Artificial Intelligence and Its Effect on Entry-level Hiring

Artificial Intelligence, despite not being fully-formed, is no longer merely threatening to shake up the labor market. By most accounts, it has already happened. Even if one takes "AI-washing" (where companies use AI disruption as a convenient scapegoat rather than a genuine reason for layoffs) into account, the fact of the matter is that two classes of tech workers are currently facing extinction.

The first are the leetcoders or hackathoners, who have spent their entire careers training to be the fastest code typers and problem-solvers possible. Entire movies have been made about these rockstars... and now they're finding out that they'll never produce code faster than a machine. I'm trying to find it in my heart to produce some sympathy, but honestly they should have seen this coming. This industry automates so many things; why not coding?

Very screwed.

And if your entire value proposition has been speed, I don't know what to tell ya, son, you're more screwed than a plank at a carpenter's convention.

The second class, of course, are entry-level tech workers.

Entry-level tech workers

The moment LLMs started being capable of churning out subpar code at light speed, at a fraction of the cost of hiring cheap slave labor fresh-faced geeks, the position of these tech workers was in jeopardy. And the LLMs aren't even all that subpar at the time of this writing. I have significantly more sympathy for this demographic than for the leetcoders, due to the simple fact that they never asked for any of this. They didn't make the conscious career mistake of maximizing for typing speed. They learned the fundamentals and did the work, but their careers look dead in the water before even being given a chance to pay their dues.

The bigger concern - one that's already been repeated ad nauseam, but bears repeating nonetheless - is that if entry-level workers aren't even given the opportunity to level up, they aren't going to grow into senior-level workers. And the senior-level workers won't be around forever.

Space to grow.

Entry-level workers should be given the space to make mistakes and grow. Already, "civilians" with LLMs are finding out that being able to build "working software" isn't quite the same thing as a qualified software developer producing something with a baseline level of engineering rigor. For example, I've come across civilian-produced apps that lack Cross-site Request Forgery protection or even expose database ids right in the URL. To provide non-technical readers the proper context, CSRF hasn't been in the OWASP Top Ten for years, but that doesn't mean it's no longer a threat - it just means that enough people have guarded against it that it's no longer a popular successful attack vector. Thus, this represents a step back. Civilians and entry-level workers alike, make mistakes; but unlike civilians, entry-level workers are professionally interested in improving.

Think about it - why is someone like me occupying this niche in the food chain? Because I'm so damn special? There is nothing special about me. I started life as a stupid kid like most of you schmucks reading this, and figured my way out over time. I spent years making mistakes and learning from them, and learning the right questions to ask. I have the scars that neither the entry-level tech worker or the non-tech worker do. More importantly, I was allowed to make those mistakes, in addition to performing the countless (entry-level, often repetitive) tasks that LLMs can now do... but precisely due to having developed that muscle memory, I'm now qualified to validate the LLM's output. If entry-level workers don't have even these tasks, how else will they grow?

Employers will say that it's not their responsibility to train the next generation of developers. Their primary responsibility is to their organizations. That's completely fair.

Who's the bad guy in this story, then?

Well, it's not AI. AI exists, but AI is not the one making the decision not to hire young developers. AI merely makes that decision more of a no-brainer.

It would be easy to paint employers as the bad guys here. Lazy too, and that's why I'm not going to do it.

Sure, they're the ones opting to adopt AI at the expense of entry-level (and even more senior) workers... but it's mostly in response to what their competitors are doing. Some of these employers don't have the luxury of thinking ten years into the future and investing in youth now. They're in the position where they know it's a bad idea, and they have to go ahead anyway. Shit, even some giants in Silicon Valley have to make moves that mirror the competition; what chance do the rest have, really?

The bad guy.

No one is the bad guy. It's just evolution. Insisting there has to be a bad guy is like calling the meteor that deleted all the dinosaurs way back then, the villain.

From where I sit, LLMs are the latest in a long line of evolutions in tech history. Significant? Of course. World-shattering? Whose world, exactly? People like me are on our way out. We don't exactly have much skin in the game.

Crap advice

In these times of uncertainty, the only certainty there's to be found seems to be from the voices of older workers, with a great deal of confidence as to how these new treacherous waters should be navigated. Toughen up. Pivot. Find your spine. Work hard and grow your network.

Excuse the fuck out of me. Toughen up? That's like telling people to learn to swim when a tsunami is crashing onto the beach. Sound advice under most circumstances, but useless for immediate survival.

Learn to swim!

One of the things I really can't stand about older tech workers like myself, or even just older workers my age in general, is that they seem to think that their age makes them intrinsically superior to the younger generation. Don't get me wrong; older and experienced workers come with a good deal of advantages, but it doesn't make us automatically qualified to advise the next generation on how to conduct their careers.

I mean, do you have experience as a young adult trying to find work? Sure. Do you have experience as an older worker trying to find work in 2026? Maybe. Do you know what it's like to be a young adult, trying to find work in 2026? No, pal, you don't fucking know. Obviously, you can't have firsthand experience. And unless you shut your mouth and listen more, you're not likely to have secondhand experience either.

Also, consider this: whatever know-how you may have accumulated over your years of experience has now been commoditized with a correctly-worded prompt. Knowing the right questions to ask is a whole other matter, of course. In fact, that is possibly the only thing separating you from the tech cosplayers with their LLMs pretending that they're the equivalent of fully-trained engineers (some of whom might actually even believe it, poor bastards). But at some point, these young tech workers are going to figure out the right questions to ask. They'll have your know-how, but they have youthful energy and enthusiasm. You have high cholesterol levels and creaking knees. Do the math.

What lies in store? Damn if I know.

I wouldn't want to be a young tech worker in 2026. Not only is the ground shaky, you've got people with the sheer audacity to tell you what you should be doing, in an arena they haven't fought in before. An unenviable position.

