I got rejected from a job I drained three and a half months of energy toward.
I learned it all. The company’s everything was to become my everything. I could tell you about basically everything each founder published online.
I romanticized. Like, so much.
Imagine me writing a massive blog post, pack filled with actual code and working examples on how to improve their app. Because that’s what I did.
Despite investing all my free energy, I said out loud acquiring the job was NO gimme. I didn’t believe that, but saying it felt comforting.
After finally getting their attention MONTHS after setting my sights on them, I had a fantastic call with their CTO who invited me try their coding challenge.
I spent a week making it PERFECT, and their team was impressed. My confidence was high and I felt secure.
Then, I took their paired programming test.
Two days later, I got a rejection email. Not a good fit, they told me. Over two thousand hours to learn a one hour lesson.
I collapsed on my couch. They were right. I didn’t REALLY fit in to their needs — I’d only spent months convincing myself I did.
It’s easy for me to see how ludicrous and risky my behavior was in retrospect. I guess old me feared rejection and wanted to do everything he could toward reducing that rejection.
Most of us probably deal with the opposite energy — by sending out our resumes en masse to every company possible. And getting zero responses.
After my awful rejection, I wised up (as if I had a choice). I developed an actual strategy, and got hired as an iOS developer at a company that I was ACTUALLY a good fit for.