Episode 341 | Sam Gavis-Hughson

Guest:

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Sam Gavis-Hughson talks with Dave Rael about the joy of writing software, family influences, making mistakes, learning, and software interviews

Sam is the founder of Byte by Byte, a company dedicated to helping software engineers interview for jobs. Through his emphasis on developing strong fundamentals and systems for mastering coding interviews, he has helped many programmers land their dream jobs. Byte by Byte students have landed jobs at companies like Amazon, Uber, Bloomberg, eBay, and more. Sam is also the author of "Dynamic Programming for Interviews", a free ebook to help anyone master dynamic programming.

Chapters: 1:17 - Dave intrduces the show and Sam Gavis-Hughson5:54 - Speed reading8:07 - How Sam got into writing software9:44 - Sam's parents and their influence on Sam's choices12:59 - Sam on building his business and the experiences that led to identifying something he had to offer19:41 - The software hiring process - broken? misunderstood?30:07 - The importance of soft skills in interviews33:03 - Honesty and objectives37:35 - Sam's stories of failure - getting in over his head in interviews, breaking a website by changing CSS without due dilligence40:07 - Dealing with things you don't know in interviews45:16 - Sam's book recommendations47:18 - Sam's top 3 tips for delivering more value50:47 - Keeping up with Sam

Resources: Sam's website and business: Byte by Byte Sam's Dynamic Programming Breakthrough Rapid Reading - Peter Kump TI-BASIC Nucleic Acid Sequence The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich - Timothy Ferriss F*** You, I Quit — Hiring Is Broken - Sahat Yalkabov - A Blog Post that Set Off Much of the Interview Process Attention Soft Skills: The software developer's life manual - John Sonmez John Sonmez on Developer On Fire Joshua Foer - Feats of Memory Anyone Can Do Jim Kwik The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change - Stephen R. Covey

Sam's book recommendation: House of Leaves - Mark Z. Danielewski Moonwalking with Einstein: The Art and Science of Remembering Everything - Joshua Foer

Sam's top 3 tips for delivering more value: Wake up early Customize your approach to learning based on what you want from what you are learning - Do you want be an expert or to have fun? Invest in Yourself