I have no answers, not even bad ones. If I did, people would be paying me for my opinion, not reading it for free on this blog.

Have an AI-dealistic day!
T___T

The Case against Hunger, Enthusiasm and Other Useless Buzzwords

After interviews with prospective candidates are concluded, when I ask fellow interviewers for impressions on the candidate, I sometimes get very strange answers.

"I dunno, the enthusiasm wasn't there."

"Has the skills. Not sure if he has the hunger."

"He just didn't seem excited enough at the prospect of working here."

I'll be honest - that mode of thinking is alien to me. I understand why the owner of a company would think his company is special, the same way the mother of the ugliest child on Earth would think her tyke was Heaven-sent. My question really is: why should others be expected to feel the same way? 

A face only a mother
could love.

Why, pray tell, should anyone, much less a fully qualified tech worker, be excited to be working for your company in particular? Is this really a reasonable expectation? Are you genuinely at the level where being allowed to work for you should be taken as an honor? What loses me is when people start giving themselves airs. Buddy, your company sells spaghetti and cheese fries. That's perfectly respectable. But stop talking about your "sacred mission" like you're solving world hunger.

What they probably really wanted

I suspect what they really meant was - we don't want people to just show up for the money and give the bare minimum. Which sounds more reasonable and actually even sympathetic.

They probably also meant that they don't want this thing to be too transactional. But here's the thing, cupcake - it's all transactional. You're literally running a business here. People need money to pay their bills. They need jobs to have that money. You're offering a job - look, I don't really need to explain this part, do I? 

And let's just quit sugarcoating it: Many of the employers who are fetishizing "hunger" can't handle genuine hunger. That level of hunger involves going above and beyond, yes. It also involves constantly looking out for the next better opportunity and coldly leaving their former employer in the dust if needs must. How do I know this? Well, I was young and dumb once. And yes, I was hungry. Starving, even. My employers were happy to benefit from my hunger, as they should. They were less happy when I left, and my hunger started benefitting other employers.

Here, eat some shit.

No, an alarming number of the employers who say they want "hunger" and "enthusiasm", generally mean that they want someone more exploitable. Someone who will eat shit, smile, and thank their employer for the opportunity to eat shit.

Now, making some grandstanding claim about how exploitation is morally wrong, would make me a huge hypocrite. All my professional life, I have been exploiting my employers' need for labor and tech expertise, the same way they've been exploiting my need for money. It's mere capitalism; very mutual, very respectable.

I just wish people would be honest about what they want, instead of abusing the thesaurus for fancy terms like "hunger", "grit", "self-starter", "go-getter" and the usual cringe LinkedIn buzzwords. Employers, employees; we're on different sides of the chessboard but we're essentially playing the same game. No need to get all self-righteous about it.

The case against enthusiasm

If I wanted to be crude (or compare myself to a sex worker), employers like that remind me of a line I heard in a movie once, and for the life of me I can't remember which one, or even who said it. Was it Al Pacino? I'm certainly hearing it in Pacino's voice, specifically the one he used in The Devil's Advocate. He was talking about how ridiculous a guy was because he hired the services of a hooker and actually expected her to enjoy the sex. Basically, not only did the unfortunate woman have to blow him, she had to pretend it tasted like candy.

Just like candy.

These employers not only want their employees to run through brick walls for them, they want these employees to act like they've been given the highest privilege. Come on, now. Are you grateful that your employees choose to work here? If not, why should the reverse be true? I'm not even asking for humility here; that might be a step too far. Perhaps something more manageable, like dialling that hubris down to less cartoonish levels.

Do I have that requisite level of bright-eyed enthusiasm? Is that why I've been in this company for the last five years? Hell no, it's just the way I work. And that's exactly my point. Asking someone to be in the company out of "enthusiasm" is like asking someone to marry you purely for "love". All these are feelings. And feelings in human beings are even less predictable than an LLM's responses.

Nothing wrong with feelings either, but at some point you're going to need something more concrete and dare I say, sustainable.

What you want is work ethic. Something that persists regardless of a worker's feelings. After all, you don't pay for their feelings. You pay for their time, and their output.

The Takeaway

Any idiot can demand enthusiasm. And any idiot can fake it.

It's not wrong to ask for enthusiasm. But you need to know what part this enthusiasm is supposed to play. "Enthusiasm" is a fuzzy metric that too many employers use to identify employees whom they can subsequently exploit.

Hunger cuts both ways. If you want anything less, you don't want "hungry". You want a wage slave asymmetric employment relationship. At least acknowledge that.

Stay hungry, but stop being foolish!
T___T

Working has different goals from working out

The last time I spoke about swimming laps in relation to software development, it was to discuss Brooks' Law. I've had a couple more insights recently, though those are more about work in general.

See, I'd gotten a bit smug about how little effort it took me to swim from Point A to Point B. I was averaging one stroke for every three that others were doing, but travelling at the same speed, or better. Then I took a closer look at the metrics I was using.

Getting smug in the water.

That's when I knew I'd lost sight of the big picture, and allowed work philosophy to cloud my judgement. Here I was, patting myself on the back for becoming a more efficient swimmer when it was never even the goal.

Working

Larry Wall summed it up elegantly when he said that laziness was a virtue in programmers. He could have meant it as a joke, but philosophically, this cuts to the heart of the matter. Work for the sake of work is not admirable, at least not in the corporate context. You are not paid to work. You are paid to get work done. You are paid to add value through your work. If you think otherwise, you're basically a (admittedly very industrious, good on ya mate) buffalo in the shape of a human being.

Beast of burden.

Thus it stands to reason that at work, you want to produce the most output for the least amount of effort. Both current and future effort. Which is why software developers try to write good code - not because writing clean elegant code is a virtue unto itself, but because code that conforms to those standards minimizes the amount of effort needed to maintain it down the road.

