Yes, this is what stood out for me. OP sounds malcontented, and habitually dissatisfied with his role, and makes antisocial decisions (like spoofing numbers - which is not just dishonest but shows contempt for the target) that show poor judgement. He compounds the poor judgement by bragging about the previous poor judgement.

The antisocial stuff is implicit in what he doesn't mention: from his descriptions, his workplaces are hollow boxes with some juicy targets (execs) in them and nothing else. Where are the people? There aren't any because at some level they don't exist for the OP. This is, of course, a hallmark trait of narcissism.

The good news (great news, really), is that NPD is one of the most treatable of personality disorders if the person decides they want treatment. The reason? The narcissist is confident in their ability, and confidence helps when you want to shape your own behavior.

The caveat to all this being that free advice is worth what you paid for it, even less if given by a stranger on the internet. But, FWIW, it's my honest take. If it ends up being accurate (if you look up the disorder) and you get help, I'd love to know if this post help you. (See, I'm a little NPD too! ;)

And OP seems very concerned about medical insurance, which might suggest something bigger behind the curtains. Young folks often think they're invincible, and medical insurance is last in their list of worries.

(BTW I agree I'm reading a lot into his post, Sherlock Holmes style, but without confirmation one way or the other, its hard to say if I'm on target. In any event, I do not believe that the OP would share your umbrage, given his post.)

But the primary false thing I want to address is the tacit assertion that "Telling someone they have NPD traits is a personal attack." I understand that assumption because, sadly, accusation of personality disorder has become a common style of personal attack. It's very similar, actually, to the classic status of "homosexuality" - once a pejoritive, now mostly just a fact. And I'm not sure if you noticed, but HN has a LOT of psychology-related content. As a group people here seem to show a lot of admirable compassion and empathy for each other's vulnerabilities. I think it's a remarkable feature of the place, and I hope you can take my words in that context. NPD is quite common in the world, in our field, and its entirely posssible to be a good person who struggles with NPD.

Your protective instinct speaks well of you! But you may need to reassess whether or not I actually attacked the OP, given his request and the context of my response.

...if they don't want to change. That is a true statement. But, if they do want to change, it's relatively straight-forward.

BTW the thing you can control is not your actions, or even your reactions, but rather your attention. The best thing a narcissist can do is learn to see themselves in others. Modulo the risk of projection (that is, ascribing too much commonality to the other), it's a nice judo move to turn a dark quality into a light one.

Reason that I mentioned that I mentioned Bill Landreth was that I think that I'm kinda like him. I got in to programming, RE, VR, soldering etc. when I was very young. Like 8 years old. I knew some folks that Wired articles were written about etc. I hanged out with a Head of Research guy at IBM who told me himself that I know some stuff that he doesn't know, and have told me that I'm smart. Which sounds cringy now that I type this. But I'm not delusional lol. I was the second person at 18 years old to be hired full-time at IBM in a certain program.. The first guy works at Armonk. I can send proof, screenshots of interview emails with DKIM etc. if anyone would like to verify my claims. Trust but verify as former president Reagan liked to quote.

In another post you brought up your longest stint being 2 months, and that you dropped out of college your freshman year. To be blunt, I don't think the achievements you list really count if you didn't actually complete them. There's a lot of "I worked with", "I got accepted to", "I got hired by" in your posts, but pretty much all of those things are followed by quitting almost immediately. When you're competing in a market with college grads and people with lots of previous experience, having gotten accepted to and then dropping out of a good school buys you much?

With an abusive childhood, homeschooling, no college, OP has a long road to travel. That all needs to be addressed, and finding a supportive environment will make that much easier. A career is based on achievement, however, beginning with simply doing the work and staying employed.

It's tough all around I think. It seems like OP might've observed signaling in the past that suggested that "appearing to be a good candidate" and "being a good candidate" are identical, and in actuality are usually not. It's tough because of nepotism, sometimes appearing to be a good candidate is good enough, but for most people you actually have to be at least close to as good a candidate as you appear to be. Meaning, if you include that you went to X university, you actually have to have worked through a substantial amount of that university's curriculum. Same with any internship/program/whatever - there's almost no value in having just been invited to attend.

