29, struggling with CS interviews. Has anyone turned it around? (Honest answers please)

Posted by JajEnkan3pe@reddit | ExperiencedDevs | View on Reddit | 40 comments

Hey everyone,

I’m 29 and have been reflecting a lot on where I stand in computer science. I’d really appreciate hearing from people who’ve gone through something similar.

I genuinely enjoy coding and building things. I mainly work with React and Node, and I have a decent understanding of how web development works in practice. I currently work at a small company for a low stipend and this is actually my first job, and I got it without going through a real technical interview.

The issue is, I feel stuck. I’ve been building products at work, but a lot of it involves using AI tools to help me along the way. While I can get things done, I’m starting to worry that I don’t have strong fundamentals.

Whenever I try to interview elsewhere, I keep failing, especially in technical coding rounds. Leetcode problems are a big challenge for me, and I tend to blank out or make mistakes under pressure. It’s gotten to the point where I’m questioning whether I’m missing core skills or just not cut out for this field.

I am trying to understand if I am cut out for this or jut super dumb and out right not built for this. Have people actually turned it all around in a few monts. If so what can I do to get through interviews.

I’m feeling pretty stuck and worn down, and I’d really value hearing honest experiences from others.

Thanks for reading.

[-]

iamchets@reddit

If someone or something decides how to build something, and you outsource the building to an AI; then how do you expect to grow? You either have to make a change in that department or start cooking hobby projects without AI. My two cents

[-]

edgmnt_net@reddit

IMO many people in OP's situation also managed to work themselves into a large but very limiting corner of the industry. I keep telling people to avoid chasing very popular stuff exclusively. E.g. it may have looked great that there were many open positions, but now you're only doing simple CRUD and can't get out. Also, in general programming work-related subreddits you rarely see anything but a very limited selection of topics.

[-]

Imoa@reddit

True enlightenment is realizing that it’s CRUD all the way down. Everything is just about doing faster, easier, more reliable CRUD.

[-]

Ok-Pace-8772@reddit

Yeah great place the industry's at. At work you have to use ai or else. Now you are also forced to write code outside of work. So to get work you gotta work a different work from work outside of work.

Fuck me and fuck this industry.

[-]

Historical_Ad4384@reddit

I am acting as a freelance CTO to a startup to gain ownership and strategical experience while fighting simultaneously for senior promotion at my primary work because I have been waiting for 3 years to get the chance to become senior there and it never seems to come to allow me to grow.

[-]

chikamakaleyley@reddit

I have been waiting for 3 years to get the chance to become senior

what do you mean, your primary only has like... X available slots for Seniors?

that aside there's no reason that you shouldn't be recognized as a senior if your effort is that of a senior

[-]

Historical_Ad4384@reddit

Yeah, only if management was sane enough to overlook beyond their favourite child vs being lazy

[-]

edgmnt_net@reddit

My hypothesis is some people are talking about the better engineering jobs, while others are stuck in some sort of sweatshop project/company.

IMO it's also less about raw effort, but a lot of people end up chasing raw delivery figures instead of focusing on more technically-demanding stuff. I don't think that scales well and provides adequate recognition in the long run.

lordnacho666@reddit

I'm going to give you the trick to leetcode and the like.

You buy the service.

You send yourself the puzzles and solve them like you are a candidate.

Costs a bit of money, but less than your first paycheck.

I did this about 12 years ago, worked out nicely. Also learned a few DSA things that I had neglected in uni.

StephTheBot@reddit

Would you recommend to do this while currently employed?

If you are looking for a new job, yes. You'll have less time, but you can squeeze it a few reps in the weekend or when you're at home.

The number of jobs gates behind live coding exercises is quite high, it's hard to avoid.

Thanks! As a new parent finding time to do anything for myself feels impossible.

NotACockroach@reddit

This is right. I have 10 years of experience in big tech. Just recently went through redundancy, so I had time to study. Part of that study was knocking out acouple of leetcode a day. A month or two later I went from struggling to finish enough while someone was watching in an hour, to passing a few choosing interviews at big tech in a row.

superide@reddit

How did you manage the mindset to make it a habit? Over a year ago I was trying out Leetcode, working on 1-2 problems (mostly easy-medium) per day, skipping weekends, and I still got tired of doing them after one month. And you mean "someone was watching" in mock interviews before taking real ones?

I tried out Pramp twice and didn't like it. It became clear a lot of them were just phoning it in as the interviewer. Felt more sterile and depressing than a real interview.

