Sam Wight

"I don't like leetcode style interviews!" See I wasn't making it up! Kurtis Nusbaum tells us more about why engineers don't like leetcode and the types of interviews that lead to a more enjoyable and effective interviewing experience.

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This job market is a dumpster fire. Hot, flaming garbage all around. I've read your stories. So many brilliant, talented and dedicated people are caught in the lurch. So many tragic stories of application purgatory (I'm looking at you, Workday and ATS systems) constant customization of resumes, CVs and cover letters... and more cover letters. (I got so sick of writing cover letters that I actually just sent a chili recipe as a cover letter - don't tell anybody) My point is this: You're valuable. Getting laid off is not your fault. Please don't feel like a victim - a big ask, I know. You've honed your craft and your skills absolutely have value. This too shall pass and I want you to know that I'm cheering for you. Simple as that. I'm cheering for you to get a better gig than you had, to get the remote or in-office situation that suits you best, a competitive market-value salary (no low-ball offers), and a chance to work within a team that values your contribution and makes it known. You deserve every bit of it. EVERY BIT. A colleague had a brilliant quote: "Your network is your net worth." Work those contacts, use this platform to connect in positive ways. I'm cheering for you.

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🎯 Hiring managers…have you ever felt overwhelmed opening a new software engineering role? 🤓 Hiring software engineers for your team shouldn't be a headache. My video below reveals the top 3️⃣ struggles I see – and the small, actionable 🎯 adjustments that'll save your team time in the hiring process. 🤝Ready to partner for a smoother search? Watch ⬇️!

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I posted recently about how salaries are still climbing at the top end of the market for hands on Software Engineers. Yesterday we took on 2x Senior roles paying $180K+Super+10% bonus, last week we took a re-brief for another Senior role with a salary increase to $180K+Super+ESOP. Don't get me wrong, it's still only really in that pocket of hands on Senior-Principal level Engineers (for now), but it's starting to feel very similar to some of the work we were doing during the post Covid boom. "We'll pay whatever just get me amazing people" "Not finding anyone good at all, what would another $10K-$20K get us?" "Happy to give a bonus if it'll get it over the line" All snippets of recent conversations with hiring managers... Something to just be aware of though is the trickle down effect. We took a Mid-Senior role on at $160K+Super+ESOP yesterday, and we also took on another Mid-Senior role up to that kind of level about 2 weeks ago. Maybe it's just 2 outliers with big budgets signed off, or maybe Senior is becoming too expensive, and that money is being chucked at the next best thing. Also - as a side note, if you can't run a near perfect process right now for those types of roles just give up, you are wasting your time.

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Your developer interview process sucks 🪠: Here’s how to fix it? 1/3 👍 Are top-tier developers slipping through your hiring net? How many "perfect on paper" developers crumble during technical assessments? This is going to be part 1 of a 3-part series on refining your hiring process, specifically focusing on how to effectively qualify a candidate's technical ability. In the past few months, I’ve worked with clients to improve their interview process, and these are some of the things that I think about when designing the interview process. 🟥 Not all developers fit in the square hole – Tech test vs. Paired Programming As a software developer and a recruiter, I’ve been on both sides of the fence. I’ve taken technical tests, given them, and done my fair share of pair programming interviews. The more I reflect on it, the clearer it becomes: these approaches test very different things. Depending on what you're looking for in a candidate, one method might be way better suited than the other. 🤖 Technical Tests are a great tool for verifying a developer can fulfil the duties of their role. You find tech tests resonate best with developers who can work independently and churn out work quickly in isolation. These candidates often excel at solving problems in a controlled environment but are not necessarily the candidates you want in a highly communicative or client-facing environment. These people will often be your top developers, and you don’t want to miss out on them! 🤝 Paired Programming, on the other hand, allows you to assess how someone interacts in real-time. It’s about collaboration, listening, and adaptability. When you are pair programming with a candidate, you can quickly gauge their soft skills, how they approach problems, and how they deal with the unexpected. More importantly, you get to see how they learn and improve in the moment. Often, I find candidates who would excel in a technical test can falter in the paired programming stage due to social anxiety, lack of soft skills, or difficulty thinking out loud under pressure, even though they may be highly skilled technically. 🤔 Ultimately, you need to be more diligent when making your interview processes. Think about what the role entails. What test would best suit that individual? Cater the process to them so they don’t fall through the cracks. 🎯Are you looking for someone to be a production machine? Or a team player who you can work closely with? If you want a team player, you’re going to have a pair programming interview where you can collaborate, teach, and see their process. If you're facing tight deadlines and need a developer who will take ownership of their space - implementing a technical test can help you find that person. Tomorrow I’ll follow this up with some horror story technical tasks I’ve come across and how we can improve them to be 1. Relevant, 2. Fair in terms of time commitment, and 3. Truly reflective of the real challenges developers face on the job.