Many jobs do not require much intelligence. Even those that do, usually its just one component of the skills required.

I definitely quit my first job because of that. My second job was better, but there wasn't all that much to learn, so I quit relatively soon. Now I'm on my third job, and there definitely hasn't been a lot of intellectual stimulation these days. Last time for something (that I was actually assigned and didn't just decide to do) was maybe late last year? The job itself pays well though and has some other perks.

I doubt there are many jobs that are interesting 100% of time. Better try to accept that.

Also most of my recommendations were rejected on my first job (large company), but most or even all were incorporated at my second job (startup).

@OP Did you mostly apply at well-known companies? Maybe go for a startup instead. Maybe you'll even be able to start a new department and not run out of stuff to do to keep yourself interested.

That's reading too far IMO. I see no mention of a degree at a reputable college. I see experience in support/QA, that has no relevance to the work of a developer (and it didn't go well apparently).

I don't expect that sort of profile to be invited to job interviews. The job market is brutal.

Meaning, if they're making it to an interview, they might be failing at a personality/conversational portion, and if they're not, it's probably because their resume/achievements do not get them to the next interview phase.

You’ve started a great dialog with yourself. Congrats, and keep it going.

This is a red flag right here. You put this in a list of evidence you’re capable and not delusional? You were near semi-notable people.

A lot of your accomplishments read that way. You were near something cool. You dropped out of a good school. You got a (self described as) low paying job at 18 at IBM. Someone really accomplished there complimented you once. You knew people who had things written about them. You were in a program someone who works at armonk was in. Someone else fixed something quickly after you flagged it. None of this is about you, it’s all about other people.

The very fact that these are what you’re listing as positives (or at least as things relevant to you) is a red flag. Do you have any “I accomplished/completed...” accomplishments? You say you’ve been doing VR since you were 8, have you finished anything worth mentioning in all that time?

I agree with another commenter that your ego and expectations could be a problem. If you got one of the jobs you quit before, would you still quit it?

Bill Landreth was homeless in Santa Monica in 2016[1]. Plenty of smart people have ended up the same way.

I think you might be making the mistake of thinking that being smart matters. It doesn't matter very much - if the outcome is "success" (whatever that means) then generally speaking having people like you is a better predictor than being smart.

Do people like you? If not then fix that. Read "How to win friends and influence people" and follow the advice.

[1] https://paleofuture.gizmodo.com/the-untold-story-of-the-teen...

Focus on smaller companies that need help solving actual business problems with automation. Offer to do a project for $20 an hour. Get a job doing straight up IT stuff until you earn their trust, and then show them what you can do software wise. There is a lot of room for competent IT people, but you need to be way more realistic about who is going to hire you.

Honestly, I don't know why anyone wants to work for Google anyways. I took a developer course from one of their former employees, and it was a fucking joke. His ego trip was so ridiculous he said the words "no good Javascript developer uses four space indentions. Have you ever seen one??" And I was thinking, yes, in the library you had us review last week.

Lots of imposters and jackasses out there. Do honest work for smaller companies. It can lead to a lot more opportunity.

< Proceeds to give advice on HN >

This part doesn't really seem worthwhile to post.

> Focus on smaller companies that need help solving actual business problems with automation. Offer to do a project for $20 an hour. Get a job doing straight up IT stuff until you earn their trust, and then show them what you can do software wise. There is a lot of room for competent IT people, but you need to be way more realistic about who is going to hire you.

Excellent advice.

I restrict my social media time to a couple of hours a week. If you want to be successful, hustle on LinkedIn. HackerNews is a procrastination hole for people who want to talk about developing software instead of actually doing it.

LinkedIn is basically facebook. I would argue that anything Facebook-esque is a fundamental waste of time. Misinformation spewing influencer spam.

Also, I'm still curious on how many recruiters have contacted you through Facebook and viewed your resume, as compared to LinkedIn.

Do you think influencers go on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram because they aren't getting paid? They just like it?

> Also, I'm still curious on how many recruiters have contacted you through Facebook and viewed your resume, as compared to LinkedIn.

To compare, the answer is 0 to both. I haven't been on Facebook since probably 2013, and I only had a LI at all because we were required to make one in college, which I logged into for the second time ever to deactivate also probably around 2013.

