NOTE: This is article has been sitting in my drafts for about a week or so now due to the process taking so long.

I apologize for the vagueness about the interview process. I'm not sure what kind of rules they have about discussing the topics covered during the interview process and I don't want to take any chances.

This is the follow up post to my Discussing my interview process.

Well, it's been about 3 weeks since I had my interview for a data center technician 1 at Google and the results are in...and I'll get to them in a sec, I just want to talk about a few things first.

Firstly, the waiting. It can't be helped. That is part of the interview process. You do your interview and then you wait to see if you got the job. In this case, I had my interview at a weird time. My interview was held on November 14th on a Monday. Normally, or at least in my experience with this particular company, sometimes it can take them a while to get back to you. I wasn't expecting to hear anything the first week because I knew they had to have time to evaluate me, my skillset and to look at me resume. The following week, was Thanksgiving. I definitely didn't expect to hear anything back then because it was the week of Thanksgiving. It was a short 3 day work week for us and my recruiter was out of office for that entire week. So I had a guess that it would be sometime this week or next week before I heard anything.

While at work today, I decided to reach out to my recruiter and check on the status of my interview. My recruiter told me that he would call me tomorrow because he had to talk to me. I'm not sure what that means but, we'll see.

The next day:

He said that I could potentially have 1 more interview depending on if the hiring manager manager wanted to continue. He said it would be around a week before I knew where my application stood. If the hiring manager wants to continue, I'll get 1 more interview and then, if I make it past that interview, my application will get sent to a hiring committee that will review it. If they also say yes, I will get the job. So again, we'll see what happens.

He also told me that, due to how my interview went, he wasn't comfortable with sending my application through for the position I interviewed for (L2). He told me I could go for an L1 position of I was still interested.

I told him sure. I mean, a job is a job and after my interview, I already kind of figured that's what would happen. Not to mention, given my current skill set, I was way more comfortable going in as an L1 and doing that for a while until I could develop the necessary skills I needed to go to the L2 position.

So now, more waiting...

One Week Later...

So, I hadnt heard anything by Tuesday so I decided to reach out to my recruiter again. He said that he was still waiting on the hiring manager to get back with him but he would schedule a phone call with me the next day at 1pm anyway. I guess to go back over everything and see if I had any questions.

The final verdict:

I get to work today and around 1:20 he calls me. The news was...not good. He told me that, based off how my interview went, the hiring manager did not want to move forward with my interview at this time. He apologized and asked me if I had any questions for him. I told him no and he gave me some advice on what I could study to improve my chances the next time and that was it.

He said he'd leave my application status as "open" and see if any other HM's we're interested and that was about it.

So, if by some chance another HM at a different site is interested, I would have 1 more interview and then have that sent off to the hiring committee.

Final thoughts and feelings:

I am feeling so many things right now that it is a bit overwhelming to get it all in a post so I'm just gonna free form it until I cover the most important topics. I just want to preface this next section and say that this is in no way a pitty party or me feeling sorry for myself. I'm just expressing how I feel right now two hours after the call.

I'm sad: Obviously, first and foremost, I'm upset I didn't get it. I feel like my efforts didn't matter. I'm bad about beating myself up and I feel like I don't know anything about computers or how they work. The interview process this time around was BRUTAL for me. My nerves really got the best of me and I struggled to even make it to the end of the interview.

I'm mad: not at my recruiter or the company but at myself. Because I have a tendency to beat myself up, I'm mad at myself because of so many different reasons. Because I didn't study enough (even though I studied diligently for months) I wasn't prepared enough (Not really sure how to avoid that feeling). Because I feel like I didn't try hard enough (even though I did the best I could.

I'm defeated: Because everything is still so fresh and raw, the thought of giving up and not applying again crossed my mind. I'm gonna reevaluate everything once I've had time to process it all and look back on it but, right now, I'm not 100% sure if I want to apply again.

Imposter syndrome: That is probably the second thing that crossed my mind. I felt like I was completely out of place and in the wrong field. I've said it earlier but I'll say it again: the interview process was BRUTAL this time around. It really made me question myself and what I knew about the job.

There are just a lot of feelings and emotions rushing through my head and I think I just need to take time to reflect on everything and revisit this whole thing at a later date.
It's not all bad though.

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly:

None of this is to say that it's all bad. I love my current job and I have learned a lot. I'll continue to work there for as long as I can and try to learn as much as I can.

This whole process has been neither completely good or completely bad. I have learned a lot and I know what I need to improve upon if I decide to apply for the position again.

I want to take some time and reflect on it and then start working towards my next goal. Whether that be trying to get the full time data center position or continuing my studies in full stack development. I'll figure it out one day at a time.

There's not really much else to say about this. I want to thank you so much for reading and hope you have a wonderful day/night!