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Have a gap? Several clients have reached out about gaps within their staff development that they're looking to get ahead of. Most of their problems in staff development have stimmed from lack of Mid-Level Developers who have 3-8 years of experience. Now, you're probably thinking, "But Alex, someone with 8 years of experience could be titled a Senior." To that I'd say your correct, but not every developer has the opportunity to succeed in that way in their current roles or have amazing company loyalty and don't understand the current hiring market/trends. On top of that there are major, major salary ranges in those 3-8 years of experience, but that can be a topic for tomorrow... So, are you seeing similar gaps in your teams?

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It’s official: landing a software engineering job is tougher now than it was just a few years ago. With many startups shutting down and big companies laying off employees, candidates with 0-5 years of experience are feeling the pinch. What can you do? Shift your storytelling from tools and languages to the impact you've made. Highlight who your users were, how you improved their lives, and any recognition you received. Remember, outcomes matter more than just the technologies you used!

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Jr. Devs, When you are sitting in that interview chair trying not to say the wrong thing and trying to remember all the stuff you’ve been told about how to interview well, don’t forget this one thing that should give you at least a little more confidence. You're not the only one being interviewed. You may think… duh, there are tons of candidates for this job. However, that’s not what I’m talking about. You are interviewing the company. Most Jr. Devs don’t think like this because, frankly, most Jr. Devs are just trying to get a job and they often don’t care or don’t consider the company or the culture they end up in. I’ve spent a lot of time on the DevMentorDave YouTube channel recently talking about mentoring and the need for it in our organizations. But that’s only one part of finding the right fit. The company is looking for candidates they think will fit what they need. Notice I said, ‘NEED”. They don’t just hire because it’s fun (it’s not). They need someone and you need to make sure they are a good fit for YOU before accepting an offer or before leaving the interview. Don’t just ask questions you found on a website or were given by a recruiter. Think about what matters to you as an employee and as an individual and ask questions that will impact how you work and impact your success and future. That level of confidence and interaction in the interview may just set you apart from the pack, even if your dev skills are the same as all the other candidates. #juniordeveloper #mentoring #interview 

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Where do most of the good Software Engineers apply for jobs? The answer is usually... nowhere Great Engineers are often passive, responding occasionally to messages that really pique their interest, or sometimes reaching out to companies that have great employer branding If you haven't got great employer branding, and you don't work with an external recruitment partner or have an internal talent person doing outbound reach out, really you are settling for who is active and who happens to see your job posting If it was me building my founding engineering team, I would want to know that nearly every Software Engineer that may be relevant to my team (right tech background, worked in the environments I like, location/salary aligned) has been reached out to and knows about what I'm building The value that we can add as recruitment agencies (if a market specialist in what you're recruiting for), we can get your message out to hundreds of relevant Software Engineers in a day Then... We're good at presenting opportunities. Often I'll speak to an Engineer about a role, and they say oh I did see them online but I didn't think it looked that interesting... But we can get them interested in you Maybe you can hire a better-quality Engineer than you ever expected 🤔

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Developers, always prioritize companies who choose two-way interviews. Interviews should feel like a conversation, not an interrogation. And your opportunity to ask questions shouldn’t be limited to the last 5-10 minutes. So, next time you head into an interview, make sure you uncover: 🗣️ What the team’s current priorities are and how they anticipate you’ll contribute to their short- and long-term goals. 🗣️ What challenges the team are currently facing, and how they’re approaching them. 🗣️ Which development practices the team currently follow, how collaborative they are, and how they approach short- and long-term projects. 🗣️ How often the team releases new features, what their pace of development is, and how quickly you’ll see your work in production. 🗣️ How the team handles bugs and production incidents (which gives you a great insight into their culture). Don’t be afraid to integrate questions into your answers to initiate conversation with the interviewer. It may feel unnatural at first, but it’ll show them that you’re confident, engaged, and are just as interested in learning about them as they are about you! #DeveloperOpportunities #DeveloperJobs #Mobileeveloper #InterviewTips

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Developers, always prioritize companies who choose two-way interviews. Interviews should feel like a conversation, not an interrogation. And your opportunity to ask questions shouldn’t be limited to the last 5-10 minutes. So, next time you head into an interview, make sure you uncover: 🗣️ What the team’s current priorities are and how they anticipate you’ll contribute to their short- and long-term goals. 🗣️ What challenges the team are currently facing, and how they’re approaching them. 🗣️ Which development practices the team currently follow, how collaborative they are, and how they approach short- and long-term projects. 🗣️ How often the team releases new features, what their pace of development is, and how quickly you’ll see your work in production. 🗣️ How the team handles bugs and production incidents (which gives you a great insight into their culture). Don’t be afraid to integrate questions into your answers to initiate conversation with the interviewer. It may feel unnatural at first, but it’ll show them that you’re confident, engaged, and are just as interested in learning about them as they are about you! #DeveloperOpportunities #DeveloperJobs #Mobileeveloper #InterviewTips

