<story><title>Ask HN: 50 job applications, 15 interviews, 7 onsites, and no offer – what next?</title><text>&amp;lt;Using a throwaway account for privacy&amp;gt;&lt;p&gt;I have been looking to change jobs over the last 8 months. I am in a product management leadership position at my current job, and looking to shift to a similar role in either a slightly smaller company or in a different industry. However, I have found it extremely hard to accomplish this. I have no idea why I am failing in final rounds, but in most instances the feedback has been &amp;quot;You are a great candidate, and we would like you to interview with this other role. But this particular role is not a good fit&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;What am I doing wrong ? Few facts about me&amp;quot; 
- I have over 12 years of work experience across 4 companies (well known brands)
- I am in my mid 30s - I am Indian, and FOB, with an accent (not a heavy accent though)&lt;p&gt;I have run completely out of ideas now. I have probably spoken with 100 people during the course of 15 interviews and I haven&amp;#x27;t gotten any feedback on what I am doing wrong. I absolutely HATE my current job. I get depressed thinking about working in my current job for the foreseeable future. But looks like I don&amp;#x27;t have any recourse. I am almost thinking of halting my job search and finding some kind of hobby to keep me occupied and keep my mind off work. Any advice would be appreciated.</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>throw_xyz</author><text>Amen.&lt;p&gt;There are very strong racial stereotypes. They also vary by who holds them.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m a 40+ yo Russian system programmer, moved to States when I was 25, worked in a bunch of places from smaller startups to Fortune-500 shops. Here are my stereotypes:&lt;p&gt;* Russians are frustrated know-it-alls with strong NIH syndrom wanting to redo everything from scratch. The language barrier often makes it hard for them to clearly express their grand ideas, hence the frustration. They will solve things backwards because it&amp;#x27;s more interesting that way.&lt;p&gt;* Chinese will cut corners to fit deadlines. They &lt;i&gt;can&lt;/i&gt; write beautiful code, but more often than not they don&amp;#x27;t bother and go with absolute minimal something that fits the spec.&lt;p&gt;* Swedes, Finns, Germans and Brits are very much OK. Easily the best in terms of working together.&lt;p&gt;* Canadians and Australians are solid if a bit slow.&lt;p&gt;* Eastern Europeans are immensely productive hacks, opinionated as hell, but very good for rapid prototyping.&lt;p&gt;* Indians ...&lt;p&gt;Now, Indians are arrogant know-it-alls that _lust_ for respect and power. Frequently the source of pointless drama in the workplace. They are very smart, write good code, but they also have very hard time admitting their mistakes. This often makes it hard to work with them as &lt;i&gt;colleagues&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;Stereotypes are VERY important to keep in mind, because that&amp;#x27;s the starting point for every candidate assessment. The best the OP can do is to throw the interviewers off their footing. Say something like I&amp;#x27;m Indian, but I was born in Argentina - and, bam, they can&amp;#x27;t sort you in a default bucket, so they are forced to actually start assessing you from scratch. The same goes for dyeing your hair, fixing the accent, changing the name - it&amp;#x27;s all for trying to separate yourself from a stereotype and make them view you as an &lt;i&gt;individual&lt;/i&gt;.</text></item><item><author>throawayname</author><text>What are you willing to sacrifice? I can give you an answer, but you won&amp;#x27;t like it.  As an Indian man you&amp;#x27;ll be discriminated against. Period. Lots of empirical proof for that, not just job wise but in lots of other cases (dating, etc).&lt;p&gt;While folks here will give you lots of tips on the professional side, here are a few actionable things you can do to minimize racial bias:&lt;p&gt;- Change your name to an americanized version. I know someone who did this. Lots of research that proves this point: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;1mcsxdJ&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;1mcsxdJ&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;- Take acting classes and learn to speak with no accent
  It wont be permanent, but you&amp;#x27;ll be able to minimize your accent for a few hours in the interview. It&amp;#x27;s akin to speaking with a fake French accent. See: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;2loPQwy&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;2loPQwy&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;- Pay people to give you mock interviews and record them. Pay someone else to review the footage and give you interviewing tips.&lt;p&gt;- Improve your appearance: Bleach your hair lighter shade of brown and try to dress comfortably casual.&lt;p&gt;- Take some dating classes, learn to improve your confidence (or at least fake it for the in-person interview0.&lt;p&gt;- Improve your public speaking ability: Join a toastmasters group, get a mentor and give a few speeches.&lt;p&gt;A job interview is a bit like dating. If you&amp;#x27;re getting rejected during in-person interviews, then learn to &amp;quot;date better&amp;quot;. A lot of racial biases here in SFbay are pretty rough. Even if you graduated top of your class at Stanford and had a successful exit you&amp;#x27;ll be near the bottom of the pile when it comes to dating.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>appreciateya</author><text>I think this is due to &amp;quot;saving face&amp;quot; aspects of their culture.&lt;p&gt;I oversaw a team of Indian-based Indians while working for a software company in Austin, TX.&lt;p&gt;My stereotypical experiences:&lt;p&gt;- Ask an Indian if he understands something, he&amp;#x27;ll always answer &amp;quot;Yes&amp;quot; even if he doesn&amp;#x27;t understand it.&lt;p&gt;- Indians will not admit fault or mistakes.  They seem to take it as a personal attack when you critique their work, rather than take it a suggestion for improvement.</text></comment>