Therefore because I was travelling through water at the same speed as others while putting in less effort, I thought I was nailing it. I forgot that I was working out, not working.

Working out

What are the metrics for working out? You want to put on more muscle. You want to lose weight. You want better cardio-vascular conditioning.

Unless being an athlete is literally your job, you're not cycling primarily because you want to be a better cyclist, or swimming because you want to be a more efficient swimmer. No, when you're working out, your goals are very different. Burn calories. Get your heart rate up. When working out, doing more work is precisely the goal.

Now, at my age, putting on more muscle isn't a goal. Decades of staring at my abs have made the prospect less than interesting. Losing weight isn't that big a deal; as long as I can see my toes when standing, I'm good.

Heart health.

But cardio-vascular conditioning? Oh, absolutely. That's what I was swimming for in the first place. And because I was going at the same speed I've been doing for years, without putting in much effort, my heart rate wasn't going up at all. Which effectively meant that while I was in the water congratulating myself for having become better at swimming, I was pretty much wasting my time.

Conclusion

Swimming faster was never the goal. Swimming more efficiently was never the goal. Putting in more physical effort was always the goal. Not only did I take my eyes off the prize, I forgot what it looked like.

Mission Swimpossible?
T___T

Hiring remote foreigners? Slow your roll, hotshot

"If I allow remote work, I'd be better off hiring programmers in Vietnam."

Sound familiar? Because that is the sound of millions of employers all over the world repeating the same old tired line. If I had a penny every time I heard some small-time Towkay-wannabe mouth off about how they'd save so much money by hiring foreign workers remotely rather than letting local talent work from home, I'd be absolutely rolling in it.

If I had a penny...

If you think this makes me sound dismissive, that's because I am. I am dismissing this line as nothing but bluster and hot air. And sit tight; I'm also about to explain why... in the Singapore context, naturally.

When it makes sense

If it's a huge MNC like, say, IBM, whose head office is in the USA and opening a regional office in Singapore, then yes, it makes total sense. Because they're already doing it. Their hiring and legal infrastructures are made for this. Even if the company is not at the scale of a large corporation, but still a respectable size, it might still make sense. It has to; plenty of these companies are doing it. The alternative is that all of them went nuts at exactly the same time... which is scarily plausible in these crazy times.

A game of expansion.

When hiring is done by the book, the host country (in this case, Singapore) and the remote country (in this case, Vietnam), both have agencies that will handle the legalities. I know because I've worked as an Agency Contractor before. These are absolutely a thing.

And of course, these agencies aren't doing it out of the goodness of their hearts. They're a business; they expect to get paid. This will eat into whatever employers think they're saving by hiring foreign workers, remote or otherwise. But that's OK - even if these tech companies don't save that much per foreign worker they hire, at scale, it tends to add up. Enormously.

When it makes less sense

A tiny tech startup trying to follow in the footsteps of a large corporation without understanding basic realities of scale, is on what I would charitably refer to as a "fool's errand". How many would such a company hire? Five programmers? Maybe ten? Whatever the company saves in wages, is nowhere what a larger company saves when hiring hundreds of these people. And if that pittance actually counts as a win, I would be deeply concerned about the finances of said company.

You sure you can
follow in those
footsteps?

I remember a time when Steve Jobs was considered the man to emulate. He was known to be a bit of an asshole, but he had undeniable talent, and thus he succeeded in spite of being hard to work for, or with. People took it to mean that in order to be as successful as Steve Jobs, one had to be an asshole. The end result was that we had quite a few Jobs-wannabes - basically talentless assholes with big dreams and even bigger mouths.

My point is, imitation may be the highest form of flattery; but for those ill-equipped to carry out said imitation, it becomes a liability quickly.

Also, consider this: any employer who isn't comfortable with employees working remotely on an island as small as Singapore, will be significantly less comfortable with employees working remotely out of Singapore.

If your employer is threatening to stop all this WFH nonsense by hiring more WFH programmers from beyond Singapore's shores, it doesn't take a genius to understand that the math does not quite add up.

When it starts being stupid

And it's at this point, where some employers will go, "Well, I'll just skip the red tape and hire direct from Vietnam, then."

Really? You're going to bypass all the legal and pertinent protections that hiring through the proper channels brings you?

How well do you know your own local employees, much less ones you hire from overseas? Do you know their residential address? And even assuming it's a verifiable genuine address, have you ever tried to navigate Vietnam using just a residential address without any understanding of the local language and conventions?

Pray tell, if the foreign software developer whom you don't know from Adam (or Minh, or Rajasamy) decides to sell your IP to the highest bidder, introduce malware into your code base or do any manner of damaging and illegal acts for profit or simply for amusement, how well do you expect to enforce your legal rights? Remember, they're not operating in Singapore, your home turf. Unlike local employees, these are foreign developers under a different jurisdiction where legal enforcement is already significantly harder - now made even more difficult because, y'know, you so cleverly bypassed the proper channels.

That's just the most extreme cases. Let's consider some less extreme but still very real considerations.

Time zones aren't that big an issue. This being Southeast Asia, assuming the employer is not adventurous (or foolhardy) enough to hire from further abroad, the time differences are off by a couple hours at most - an hour tops in the case of Vietnam. It'll need work, but it can work.

What's arguably a bigger issue, is culture. Just because you are all presumably communicating in English does not mean you speak the same language. Nuance gets lost in translation, especially if you're speaking through a computer screen. Honestly, colleagues have enough problems just communicating face-to-face, in the same culture, in the same language.

Don't cut through
this red tape.

And the most relevant question of all: Why, in the name of all that's right and holy, would anyone put themselves in this position just to save a few thousand bucks a month? Does a company that needs to save that kind of chump change so badly, really inspire confidence in you as an employee?

