Struggles of getting a high paying job in the US

Gaurang Mhatre
Sep 3, 2018 · 3 min read

My goal is to reflect on the difficulties I have faced while getting an awesome job in the United States of America. I am a Distributed Systems Software Engineer working for a company in Silicon Valley, California.

Just for a better understanding of who I am, Let me give you some background. I was a foreign student pursuing my Masters at San Jose State University, California. I have studied Computer Science from Mumbai University, India. I was also working for a company in Mumbai for two years, where I was building full-stack Software. I enjoy programming, architecting and designing systems.

In this post, I will talk about one of the most fundamental things that will decide what kind of job you end up with.

But before that let me share some of the most common kinds of rejections that I have faced, These things are quite common and don’t worry you will also get to experience them.

  • You got rejected just because of some imperfection in your resume
  • Your telephonic interviews were not on point
  • You bombed your on-site interview
  • Recruiter ghosted you after your interviews.

Now unless you are a pro with 10+ patents on your name, you cannot avoid rejections while looking for jobs.

But let me share my secret tip for handling and overcoming rejections.

There is no secret ingredient; it’s just you
  • In order to take control of your failures, let’s take a step back and think about why do we need an awesome job? we can always settle for an ordinary one, and the process of getting an ordinary job is also not that hard. So the question is, why do you need the best job in your domain? If you have a clear answer to this questions, Bravo! Your dream job is waiting for you.
  • But, if you are not sure, maybe we can think about what really matters for you? This may sound like nonsense, but this will matter a lot when you are going through rejections. The things that matter to you need not be super hard or remote to grasp like, “I want to stop global warming” or “I will be the first person on the Mars” but it can be a simple thing like, “I want to pay off my student loan in 1 year” or “I want to write a book on building Microservices” or “I want my parents to retire” or “I want to buy a cash paid Tesla Roadster 2”.
  • Now let’s write these goals down on a piece of paper every day. This will keep your mind focused and calm even in your downtime. This single activity was so powerful, that when I use to receive all the painful rejection calls and emails, I used to look at my paper and think about all the nice things that are going to happen once I get the job of my dreams.

Now, this is not some mumbo-jumbo that I have invented. If you want more clarity on this topic, you can check out book “What to Say When You Talk to Yourself” by Shad Helmstetter.

Even of the highly analytical individuals among us, “Sometimes it is okay to see things in your mind before you have it”.