<story><title>Ask HN: 50 job applications, 15 interviews, 7 onsites, and no offer – what next?</title><text>&amp;lt;Using a throwaway account for privacy&amp;gt;&lt;p&gt;I have been looking to change jobs over the last 8 months. I am in a product management leadership position at my current job, and looking to shift to a similar role in either a slightly smaller company or in a different industry. However, I have found it extremely hard to accomplish this. I have no idea why I am failing in final rounds, but in most instances the feedback has been &amp;quot;You are a great candidate, and we would like you to interview with this other role. But this particular role is not a good fit&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;What am I doing wrong ? Few facts about me&amp;quot; 
- I have over 12 years of work experience across 4 companies (well known brands)
- I am in my mid 30s - I am Indian, and FOB, with an accent (not a heavy accent though)&lt;p&gt;I have run completely out of ideas now. I have probably spoken with 100 people during the course of 15 interviews and I haven&amp;#x27;t gotten any feedback on what I am doing wrong. I absolutely HATE my current job. I get depressed thinking about working in my current job for the foreseeable future. But looks like I don&amp;#x27;t have any recourse. I am almost thinking of halting my job search and finding some kind of hobby to keep me occupied and keep my mind off work. Any advice would be appreciated.</text></story><parent_chain><item><author>throw_xyz</author><text>Amen.&lt;p&gt;There are very strong racial stereotypes. They also vary by who holds them.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m a 40+ yo Russian system programmer, moved to States when I was 25, worked in a bunch of places from smaller startups to Fortune-500 shops. Here are my stereotypes:&lt;p&gt;* Russians are frustrated know-it-alls with strong NIH syndrom wanting to redo everything from scratch. The language barrier often makes it hard for them to clearly express their grand ideas, hence the frustration. They will solve things backwards because it&amp;#x27;s more interesting that way.&lt;p&gt;* Chinese will cut corners to fit deadlines. They &lt;i&gt;can&lt;/i&gt; write beautiful code, but more often than not they don&amp;#x27;t bother and go with absolute minimal something that fits the spec.&lt;p&gt;* Swedes, Finns, Germans and Brits are very much OK. Easily the best in terms of working together.&lt;p&gt;* Canadians and Australians are solid if a bit slow.&lt;p&gt;* Eastern Europeans are immensely productive hacks, opinionated as hell, but very good for rapid prototyping.&lt;p&gt;* Indians ...&lt;p&gt;Now, Indians are arrogant know-it-alls that _lust_ for respect and power. Frequently the source of pointless drama in the workplace. They are very smart, write good code, but they also have very hard time admitting their mistakes. This often makes it hard to work with them as &lt;i&gt;colleagues&lt;/i&gt;.&lt;p&gt;Stereotypes are VERY important to keep in mind, because that&amp;#x27;s the starting point for every candidate assessment. The best the OP can do is to throw the interviewers off their footing. Say something like I&amp;#x27;m Indian, but I was born in Argentina - and, bam, they can&amp;#x27;t sort you in a default bucket, so they are forced to actually start assessing you from scratch. The same goes for dyeing your hair, fixing the accent, changing the name - it&amp;#x27;s all for trying to separate yourself from a stereotype and make them view you as an &lt;i&gt;individual&lt;/i&gt;.</text></item><item><author>throawayname</author><text>What are you willing to sacrifice? I can give you an answer, but you won&amp;#x27;t like it.  As an Indian man you&amp;#x27;ll be discriminated against. Period. Lots of empirical proof for that, not just job wise but in lots of other cases (dating, etc).&lt;p&gt;While folks here will give you lots of tips on the professional side, here are a few actionable things you can do to minimize racial bias:&lt;p&gt;- Change your name to an americanized version. I know someone who did this. Lots of research that proves this point: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;1mcsxdJ&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;1mcsxdJ&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;- Take acting classes and learn to speak with no accent
  It wont be permanent, but you&amp;#x27;ll be able to minimize your accent for a few hours in the interview. It&amp;#x27;s akin to speaking with a fake French accent. See: &lt;a href=&quot;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;2loPQwy&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;bit.ly&amp;#x2F;2loPQwy&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;- Pay people to give you mock interviews and record them. Pay someone else to review the footage and give you interviewing tips.&lt;p&gt;- Improve your appearance: Bleach your hair lighter shade of brown and try to dress comfortably casual.&lt;p&gt;- Take some dating classes, learn to improve your confidence (or at least fake it for the in-person interview0.&lt;p&gt;- Improve your public speaking ability: Join a toastmasters group, get a mentor and give a few speeches.&lt;p&gt;A job interview is a bit like dating. If you&amp;#x27;re getting rejected during in-person interviews, then learn to &amp;quot;date better&amp;quot;. A lot of racial biases here in SFbay are pretty rough. Even if you graduated top of your class at Stanford and had a successful exit you&amp;#x27;ll be near the bottom of the pile when it comes to dating.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>paulvs</author><text>Nice, as an Australian I concur.&lt;p&gt;I live in Paraguay, could anyone shed light on what stereotypical views&amp;#x2F;biases I would experience in a job interview as an Aussie living in Paraguay?</text></comment>