So as I said I was made redundant. I set myself a plan. To simulate an interview with leetcode I timed them, copied the questions to my IDE, wrote tests and spoke out loud. Under those conditions I targeted 30 minutes for a medium, 15 minutes for an easy. I used AI to give me feedback, asking it to focus on code quality and maintainability rather than performance since leetcode over indexes on performance.

The I spent a hour studying a system design book, either reading or doing a practice interview. Again, just talking out loud, making diagrams and asking AI for feedback or comparing it to the answers in the book.

Around 40 minutes writing out scenarios for behavioural interviews

Around 1 hour doing resume stuff and applying for jobs.

This structure took around 4-5 hours a day. It was nice because it felt productive, but also easier than a full time job. I did no work on the weekend.

I never actually used a service for practice interviews, so no advice there from me.

Ambitiousmonty@reddit

Which book and how do you like it? I’m on the hunt for a system design book!

Grokking the system design interview. I found it covered everything you'd need for the interview.

JohnWangDoe@reddit

Based

pr0xyb0i@reddit

Or just use an app like Leetcode Wizard

LoaderD@reddit

I think you mean “pay for premium”, because on first read I thought you were suggesting one of those LC AI cheating overlay tools.

Ambitious-Garbage-73@reddit

You can turn it around, but I'd separate 'can build apps' from 'can pass interview games.' Different muscles. Practice LC like a weird test format, not a verdict on you.

erialai95@reddit

Me and my friend with have data and software engineering experiences have both found new roles without leetcode involved in the interview.

The technical round was pretty in depth so maybe that counted as the leetcode but yeah there are interviews that don’t use leetcode

BigTunaBat@reddit

I’ve got 15yrs+ experience and I couldn’t solve most LC tests. Don’t let it get you down. I’ve found in the many companies I’ve worked in - The challenge is nearly always scalability, architecture and debugging, it the actual coding being complex. The code is usually simple once enough thought is given to the problem but the devil is in the design and architecture. So… keep looking and stay positive. Plenty of companies out there, large and small, realise LC is not representative of talent or skill

Recent_Science4709@reddit

Many many popular leetcode problems in interviews are “sliding window”. Learn the general categories of problems, that helps a lot. Even if you can’t finish you’ll at least go down the right path and for a lot of interviews that’s good enough.

Interviewing is a skill in itself and has to be practiced. You can get good at this stuff and when you look for a job after 5 years it’s like starting over again. It takes practice. Nature of the field.

nirvanist_x@reddit

You’re not dumb, and this situation is more common than people admit. A lot of developers can build real products but struggle with interview-style problem solving because interviews test a different skill set than day-to-day work.

There’s no magic solution, but if pressure gets to you, having an AI tool available during coding interviews can help. You may not even need to use it, but if your mind goes blank, a quick glance can help you reset. I used Blind.codes myself, and honestly, it worked perfectly for me.

HappyFlames@reddit

I basically feel like I'm starting from scratch every time I start interviewing again. The whole interview process is the worst part of being in this industry. My usual plan is to apply, study, and interview in parallel and keep going until I land a job. It's a grueling process every time, I'm not sure it gets easier.

Due_Helicopter6084@reddit

Some things, like DSA, are grinding, but T shaping is also an option. There is a huge bonus in having a lot of secondary skills.

SwitchOrganic@reddit

Wrote this on a similar post a few weeks ago:

Learning how to do leetcode is very similar to learning calculus or probability theory. It's the programming version of recognizing what kind of probability distribution you're looking at or what kind of rule you need to apply for a derivative or integral.

Assuming you already know basic DSA, follow something like Neetcode and go through 1-2 problems a day. Write the problems you do on flash cards and practice spaced repition with them, going back to review concepts, patterns, or specific questions you struggle with over time. Move to mediums as it gets easier and then eventually hards. If you don't get the hards or struggle with them that's okay, just try to figure out the logical solution even if you can't code it up. Then keep at it.

While some of the more difficult problems may have a "trick", most of these problems have a brute force solution you can get to using these patterns. The trick only really matters if you're looking for an optimal solution, which I don't think very many people are when they're throwing the harder LC Hards at people.

One problem a day for six months is around 180 problems, two a day is over 360. It's really not that bad unless you're trying to cram and do like 200 problems in a month or two. There are only like ~18 different patterns to learn and of those some are way more common than others.

syndbg@reddit

I'll be a bit more straight. You realize the mistakes you're making, you try and fail. This is practice, it's good. Talking yourself down is not helpful. You suck at leetcode? We all suck at leetcode, that's why we practice it when needed. You suck at X subject? Ask the AI how to approach learning X subject and start getting familiar with books, courses, whichever learning materials work best for you.

