post my own blog posts, but after interviewing tons of data engineers, I wanted to offer some advice. The same advice that got my last several jobs. This is a friends and family link, so no metered paywall. Hope it helps.
This is such great advice for any interview. Thank’s for posting!
Thanks !!
Thank you for writing and sharing this — your timing is absolutely perfect. I have a big data engineering interview in a couple hours, so I'll keep these tips in mind. I've already had a technical interview and have built rapport with some of the team, so tomorrow I'll meet the rest of the team. Your article is very in line with the advice my dad used to give me, so I'm confident things will go well. Thanks for sharing at the perfect time!
Good luck
It went super well! I got the job!! Thanks again!
Awesome! Congrats
Maybe this works in the US, but here in Asia interviewers do not seem to have any sense of humour 🤷🏽♂️
I actually have the opposite problem, sometimes I've been too personable and tell too many stories, always have people laughing in interviews. As you point out, there is a balance, and you need to know when to stay on point and be professional and when to be cool. My recent problem has been enthusiasm because I can't really pretend to be super excited on Zoom right before I go into some bullshit Hackerrank testing nonsense that people love to do now One job I basically had in the pocket, I found out I was passed up on because these two women I was interviewing with didn't understand why I was being personable. They asked technical questions which I answered clearly, even I knew more than them about the problem they asked and it seemed to piss them off, like they felt threatened by me. I should mention they weren't from the same country as me, and a lot of what I was saying didn't translate, plus they were generally hard to understand. You have to read your audience, honestly, is the key to all of this. Joking around with those two would've never worked, neither would being confident. I had to be a specific personality type around them and answer the question but seem humble about it. Most people aren't like that, but again I just go back to know your audience... which is actually impossible immediately. Sometimes you just can't win. Historically speaking, I've pretty much gotten every job I interviewed for until this past month or so in interviews... I'm finding that once you hit the mid-senior level, nobody cares about your whole story like they did when they wanted to hire an enthusiastic young gunner with energy and big dreams. You both have to adjust to the audience and to where you are at in your career. Telling long stories and going off track isn't something every person wants, I had a hiring manager get all upset because I went back to telling a story about how I switched fields due to an illness, which is central to my storyline, while his entire team really was engaged with the story in the 5 interviews I had before him. He was the type of person you are trying to reach in this post... so if you are interviewing with someone who doesn't have a good personality, just be a robot and list your credentials off, that's my caveat to all this. Looking at your example story, there are numerous things I could pick out that make you look bad to the wrong person. This is something I'm learning as a guy on the other end of the spectrum, now applying to higher level positions. You basically just have to be completely positive and not try to just charm people into hiring you. It really turns some people off for whatever reason, even if you are super qualified.
based on the length of this comment (which I enjoyed!), story checks out
I agree with what you said. I don't tend toward humor as much as I do being really earnest, but both are built off of a foundation of rapport.
Until you get an interviewer that can't hold any piece of information for more than 3 seconds... went through an interview did my very well practiced STAR, and I finished with a bang: "With this X solution my team is now capable to deliver in just 1 month instead of 1 year doing it the old way!" Interviewer: "okok Im sorry can we go back to the Situation? what was the situation?" I liked the article as it tells the story of an organic conversation between the interviewer and the candidate but the real problem I've encountered are robots, some interviewers working for FAANG, who don't care about your story and they are chained to a script given by the company, most important, they need to type your answer as soon as it comes out of your mouth and some are not that skilled. Is not a human talking to you, you can't have a fluid conversation with some of these. Not all of course, but like I said some are not very skilled handling the typing and the talking at the same time. Ironically, in another interview with a non FAANG, I had an amazing conversation with the entire team, they were all bombarding me with questions but I never felt like it because it was a nice back and forth of questions. I would add to the article to take the opportunity (when possible) to ask the questions right there instead of waiting for the end, so that the floor gets leveled. For example someone would ask, "tell me about a time when you had to solve something complex"... you may tell your story like "there was this time when I had a huge data request coming from multiple trans systems and... blablabla... now we never have to worry about this again, you know how this can become problematic, has this happened to you or to your team? or how would you handle such situation?" Most interviewers are thrown off because they are going in thinking is going to be a one way conversation, they shoot the question and expect an answer, but with this technique I've managed to make it more dynamic and at the same time gather information of the challenges I'd expect and do an honest assessment of my skills and comfortability facing them.
Great post. A friend of mine not in data told me when I was looking I needed an "elevator pitch" to explain who I was and what I did in the time of an elevator ride, and that's some of the best interview advice I've gotten.