Anyone old enough to run a business, is too old to be this fucking dumb.

Hiring foreigners isn't foolish inherently. Hiring foreigners remotely isn't either, though significantly riskier. Hiring foreigners remotely without going through the proper channels? Reckless, and potentially illegal. Don't do it.

Conclusion and disclaimer

This is not meant to be any kind of statement against Vietnam. Vietnam absolutely does have a wealth of tech talent at affordable prices. I've worked with quite a few. I was only using Vietnam as a convenient example. I could easily have said Myanmar or India.

My point isn't that employers shouldn't hire foreigners remotely. My point is that it's not something that can just be hand-waved. Employers who have the experience and capability to carry this out, won't be talking about it because they are already - as Nike likes to say - just doing it. Or at the very least, taking cautious first steps. And the ones who are bringing it up casually as leverage during a discussion about remote work, will in all probability continue to just talk.

Your employer is not stupid. But if he's using hiring remote foreigners as a threat, he probably really hopes you are.

Tạm biệt hẹn gặp lại,
T___T

Bolt CEO's dangerous logic for axing his entire HR Team

It's been a couple weeks since I last heard the news that the entire HR Team at Bolt was fired by CEO Ryan Breslow.

Now I'm not a fan of HR, and I like to warn people that mistaking HR as your friend is a mistake they should make only once, if at all. Hell, "nobody at work is your friend" is a good principle to have, and HR should probably head that list.

But anyone expecting me to join the pile-on and gloat about "HR finally getting a taste of their own medicine"? Sorry lads, I'm going to have to disappoint you today. This is a dodgy move at best.

What happened

Bolt was valued at around $11 billion in 2022 when Breslow stepped away, and lost up to 90% of its valuation by 2026. Breslow returned to make sweeping changes, starting with removing about 30% of staff, including the HR function.

Breslow was on record glibly saying the following.

"We had an HR team, right? And that HR team was creating problems that didn't exist. And those problems disappeared when I let them go."

Don't know about you, but this simultaneously caused me amusement and discomfort. It reminded me of a joke I used to make as a smoker.

"I've been smoking for years, but when I read about all the different toxins I've been inhaling into my body, I got so disturbed that I stopped reading."

Turn that racket off!

I mean, would you turn off the fire alarm just because it made a loud distracting sound every time there was a fire? Or remove the brakes on your car to make it incapable of slowing down?

Yes, that's the TeochewThunder equivalent of sticking your head in the sand.

Another disturbing idea

Breslow was also quoted as saying, sounding somewhat conciliatory.

"Those HR professionals have really important insights when you're in a peacetime at a larger company. But we're a remote company, it's not like - a lot of the potential issues that you would have in a workplace don't really exist because you're not in the same room as somebody."

Did our boy just say we don't really need HR if we're remote? Maybe not, but it sounded an awful lot like it. And in case that's the takeaway anyone gets from this, I'm going to shut it down right now.

HR problems don't exist only if people are in the same room together. Remote workers still have to get paid, appraised and onboarded. They still interact with other workers, even online. Company leadership may still, in their zeal, make errors in judgement they need to be warned about. And in certain cases, HR problems get more intense precisely because it's remote. Workplace bullying, for example. I've encountered wankers who became even bigger wankers simply because being remote meant they weren't in immediate danger of being bitch-slapped for talking shit taken to task for being impolite. Come now, we all know someone like that.

What did he just
say to me?!

The only way remote work lessens the need for HR would be if HR's only function was just to look pretty and ask how everyone's day was. And that's not how it works. Not even a little bit.

So no... HR does not become less relevant because the company structure is remote. Sometimes, in those cases, HR becomes more relevant.

The real danger

Let's give Breslow the benefit of the doubt. Let's say HR was really creating problems where there were none, or making issues out of non-issues. Mountains out of molehills. Playing office politics, or worse, identity politics. Overreaching like they were cosplaying Dhalsim in Street Fighter.

Maybe. And even then, saying "they made problems so I got rid of them, problem solved" is a dangerous path to go down.

The point is, what often looks like non-issues slowing things down unnecessarily, are actual problems that laypersons just aren't equipped to handle. And let me be clear; this is not about defending HR.

Not interested in
defending HR.

What if it was an entire team of software developers who were fired because business people started thinking that software devs and their trifling concerns were slowing shit down? We've got LLMs that can generate code now, so business people don't actually need techies to write code.

However, business people are not software engineers, and being able to produce code doesn't magically make them so. Business people have largely the same concerns as software developers - aesthetics, functionality, compliance, security, maintainability - but ask a business person and software developer to rank all these in order of importance, and their answers would look very different. Go ahead, ask business people what they'd do if you told them implementing unit tests would add another week to deployment time at minimum. I'm not saying that all business people would give you an answer that would have you internally questioning your life choices, but the fact is that business and tech people have very different priorities. That tends to introduce resistance into the decision-making process.

What if people started thinking that, armed with LLMs, they could just replace software engineers and get rid of that resistance? Y'all know it's a matter of time someone starts going down this road, if they haven't already. I've seen business people make apps using LLMs, with sometimes comical results. But let's not pretend that eventually replacing techies isn't on the cards.

Au Revoir, Bolt HR!

Still think the firing the entire HR team isn't a big deal? You're right, it's probably not. But the reasoning - that's something we need to look at.

Time for me to Bolt,
T___T

Ten Reasons To Keep Treating Job Interviews As Target Practice

For the longest time, I've been an advocate of getting practice in job interviews... using actual job interviews. I make no apology for this; in fact, at a certain stage in my career, I made it a point to do this regularly. And I will continue to advise professionals to keep applying for jobs and going for job interviews, even - or especially - if they have no current intention of switching jobs. Hey, life is about at least opening new doors to see what lies beyond, if not going through them.

