How to get interviews in the biggest companies in the world?
Hello Abdelrahman, It’s a pleasure having you today as a guest to help Arab talents in their careers through your experience.
1- First tell us how you got all of these interviews at all these major companies till you reached your position now in Amazon?
- Thank you for the opportunity, I hope to add a value to help talents. First I joined Ain Shams University, Computer Science in 2006 and graduated in 2010. Along the years in between, I had many interviews in the biggest companies in the software industry, the first one was with Microsoft in late 2008, 8 months after, I had an interview at Google and I didn’t pass in any of them. Then I had an interview with Facebook, and again I didn’t pass. Another one in Microsoft and I didn’t pass, then again with Google, and I didn’t pass. And in late 2010, I had the last interview during my college years with Facebook and I didn’t pass that either.
After graduation, I got interviewed at Microsoft in late 2010, that interview was the one I passed at and actually got an offer. There were other interviews I got with Nokia in Berlin, and I passed that also. These were all the interviews I made when I was living in Egypt. When I arrived at the US I got lots and lots of interviews with many companies, all were American Multinational companies, to name some: Amazon, LinkedIn, Groupon, NVidia, VMWare, Riot Games, Uber, Palantir, and EA Games.
2- As an Egyptian living now in US, who got the Egyptian education along your years of education, and got accepted in large companies, what was the biggest challenge you faced when you were in US facing different work environment and culture??
- The challenges I faced were similar to those that any fresh graduate would face when joining the industry for the first time, understanding work dynamics, work nature, how to deal with your manage, what you are supposed to do, what you are allowed to experiment and what you are not, what a tester does and what the job of a product manager is, …. etc. All industry related topics that any fresh graduate needs to deal with, learn and prepare for. This knowledge is available to any graduate in Egypt, regardless that the work dynamics in Egypt is surely different from the work dynamics in US. So it is a common challenge that all fresh graduates share. It is a challenge to deal with the new work environment which is totally different from the environment we deal with while we are students; learning how to grow my career, how to get promoted, what are my options for career advancement, whether I want to be a researcher, a tester or a program manager. So when you get involved, you get the big picture of everything at work. It’s not a location based challenge, it’s universal.
3-So in your opinion what are the most 3 important factors needed for talents in Egypt and GCC, so they can get interviews in the biggest companies like Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft and Google?
- I think the first skill they should have are problem solving, data structures and algorithms. Secondly, they should have side projects, whether they are activities they do on the side, by themselves or with their colleagues or friends. Thirdly, they should work on their branding like CV, LinkedIn and networking skills. And that latter point is a very essential, people whom you know might be your back door to your dream job, they will help you get the interview or tell you if there’s a job opening or even recommend you, so you have a better chance in getting in.
4-If I’m a college student now, and I have a goal to get get interviews in the biggest companies like Microsoft, Google, Amazon or Facebook, how to create the opportunity that helps me get the interview? What should I do? Where should I go to apply?
- The first method is not that hard, you can check their website, find the careers pages and keep an eye on the job openings, apply for the ones you want and submit your CV. For sure if you’re a student, you would be searching for internships. As for a graduate, given the prerequisites in the last question, it’s better to have a listing for all the companies you want to join and follow their job openings and keep applying till you get an interview. The second method, which I mentioned before, is networking, LinkedIn openings, colleagues and friends working in companies you want to join. Also, the University sometimes arranges internship opportunities for students. All of that was the easy track to get the job you dream of. On the other hand, there is a harder way to get through, yet a more reliable track. It’s a high effort, high gain! This is by participating in contests and competitions of programming. They are all known to the programming community like ACM, Top Coder, Code chief, Code forces. Big companies also make contests to hunt the talents and calibers they are searching for. We at Amazon publish a challenge every couple of months and the winners get interviews or even get hired and join the team. Google has Code Jam in which they publish a problem and participants have to deliver the right answer with its time frame. The good thing that comes with that track is that you can do it all from home! If you get it right, it can be your ticket to your dream job.
5-From your experience, after your exposure to different cultures & surroundings, what is the one single advice you would give to the Arab talents in 2017?
- Just the two most powerful words, determinacy & perseverance! It takes time to reach your goal, may be years. Don’t get bored or get busy with other things. If you don’t prioritize your goals, they won’t have place to occur. It’s actually applicable on any goal you want to achieve, whether it be career related or any other goal. And before you stick to doing something every day that’s considered a step towards your goal, you have to determine what your goals are and whether you are willing to sacrifice most of your time and effort to make them happen.
Simply this is how you can invent your career and get interviews in the biggest companies in the world
Thank you
Also you can read An Expert Reveals How Arab Talents Can Join LinkedIn Team