The Art of Figuring Out
“I have all these skills, but how do I go about applying them?”
“I have a ton of projects on my resume and LinkedIn but I’m having trouble transforming those into valuable opportunities”
The above are the two top questions that I get asked all the time by freshman and sophomores. Although I do not have a perfect recipe (and I doubt that there exists one), through this article I want to share my story describing what did (and did not) work for me when I was looking for internships and research projects, because believe me, all of us have been in that boat.
Something that I realized only after getting my first acceptance letter from a startup was that no knowledge or skill ever goes to waste. Everything that you learn, no matter how random it may seem, will help in some way, shape or form. For me, it was my ability to solve the Rubik’s cube in under 30 seconds. There was a company at a campus career fair giving out $1000 to anyone who solved the Rubik’s cube with the best time. While I was not at the event initially, a friend of mine who had seen me solve the cube before, gave me a call and told me about this crazy opportunity. While I was beaten by one other person towards the end of the fair, that Rubik’s cube led to a conversation with the hiring manager, which in turn led to 3 interview rounds which finally resulted in my first internship acceptance letter. All in all, can’t complain much about loosing the $1000. Key thing to note here is that the knowledge and skills that may appear random or irrelevant right now that will give you context to build conversations that can and most definitely bring in new opportunities.
The next thing I am going to talk about might sound cliched but is incredibly useful and that is, how you stand out. Let me explain this with an example. I was in the process of finding research projects to contribute to and was sending a ton of cold emails daily. But opportunities were just slipping by. Something was not working out. It took me a while to realize that the professors I was writing those emails to were getting hundreds of those every week. Skip to the time when my friend asked me to bring him a cup of coffee before his phone screen interview. Of course I got lost on the floor and accidentally landed up at the office of a professor I had taken a CS class with. Something just clicked and I knocked my way into his office. Amazingly, he remembered my name and face which was enough to kindle a conversation. One thing led to another, and by the time I left the office I was a full stack developer on one of his projects. For those of you wondering about the coffee, that cup did eventually find its way to my friend. Important thing to note here is that adding a bit personal touch never hurts. A similar kind of “being different” approach worked for me to land interviews at career fairs as well. Career fairs can be and generally are brutal. So after having no luck at my first few fairs, I decided to spice things up and held my laptop along with my resumes. Rather than words, I decided to let my work do the talking, which fortunately worked in my favor. Don’t get me wrong though, words are extremely important as well!
I am a senior studying Informatics (People + Tech) at the University of Washington, Seattle and this is a big university. The first lesson that I learnt only in my junior year was that it all started with taking initiative. At first, this kind of seems obvious and relatively simple. But, (for me at least) talking about all the cool stuff I was doing showcasing all the skills that I brought to the table was as hard, if not harder, as building those projects in the first place. This hesitance was due to a couple of factors. My high school graduating class only comprised of ~160 people. Everyone knew everyone and the work they were doing. So there was never a need to sell my skills. However, that lies in complete contrast when compared to a big university like UW where everyone is doing amazing things and distinguishing yourself becomes all the way more difficult. This can be (was for me) really intimidating and can discourage you from taking the first step. While it’s okay to be nervous, I can’t stress enough the importance of just starting something, anything, be it big or small. Naturally, not everything will go according to plan but neither should you expect it to. It is going to be those challenges and obstacles that will teach you the most. They also make for great conversation starters when interviewers ask you, “Tell me about some of the hardships and how you overcame them on <insert name of project>”.
So you have now taken the first step and have an awesome project to show off. But who do you show it off to? Networking is key here. Finding people who value your work opens up doors to new opportunities. I got my first research position through a very close friend who knew my skillset and work ethic. She also had connections with the right people looking for a profile like mine for a big research project at UW. Fortunately, the dots connected and I became one of the core developers. The six months that I spent here taught me that software development is so much more than just writing code. In fact, I think writing code was the easier part. The difficult part was figuring out what best solved the problem for the people involved in the process. Working in a team of 4 developers and 8 designers, I was forced into participating in a collaborative environment which made me better at expressing myself out to other people. This project was also a meeting ground for amazing people from diverse backgrounds, each of whom had a different story to tell. Talking to them and just knowing more about them definitely contributed to my networking skills.
I will be honest and say that my realization period to understand the importance of everything that I have talked about so far came in pretty late, during my junior year. It took a lot of things not going my way to learn the lessons the hard way around. But better late than never! My hope through this article is to help anyone who is feeling stuck and is trying figure their way out, a little earlier than me to maximize the opportunities that come your way. Well, that combined with my sudden love for giving life advice and suggestions (I guess that comes that comes as a part of being a senior) provides the motivation behind this article. Hopefully, very soon you will have your own stories to share as well!