Opening new doors.

Don't feel too bad about potentially wasting the time of the companies you apply at. How many companies post job ads and conduct interviews for positions they have no intention of filling, just so they can technically bypass the requirements set out by the TAFEP? Two can play at that game.

Plus, there are some really compelling reasons to do it. Here's a list of some really big ones.

1. Muscle memory

You know what they say about practice making perfect? Well, there's no such thing when it comes to interviews (or anything, really). But you can get awfully good at it. What about mock interviews? Well, mock interviews are great and all, but at some point you're going to have to stop hitting the punching bag and square off against someone who's actually trying to hit you back.

This won't hit back.

People also tell me that they have better things to do than to attempt interviews "for fun". This is a huge misrepresentation of what I'm recommending. Of course, if it's fun for you, that's a bonus. But it's not the main point.

Nothing about this is supposed to be fun. Think of this as working out, where you condition your body, strengthen it, in the event that one day it might be ready when called upon. This is the career interview equivalent of exercising in a gym.

2. Confidence

At the very least, you'll get a lot more comfortable at it.

Even when it's a high stakes interview where there's a lot riding on it and you actually care about the outcome, there's no denying that prior practice helps. A big part of you will feel like you've seen and done all this before. There will be a certain familiarity to the entire process that, due to the comfort said familiarity brings, will go a long way towards offsetting any nerves.

Staying chill.

People have remarked on how remarkably at ease I seem during job interviews. What they don't know is that this has nothing to do with my people skills. I still find other human beings tiresome and annoying. It's simply that after a few hundred interviews with actual companies and dealing with all their bullshit, it stops being fresh and exciting. As a result, it also stops being anxiety-inducing. Seriously, no matter how unique and special some interviewers seem to think their interview process is, the truth is that the vast majority of the time, it's like most other interview processes.

Tech round? Mock project? Whiteboard? I've seen it. I've done it. I've even conducted it. Nothing makes me nervous. Because almost none of it is new.

Reusing the boxing analogy from before, the best way to get over a fear of being punched in the face, is to get punched in the face frequently. Similarly, to get over a fear of rejection from interviewers, you need to get rejected often. From real interviews.

3. Develop market awareness

The tech industry is wide and varied. Even if you narrow it down to software development, or even further down to web development, the fact is that different employers have different requirements. They may need proficiency or even just passing familiarity with new software, new frameworks, new software libraries that you may never even have heard of.

And it's true that you don't know what you don't know. So if you don't even have any idea where to start improving, how are you going to improve? It certainly isn't going to be by repeating the same old stuff over and over. That may work for some industries. But no, not software development.

Laundry list of requirements.

But every time one applies for a new job, guess what - the application often comes with an oh-so-helpful wish list of skills that the employer is looking out for. Sure, some of it is laughably impractical, but this is generally where you can scan the list for things that look unfamiliar to you, and then start exploring.

You know the D3 and HighCharts demos I have done? They both started out as items on a job application list of requirements. I Googled the terms and the rest is history.

4. Broaden horizons

There are sights you don't get too see very often. Huge, sprawling offices that overlook the sparkling waves of Marina Bay. Fancy commercial towers. Lush lobbies.

Not to say you can't see those things without going for a job interview... but really, what better time? Surely not during your free time when you undoubtedly have more pressing concerns and better things to do?

See the sights.

Aside from the sights, sometimes companies have interesting ways of testing interviewers, such as through puzzles or case studies. Some of them were so fun I turned them into web demos. Tetris in vanilla JavaScript? Rock, Paper, Scissors app? All that came from some applicant assignment sheet.

Also, I know I earlier said that most interview questions are lame and formulaic. Most. Sometimes interviewers surprise you with a question you haven't heard before. That's very valuable. It not only expands your experience, it tests your ability to think on your feet.

Take the experience as a way to broaden your horizons. Add to the growing list of stuff you can later confidently claim to have seen.

5. Learn how to conduct

One side effect of having attended a whole shitload of interviews in your career, is that you learn how to conduct them.

Well... not quite.

Let me qualify that. You don't exactly learn how to conduct them. That kind of experience comes from actually conducting them, just as the know-how to get through job interviews comes form actually attending job interviews.

Conducting an
interview.

But you do learn an awful lot about how to conduct them. For example, you would know from firsthand experience how cringey some questions sound, such as the classic "where do you see yourself in five years?" and the ultimate douchebaggy "why should we hire you?", and hopefully avoid being such a cliché.

You would learn, from the interviewee's point of view, what makes a bad impression on them, and avoid falling into those traps.

6. Zero consequences

Using real companies and real job applications for practice, is like honing your craft in a real environment with no stakes whatsoever.

If you weren't all that (or even at all) interested in the job, it doesn't matter if you fail. Your ego might get bruised a little bit, but that's about it.

Target practice.

What are they going to do if they find out you were just using them for practice? Not hire you? Big deal. It's not like you were actually interested to begin with. Practice, remember? Are they going to sure no one ever hires you in the industry? Please, they wish they had this much clout. This is Singapore, not Silicon Valley.

My entire point is that there are no consequences for failure. This is a consequence-free activity dressed up as high-stakes operation. You pretend to yourself that this is a job you really want, though in actual fact you could care less. As interviews go, the only thing less stressful is a mock interview, and those are pretty lame.

7. Future-proofing

"But I'm happy where I am!"

Oh, you sweet summer child. You don't have to be unhappy where you are, to go for a job interview. Especially when the objective is practice. But it probably would add a huge dose of motivation.

If you're happy and
you know it...

It's a hedge against the eventuality that you no longer want to work in your current place of employment, for whatever reason. No relationship lasts forever, especially not one that's predicated on a nebulous human emotion like "happiness".