If not, wha'ts the alternative? For things to get easier without trying? AI is at best ONLY accelerating the delivery of code up to your competence. AI is a great learning tool if you use it to learn, research, try different approaches, but it makes a ton of mistakes.

Using it as a crutch to do your daily work without pushing yourself to get better is leading to what you're already seeing.

skyturnsred@reddit

Nailed it. Especially asking AI about a subject. Have it create a study guide, have it quiz you like an interview and only use voice to text to respond. This is what I did to solidify myself for fundamental questions. I was honest with myself with how confident I felt when talking as well.

snakebitin22@reddit

I guess the question is why do you feel like you’re missing fundamentals?

What fundamentals do you think you are missing?

Personally, I’m not a big fan of LC because of the “quiz show” nature of how it works. In my opinion, it teaches more memorization than it does coding principles. Furthermore, HMs that rely upon how a candidate performs on LC questions may not fully grasp how LC questions apply to real world problems in the actual environment that the candidate is interviewing to support.

LC is just not the best indicator of competency in my opinion.

In my opinion, as someone who is relatively early in their career (at 29, you’re super early), I would suggest that you focus on getting good with more than coding fundamentals.

You should be able to explain basic technology protocols in plain English to nontechnical people. Things like OSI, DNS, DHCP, TLS, etc.

If you do not understand these basic IT concepts, you are pretty much screwed as a developer or as an engineer.

Above and beyond that, you should get good with basic concepts of object oriented programming to the point that it no longer matters which language you are working with. Get your mind to the point of “it’s all syntax” and really all you need to do is learn the nuances of the language to get effective.

Lastly, work on your soft skills. All the knowledge and skills in the world mean nothing if you cannot explain it to nontechnical people in a way that makes them feel comfortable. If you come across as an arrogant asshole or just plain weird, you will not be selected in interviews.

Good luck out there!

stoneg1@reddit

Lots of questionable advice in this thread. No one is good at leetcode without practice. I mean literally no one, Ive interviewed stanford and mit students who couldn’t do med problems.

You just need to practice a lot, do an easy leetcode a day until they are too easy for you then jump to mediums. I wouldn’t bother with hard problems. Eventually youll be able to do almost any mediums without thinking.

I also used to really struggle with coding interviews and i had a ton of nerves. Once i studied for them though they became a lot less stressful.

ephemeral_resource@reddit

Have you been asking for feedback? Few places offer it outright but many will if you ask. Especially if you ask for "honest first impressions as feedback you need because you've been striking out" during the process. They'll feel more like they owe you something during as they see they're taking your time.

YetMoreSpaceDust@reddit

Stop using AI tools, including IDE's. Go back to basics - use a dumb text editor and start solving problems. Leetcode gets a bad reputation, but it's a good repository for decent-ish "brainteaser" programming problems. But type everything out yourself - no code completion.

Just use A.I none care anymore, blind.codes did the job for me

skidmark_zuckerberg@reddit

I do not do not do LC interviews. Not sure where you live but there are plenty of companies that don’t do this type of interview. Also not to be pedantic but CS != software development. They are two completely different things in the modern day. Computer science is being a research scientist. Software development involves building product using extremely abstracted tools to accomplish it. It’s not natural to do LC because you simply do not this on a day to day basis, unless you’re someone who is highly specialized working a lot further upstream than most of the us who are just building CRUD apps and their infrastructure over and over again.

ProvidenceXz@reddit

I never do LC. Imo it's a waste of time in the agent era. However yes I may be leaving money on the table. But the companies I enjoy working for have a higher chance of interview by building stuff or working alongside them onsite. I'm also close to founding. I also enjoy building stuff so it might work out for you too. Best of luck.

KwonDarko@reddit

I was in the same spot as you are now 8 years ago. Check my post where I covered all the mistakes I did and how I fixed them. It was top 5 on Hacker News a few days ago.

Eastern_Vanilla_5184@reddit

have you considered smaller companies first

how many YOE?

I’m starting to worry that I don’t have strong fundamentals.

and

It’s gotten to the point where I’m questioning whether I’m missing core skills or just not cut out for this field.

Its okay if you don't have this, at least you know what you need to polish

What you have to keep in mind is you're prob competing with candidates that do have decent fundamentals, if not strong.

And so it's not like all hope is lost because, those things are still teachable, just requires accepting it, willingness and motivation to get better

and trust me as someone who didn't focus on fundamentals til much later in their career, i know how it is, it's a lot of work, but in the end it helps not just for the interview.