I am, which is why I totally ignore LinkedIn :)

> Why are you so interested in chiming in on products you haven't used in 8 years?

I didn't realize I wasn't allowed to post verifiable information about products unless I also participated.

Your comments seem to be increasingly condescending and short. You're welcome to take that behavior to LI, but I will not continue participating in this discussion. Have a great day.

Thirding this. Smaller companies are easier to get into and actually more satisfying to work for (YMMV). Another responder also said basically "keep your head down and learn for the first year" which is great advice too.

I can tell you why - www.levels.fyi

Google is quite literally one of the most well-known and powerful tech companies in the world - I assume it's not that hard to think people who work in tech would want to associate with an organization int hat position.

---

I don't understand your basis of judging the skills of their engineers either. You had one data point of taking a course from a former engineer - not working together with, not a current Googler. Google employs thousands of Software Engineers and represent a large part of the Internet.

Through hard work and some dumb luck, I've also interacted with other Fortune 10/50 corporations at the VP level. I wasn't impressed with them either. So it's not just an anti-Google thing.

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/technology/google-used-d...

If you can't get hired at a place there is a gig economy of sorts with lots of sites where you can bid yourself on projects. Start with small easy stuff and use those projects to build a portfolio.

I about a year that portfolio should be enough to get you in the door (for entry level developer roles) of most companies even if you have never worked as a programmer yet.

For applications and interviews for the people hiring it is all about perception and reducing risk. When hiring managers/assistants go through the piles of applications they throw away any with red flags, or at best put them in the maybe pile. If a lot of non-red flag applications they discard the maybes as well.

Don't have red flags, or at least camouflage them as best you can on the CV, don't lie though.

In the interviews don't raise red flags either. Some of your original post and comments are potential red flags to me. Practice interviews over and over again, and have ready made answers to all awkward possible questions. No excuses though, make them a good thing for some reason.

I suck at the first interview I do every time I go through the finding-a-new-job/contract process. But by the 2nd, perhaps 3rd, I have remembered the fine art of interviewing, and regurgitate the same practised answers over and over again, and mostly get offered the jobs. Practice.

Don't have gaps on your CV. I have gaps on my CV, but you can't really spot them. E.g. I removed mentioning months to just state the calendar years I was at companies. Sometimes there was a 6 months gaps but you can't tell. I also took a long time off to help when the kids were young. On my CV I just list the smaller projects I was working on at the time instead, even if that was just 10 hours a week. It is all about perception for the person skim-reading your CV.

Ps. in an interview don't say "I did move to Austin when I received a lump sum of money, and hanged with some people". Reword that to something career positive. E.g. took a gap year, worked on startup ideas, taking mentoring lessons, or at best don't mention it. I know when you are young it is a normal thing to do, just it looks or sounds terrible in a hiring process. Again don't have gaps.

Also never again mention that other people say you are smart, know some smart people etc. It is irrelevant, and mostly off putting. Nice for your own self-esteem but not for anyone else. Instead show examples of things you delivered.

Remember you are not the only person applying for that role. Make them want you, as a non-risk option. You also need to seem keen on the company but also make them aware you have other options and are not desperate even if not true...

(I'd hope it would be close to 0, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was much higher.)

It's also virtually always social skill related... if you weren't up to the task technically, you wouldn't have been asked to interview. The in person interview is normally to decide "do I want to see this person 40+ hours a week for the next 5 years" rather than "can they do the job."

Lots of exceptions obviously but mostly true across the board.

There are a lot of flaws in the way interviews are done in our industry that make it more subjective than it should be, but I still wouldn't consider the latter set of problems to be social skill related.

That's why we have discussions like this: https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/.

If validating their technical qualifications is not the point of the interview, are you really only interviewing candidates to see if people like their social skills? That sounds legally shady for most cases, and honestly for extreme cases where there's a valid concern that IS the kind of thing I'd expect to be filtered out by an introductory call with a manager or something.

The phone screen should cover lots of technical areas with deep follow up questions and examples.