And when - when, not if - that happens, you'll be glad you bothered. Your resume's already somewhat up-to-date due to all the regular practice. The last interview's still fresh in your mind, along with all the land mines you stepped on in the process. You're ready to go.

At the very least, you'll have gotten a good idea of how much your skills and abilities are worth in the market.

8. Bragging

Anyone with even an ounce of ego likes to brag about their accomplishments. Well, sunshine, here's your chance. A sanctioned space for you to safely brag about all your professional accomplishments. Talk about how you solved the persistent rounding error, that intermittent asynchronous event bubbling issue, and optimized that query to reduce latency to milliseconds.

Not only are you expected to do so, you are encouraged to. That's the entire point - to sell yourself.

I'll confess - this is one of the biggest reasons for me to attend any job interview. Not only do I get to brag, I get to brag to an interviewer who knows exactly what I'm bragging about. That's not a small thing. You see, anyone can brag. But who you brag to makes a hell lot of difference.

Toot that horn!

As a tech, if you're bragging to people who don't have the know-how to properly appreciate the brilliance of what you're bragging about, it can be like casting pearls before swine.

But when you're speaking to someone who has a pretty good idea as to why your accomplishments are impressive, that is sweet. And the cherry on top? Impress that someone enough and you may just win a job offer.

9. Eureka moments

During interviews, you're asked to describe your current work, and the challenges you face. And this can have a few effects.

You'll talk about the problems you're tackling, and how you either solved them, or are attempting to solve them. And we all know what happens when you talk them through someone, especially if you're explaining those problems well enough: you get an Eureka moment. Honestly, a lot of problems are solved just by talking the problem through with someone; anyone actually. You don't really need to be in a job interview to get that Eureka moment.

Your Eureka moment.

But can you get that Eureka moment during a job interview when you're talking about your work? Yes, absolutely. I wouldn't make it the reason to do job interviews, but it's one of the possible side-effects.

10. Gaining Perspective

One thing may happen when you go for those interviews and discover all the things you wouldn't have otherwise. You may actually realize how good you have it. You may gain a newfound appreciation of your workplace, warts and all. If seeing how things are out there makes you happier at your job, that's value.

The grass is browner on the
other side.

Granted, some places seem more fun to work in. They're also potentially messy, have less benefits, and are a pain in the butt to commute to. It could be any number of things, or all of them.

In the process, you may just discover that you're really grateful to have this job. And that's fine. Just don't be too grateful. Your career depends on it.

I like to call it the "grass is browner" syndrome.

Final notes

I haven't followed my own advice in years. I do still think it's good - even great - advice. But for me, it's started to show diminishing returns. The gains just aren't there anymore once you've clocked in the hours. Still, what this means is that there are gains. I can walk into an interview and feel little to no anxiety. I can answer most questions glibly, and even if I don't impress sufficiently in the end, I'm rarely too bothered by it.

Do exercise caution. It's entirely possible that you'll become better at passing interviews than actually doing the work... and that's the last thing you should want.

Let's review this in five years!
T___T

In defense of small steps

It was 1997. I was a Temasek Polytechnic student waiting to go into National Service. While hanging out at a running track (imagine, in those days I actually had knees that didn't creak.) I bumped into a schoolmate also waiting for National Service.

He told me he had been preparing for National Service by running three rounds around the running track every day. Three. That was 1.2 kilometers. I was baffled. I laughed in his face and said he might as well not bother. This was a pitifully short distance. What good would it do?

Running in preparation.

I know, I know, I was a jerk. And if I ever see him again, even if he's forgotten all about it, I really should offer him an apology. I'm a kinder, more evolved individual now and all. More importantly, I've spent decades as a web developer and it's not just compassion behind the apology - it's professional clarity.

The lesson behind this

The story here isn't about me saying stupid, needlessly cruel things like some empty-headed moron. I was nineteen, FFS. Saying dumb shit was par for the course.

No, the story is that, in my youthful arrogance, I was blind to the simple fact that everything begins with small steps. Everything. And years later, life would beat that lesson into me over and over. I would attempt a tech career in sunny Singapore. I would stumble repeatedly. Sometimes I would take a few steps forward only to be shunted one step back.

In many ways, life was not kind. It could have been worse, of course. A lot worse. But the fact remains that there were challenges. Challenges that weren't going to be navigated in a single bound. I was dismissed from jobs. Failed probationary periods. Screwed up at work. Joined companies that crashed and burned. Worked for exploitative bosses with the ethics of a swamp leech.

But you know what? It was OK because my failures were due to me actually trying. That was valuable. The thing about freedom, and having agency, is that you own all your success and your failures.

Moving slowly.

The thing is, I wasn't shooting up the corporate ladder. Sometimes I wasn't anywhere near any kind of ladder. It took a few (OK, several) iterations before my career got any kind of traction, and even then, it was a slow grind.

In retrospect, my career was like how software is typically written - iteratively. "Do it once, do it good" is music to the ears. Unfortunately, that's all it often is. The ugly reality is that software evolves. You start off with an MVP that gets fleshed out over time, and requirements are going to change. That's business. That's life, even.

What I know now

A new appreciation for small steps is one of the things I've gained. It's not about how big the step is. It's about the fact that the step is being taken at all. It's a statement of intent, and this can be powerful. Without even a small step in the right direction, you ain't getting anywhere, son.

Pretty much like my ex-schoolmate and his 1.2 kilometer run. A tiny step? Yes. Very tiny. But no less important. Because it was the intention that counted. And later on, whatever success he enjoyed in that area should be attributed to that intention.

It wasn't like he simply went on Social Media and talked about doing it without actually doing it. No, he was doing it when I encountered him. And what did I do? Minimized his efforts like a jackass, that's what.

Wishing for software.

