leetcode

I was part of a reduction in force late September. In all truth, it was part relief being forcibly extricated from work I didn’t have passion for and part terror at having to enter the job market again. There will be another post about this, but I learned a while back that if I’m going to be successful in my life, I have to “do it for me”. Don’t get me wrong, I think altruism and collectivism are the way but I’m not able to be my best for others unless I am doing things in earnest.

Enter leetcode in software interviews.

I think most engineers would agree that leetcode algorithm style technical interviews are not representative of the type of work most commonly done in the industry. Earlier in my career I would be rejected by either not finishing a hackerrank problem in a set amount of time or not performing satisfactorily in person. I had difficulty investing in algorithmic learning knowing it wouldn’t be part of my day to do and only managed to practice with great cognitive dissonance.

Interestingly enough, algorithmic problems are things I find very interesting, so I should have been inclined to do them, right? I think the issue for me was the motivation for doing them and the path for learning. Because I was compelled to learn, and fast, I struggled focusing and really understanding underlying principles because I was focused on figuring out the answer. No shade to anyone doing this, this is what I did and given constraints will do again; capitalism.

However something that clicked much better for me this last round of compulsion to practice was that I was spending enough time to actually become curious about why solutions worked, about what real-world problems existed that the subject algorithms solved for. Once I got far enough that I no longer had to emphasize focusing on memorizing answers and could follow my curiosities vs compulsions I was able to much more effectively understand algorithm patterns and apply them in different ways.

To bring this all back around, a powerful motivation to learn and enabler of focus is curiosity.

For a very long time in my career I have been focused on ‘delivering’, which isn’t a bad thing. However, I think in the industry I have seen such an emphasis on getting work out we’ve forgotten the creative, curious, and growing nature of the craft; I know I have.

May I remember to follow curiosity, have opportunities to do so and for you as well. 💕