I work in a specific niche (not coding) and can tell you that I bat .1000 on technical fit... cultural fit cannot be assessed until you meet the person and they meet the team, or at a minimum, hiring manager.

Otherwise we miss interviewing people who can do the job, and in my experience, some of the most interesting people; but this means, one may sometimes be interviewing people that cannot do the job.

Since these are human-mediated processes, there is no accurate single-stage filter, and anyone claiming to operate an unbiased hiring process is either a fool or a liar. A hiring funnel (and really, any decision process) that recognises the inevitability of biases, and is phased accordingly, leads to more optimal outcomes.

I'm not saying no human should be involved. I'm saying an excellent human should screen candidates in a phone (or Teams or Zoom or whatever) interview before they are invited to sit across from you at your desk or in a conference room.

If you find yourself sitting across from someone who cannot technically do the job, your step one has failed (and should never fail).

If you don't hire someone because their in-person interview didn't go well, it is social skill (or cultural fit) related.

If that's not the case, reference step one to see that you have an error in who you are inviting for in-person interviews (or your phone screener should not be the person phone screening).

"If you find yourself sitting across from someone who cannot technically do the job, your step one has failed (and should never fail)."

The suggestion that any screening test must be infallible is simply nonsense, since simultaneous perfect specificity and sensitivity is impossible, and contradicts numerous findings in decision-theoretic research, and I therefore simply and absolutely disagree. All processes fail, and in particular, because individual process steps fail; it merely remains to determine whether you're biased for showing interesting people the door, or inviting them in to take a closer look. This is also the essence of a screening test in, say, medicine, that are necessarily biased to be sensitive over specific, since a false rejection of a patient may be health threatening; more specific (and generally more expensive) testing follows. Or perhaps in sales, where a lead attracts ever more attention as it moves through the qualification funnel.

As I say, these are general consequences of decision theory, a branch of mathematics to which hiring has no magical exemption.

Ergo, anyone claiming their screening is infallible is either a fool or a liar. Sadly, many recruiters are both, which partially explains why so many HR departments are essentially a mediocrity police that create barriers to accessing the entire talent pool. These are not to be trusted (and must, therefore, be bypassed at the earliest opportunity) when in comes to building teams of heterogeneous and interesting people with complementary skills and diverse perspectives, which is to say, any high-performance team, or at least every high-performing team I've been privileged to encounter in the last forty years.

Incidentally, my experience at AWS was the opposite. The talent acquisition team there, at least that assisting my own business unit, was very much on the ball when it came to pulling in candidates from left-field.

When we meet after an interview round "meh" is a much more common collective reaction than "run away now."

And in my experience, if you fail the technical portion of an interview, most companies will tell you. Meaning, if you ask and they don't bring up technical skills, it's probably not the technical skills.

When I was young I interviewed at Microsoft and was rejected. I asked the recruiter for feedback. She talked me through some of the feedback from the interviewers and gave me advice for the future. It was really helpful.

I like that one. I've done interviews where the answer should be at most a summary sentence, and 2-3 supporting points. I know the candidate knows the answer, it's a warmup question! Then what do I get? Word salad. A gigantic run-on sentence where the candidate talks and talks and talks and this, and that, and also, and furthermore... lasting 5 minutes or until I politely interrupt with, "OK let's move on to the next question."

It is better to keep quiet about negative feedback in the lawsuit-heavy culture we inhabit.

I recently saw a junior CV that said "I can lead and I can follow" in personal skills... meanwhile his CV was full of spelling mistakes and his biggest project was setting up a website for some realestate agency.

The number one thing I would want to see in a junior hire is effort and attention to detail, on the extreemes I prefer working with someone who's less talented but reliable and paying attention over someone who's technically capable but unfocused and all over the place.

Well, indeed.

Great point. I interviewed at Bridgewater and they gave a good post mortem on why I didnt get the job. It is something that I now ask for after every interview process that matters to me.

Doesn't always work but has changed my approach in a positive way. For me it takes 12 - 15 attempts to get a job. I am an (old)Infra/Cloud Engineer coming from a sysadmin background and need to constantly improve programming skills.

Asking for post-rejection feedback with humility and in the spirit of self improvement has led to me making connections and leaving interviews with the feeling of an open door for future attempts.