I've come to understand the need to do things in iterations. Small incremental steps if necessary. And it's often necessary. Software isn't simply conjured out of thin air after verbalizing a wish, no matter what the likes of Jensen Huang or Elon Musk would have you believe. It follows a process of repeated refinement. A lot of eventual success is predicated upon simply showing up to do the work, and showing up consistently.

This has also manifested in my reading habits, and even my consumption of media. Before, I always felt the need to watch YouTube videos to the end. Finish the book I borrowed from the library. If I started on a TV series, I would binge it to the end.

No longer.

Now I understand that reading a book to the end, for example, means very little. It doesn't actually mean that I'm finished with it. I can always gain new insights from rereading it. Conversely, if it's not worth my time the first round, I can feel free to cut it loose without wasting any more time on it. Perhaps one day I'll find the motivation to get back to it... and if not, it's not a big deal. Basically, I no longer feel the pressure to finish things I started. Because the "finish" is ultimately artificial.

Just like software. Software is never "finished". It's only ready for shipping, but it will evolve in its lifetime.

Small conclusions

Be comfortable with small beginnings. Showing up is more important than showing up loud. "Go big or go home" is ego and stupidity talking, nothing more.

One small step for man...
T___T

Finding Your Purpose Professionally

For years now, I've been reading that young people (which, to me, means Gen Z) are unemployable because they want to find purpose in work. By that, they mean that the company they eventually join, should have values that align with their own. They want to impact the world in meaningful ways.

This, of course, may not be compatible with the values that employers traditionally value - hard work and discipline.

Now, I've often stated my opinion that the value of hard work is often overrated. And people who fixate on that at the exclusion of all else, are doomed to fail. That doesn't mean I think that fixating on purpose in work is necessarily an improvement.

Heal the world; make it a
better place...

On the face of it, these are noble goals. Who doesn't want to make the world a better place?

On the other hand, what's "better"? There are some who would say the world would be better if everyone was unable to say hurtful things, and some might say the world would be better if certain kinds of people simply did not exist. Who gets to decide? I think most of us would have enough of a sense of self-preservation not to trust some wet-behind-the-years kid straight out from University, high on purist ideals, to make that decision. Not that I would necessarily depend on some Bible-thumper Churchgoer for those decisions either, if we're being honest.

In all fairness, however, career choices are highly personal. Still, let's examine the issue of wanting to find purpose in work. Some like to claim that it's all hubris and entitlement.

Is it really entitlement, though?

One might say this comes across as a little selfish. After all, every day one remains without a job is another day that financial slack is taken up by someone else. So holding out for a job with purpose does suggest a disproportionate amount of privilege.

But entitlement?

To be honest, this does come across as awfully entitled if they want the success from the start, without paying their dues or starting small like the rest of us. The people who have changed the world as we know it, were extraordinary people with extraordinary talent, some of whom endured extraordinary hardship. I'm by no means saying that people should not aim to be extraordinary - ambition is a grand thing to have, after all - but the fact is, not everyone can be extraordinary. That's literally what the word means. If everyone can be special, then no one is special.

Everyone should have the right to aim high. Not everyone, however, should expect to be given an easy ride. Chances are, the first several companies won't be a great fit in terms of purpose and values. The pay and hours may (probably will) suck. And expecting not to have to deal with any of that shit because you're special or something, does smack of entitlement. I mean, you better be pretty damn special, sweetheart.

Be willing to start small.

All I'm saying is, as long as one's willing to start small and compromise without expecting instant success, it's not entitlement. It's just a goal like any other.

Now, I could spend this entire blogpost ranting endlessly about how kids these days don't understand the value of hard work and paying your dues, loyalty and all other Boomer values that employers tend to like perpetuating (wink wink, nudge nudge). Or I could unpack my own experiences when I had what the older generation called "unrealistic expectations".

And trust me, there's plenty to unpack.

Back in 2010...

I was in between jobs. Things were looking bleak. I was patiently holding out for a proper software dev job. My dad recommended me a tech support job at some medical company. I declined repeatedly. If anyone's at all familiar with my backstory, they would know how much I absolutely despise the role that I spent the first six years of my career in, and how hard I worked to never have to do another day of tech support in my life, ever again.

Dad didn't agree. To him, a job was just a job. To him, I was this spoilt brat who wasn't even giving it a fair chance.

I didn't understand why my dad, who sometimes couldn't tell a laptop from a lap dance, was presuming to give me any kind of career advice, let alone tech career advice. The truth was that he wasn't. He was just trying to get me to see reason; that any job was better than no job at all.

From a survival standpoint, he was absolutely right. However, from the standpoint of a career in software development, it would have been one hell of a stupid choice.

I didn't want just any job. I wanted a career. And the job I chose needed to at least be a positive step towards that goal, no matter how small. Dad didn't understand the concept of a career. He didn't have much of an education. His work experience consisted of selling used cars, selling insurance, basically selling. He might even have tried to run a garment factory once. As far as he was concerned, he was lucky to have any kind of job, let alone one that just required him to drive around and talk to people. To this day, I simultaneously resent and admire him for his ability to just suck it up.

I have an
education, dammit!

Because I was different. I had an education, and with it, the ability to be choosy. Honestly, if I just wanted to do any job, why waste all those years on tech qualifications?

Thus, I like to think that I had a practical reason to be choosy, as opposed to doing it for "purpose". (Like these young punks. Heh heh.)

It's now 2026!

I won't pretend I know how kids these days think. I know what they think, or at least, what the news reports say they think. But I don't know how they arrive at those conclusions, or how it even makes sense to them.

Purpose? Every job has a purpose. Perhaps not the high-minded noble purpose these young ones pontificate about constantly, but purpose nonetheless.

Hey, some people find purpose in not starving. And if you think that's not a purpose, shut your privileged piehole.