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If you're not a software engineer, keep scrolling. I've been an engineer my entire career and have led engineers for 9+ years. I love this profession. But there's one mistake I see mid-level engineers make too often: Not being clear about the value they're providing. There are 4 areas in which engineers provide value: Technology, Product, Process, and People. But no one gets to Product, Process, or People without mastering Technology. And I'm here to tell you there is a lot of value in the technical understanding. Don't try to scale the ranks before you build depth there. We’re engineers. No matter your title, you need to be comfortable building software. Ideally, you should love it. When you’re progressing through your career, it’s exciting to get tapped on the shoulder to lead a product, overhaul a DevOps process, or manage people. And when you get these opportunities, take them. But make sure you stay close to the engineering part of the process. Because as soon as your coding capabilities start to dwindle, you lose value. That sword needs to stay sharp. A principal engineer who is either a) not interested in being hands-on or b) no longer capable of being hands-on, can’t succeed in leading a team. Today I’m a CTO. But if my team needs me to write code, I’m there in a heartbeat. So my advice to younger engineers is: Stay close to the tech. It makes you better at Product, Process, and People. If you’re an engineer reading this, know that I appreciate you. This isn’t an easy job, and I respect you for doing it. P.S. In the spirit of this post, here's a photo of me with much longer hair from *slightly* earlier in my career.

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On this random Wednesday, if you’re a software developer thinking, for no specific reason, about pivoting into the impact space and want to talk about what FreeWorld is doing and why we’re growing so fast and how you can help, please reach out.

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It's been recommended to me twice now to stop posting negative things (or delete existing posts) about companies who might hire me. Some thoughts: 1. If you are a software company that can't handle your flaws being pointed out, then you probably don't want me to be part of QA. 2. Just fix your problems. 3. I'm not getting hired anyway, so why should I censor what I say? 4. There will be more.

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What's the business ROI for your interview process for software engineers? It takes maybe 3 months to be interviewed and then accepted for a senior role. Then a few weeks for legal. Then a few weeks to ramp up. Then after about three years they need to hop jobs to remain competitive. This seems broken. Is this broken?

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Top 3 things I’m hearing software engineers want… (aside from money & flexibility) 🎯𝐎𝐰𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐩 & 𝐈𝐦𝐩𝐚𝐜𝐭 🎯𝐆𝐫𝐨𝐰𝐭𝐡 𝐎𝐩𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬  🎯𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐞𝐱 𝐓𝐞𝐜𝐡 𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐬 If you’re hiring for software folks… A good place to start is highlighting these in job specs. Then as part of your interview process. And once they’re in the door. Put it into practice and your retention will improve. Otherwise I might be speaking to them again 😊 Anything I've missed? #softwareengineer #retention #talentacquisition 

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Want to know how I helped a software engineer overcome crippling presentation anxiety? It wasn't just about the presentations... He was battling: → A serious knee injury and recovering from surgery → Sleepless nights that destroyed his focus → Anxiety that was killing his confidence The cost? His credibility was slipping. Opportunities were passing him by. His irritability was pushing people away. But here's where it gets interesting... We tackled it with a simple 3-step approach: ― Light Breathing - This wasn't just about calming down. It increased oxygen delivery to his muscles and tissues. (Hello, faster recovery!) ― Nighttime Mouth Taping - Sounds weird, right? But it encourages nose breathing during sleep. (Game-changer for sleep quality) ― Box Breathing before presentations - Think of it as a secret weapon. 4 seconds in, 4 hold, 4 out, 4 hold. (Instant calm and focus) After 8 weeks on my daily breathwork program: The results? ✅ Deep sleep up 120% (Tracked on his Whoop strap) ✅ Recovery speed doubled (His doctor was surprised) ✅Confidence tripled (His words, not mine) But the real transformation? He went from: "Please don't make me present" to "When's my next opportunity?" The ripple effect? → His credibility soared → Opportunities started flowing → Work became fun again That's what proper breathing can do. Want to learn these exact techniques? DM me "ICE" and we can chat more about my coaching program. Because here's the truth: Your breath is the most underrated performance tool you have.

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So I can officially say I'm a "Staff Engineer" - again! I first made Staff Eng almost 8 years ago during my time at Etsy. And after leaving that role I've been stuck either at Senior (because the next step up was Principal and I wasn't there yet) or without a title (for...a lot of reasons). Of course, when I was given a formal title again, I was bumped down to Senior. Titles are weird, let's just state that outright. They're uneven (sometimes out of necessity and with some good reasons). And arguments that you can be effective if you're called L5 or L55 do have some merit. At the end of the day, though, pay structures, career progression, and lots of day to day things like the meetings you're invited to depend on a title, for better or worse. There's probably a blog post to write about when I switched companies and took a hit on the title at some point in my future. For now, though, it's great to be recognized for my work.

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