Some people find purpose in a job that enables them to take care of the people who matter. What the job actually entails isn't the issue. What effect it has on the world isn't the issue. The issue is that they have mouths to feed, and by God they are going to feed those mouths.

Still think all that isn't purpose? It might be more actual purpose than these youngsters have ever dealt with. Remember, before you try to save the world, take some time to help Mommy with the dishes.

Too good to do the dishes?

I don't mean to sound condescending (even though I probably do). After all, I've struggled with career choices myself. And the conclusions I came to as a result, some might uncharitably say was due to me not being successful in changing the world.

Newsflash: don't worry too much about changing the world. Leave it alone and it'll sort itself out most of the time, with or without you. Thinking that your input is required, is nothing short of vanity... though it can be argued that said hubris is exactly one of the ingredients required to change the world.

But I can say all that. I have the benefit of hindsight, after all. And perhaps young people need that exact same benefit.

Or it could be that they're right, and my ways are outdated, the same way my father's ways were outdated back in 2010.

My advice (not that anyone asked for it)

There's nothing wrong at all with starting small, or imperfect beginnings. So what if the company you land in doesn't align with your life goals, or at all? You're fresh out of University; you have zero leverage with which to change the world. And expecting to be able to do it right away is mere fantasy.

Clock your experience points. Pay your dues. Do all that, and you'll have a leg to stand on when you eventually pursue those lofty noble goals. Without practical experience, all you have are good intentions. And we all know what the road to hell is paved by.

This blogpost was written on purpose,
T___T

Handle Your Imposter Syndrome

Imposter Syndrome. A curious term. It speaks, professionally, of the persistent doubt that ones current position is undeserved, that we do not have the talent to warrant what we currently have, and that one day we will be found out for the frauds that we are.

And among software developers, it's an all-too-common trope. I've struggled with it myself, and for good reason. There have been times when I doubted my own abilities as a software dev, after witnessing the rapid changes in the industry, being outright told I wasn't good enough, and so on. Sometimes interviewers tried to use it as a negotiation tactic, before tragically discovering that His Teochewness does not negotiate.

Never good enough.

I'm here today, however, not to tell you to be strong, or that you're better than you think. No, I'm going to do you one better - I'm going to explain why it doesn't matter even if your deepest darkest fears are true.

It's an unforgiving industry

First, let's establish a fact: there are probably tons of people in the industry significantly more talented and experienced than you are. (If that's not true, if you're at the top of the pile, there's no good reason for you to be reading this, so...)

Even these talented people are currently wandering around without a job thanks to layoffs in Big Tech such as Microsoft, Google and the like. The software industry is savage, man. All employers need is a hint that they don't exactly need you, and they'll be rid of you, just like that. Did these people deserve to be axed? I'd say no, but what do I know, eh?

Given the axe.

With that in mind, this is not to say that you absolutely deserve to be where you are. But statistically, if you didn't, chances are you'd already have been out of a job. Thus the chances of you at least somewhat deserving your current position, are pretty decent.

Also, let's agree that deserving to be in your position does not necessarily just mean you have the technical competence to do your job. You impressed the right people. You made the right connections. Those make you just as deserving, if not more so. Even if the interviewer at the job interview happened to be an idiot who was easily impressed, it's not like you just sat there and did jackshit.

So give yourself some credit. Not a whole lot of it, but at least just a little bit. Because my next couple points are about to annihilate everything I just said.

Deserving has nothing to do with it

You'll notice that I've been using the term "deserve" a lot. That was to help me make my earlier point - that you're not necessarily undeserving of what you have, and probably pretty deserving of it, at that. That's the good news.

The bad news is, what you think you deserve, does not matter. I've said as much previously. The world is much bigger than you and what you think you deserve, or even what you actually deserve.

Global forces
at work.

Have all the Imposter Syndrome you want. It changes nothing. You have less control over your own destiny than you think. There's certainly a lot that's within your control, but as those laid-off techies found out, there are forces beyond their ken. I'd say they deserved a lot more than what they ultimately got; but the fact is that they got what they got, and there ain't nothing me or anyone else can do about it, son. Them's the breaks. It's the way of the world.

We didn't ask for AI to come for our jobs. We didn't cause the interest rates to fluctuate and the Big Tech company boards to jettison their headcount. We certainly didn't ask for COVID-19, which was partly what caused much of the overhiring in the first place. But it all happened; and you know what, deal with it.

No pressure

Recently, Singapore held her General Elections, and as usual, on Social Media, there was a lot of self-righteous, self-aggrandizing caterwauling about "voting wisely" and "looking at the big picture". Dear Lord, the utter cringe of it all.

Anyway, my position was this.

No doubt your vote is important. Your contribution to nation-building should be appreciated. But at the same time, buddy, you're casting a vote, not curing cancer. Sit your ass down before you give yourself a heart attack.

Not curing cancer.

I take a similar attitude to work. Is your work important? Sure it is. If it wasn't, why should anyone pay you to do it?

But at the same time, is anyone going to die because you didn't do your job properly? If so, then yes, you should take your Imposter Syndrome seriously. Otherwise...

What are the consequences of you being unqualified to do your job? Do you rescue people from burning buildings? Fly planes? Arrest violent criminals? Build bridges? Some of us do those things, yes. But for the vast majority of us, it's not that vital that you're qualified for your job, and therefore you don't need to worry too much over whether you're good enough to do it.

You won't be killing anyone with your incompetence. At most, you'll severely inconvenience some people. Or several. In other words, get over yourself.

Conclusion

The question is not whether you've earned your place. The question is really - why does it matter? It could all be gone the next day, through no real fault of your own. You don't have to deserve something in order to get it, or even keep it. Sure, it helps, but that's all it does. The world is unfair like that.

Your imposter boy for programming,
T___T