Overwhelmed with Interview Prep!

Mid-Level Software Engineer at Taro Community23 days ago

Hey everyone,

I’m currently working a 9-6 job and one of the biggest challenges I’m facing is finding the time and energy to properly prepare for interviews. My prep is currently spread across multiple areas - LeetCode/DSA, system design, reviewing technical concepts tied to specific frameworks/languages, behavioral questions and even trying to wrok on personal projects to beef up my resume

With so many topics to cover, I often feel overwhelmed and unsure of how to prioritize my time. I’m finding it hard to build a focused, directed learning plan, and end up context-switching a lot, which makes it even harder to stay consistent. Especially since I am trying to apply for full-stack roles, the number of topics i need to study and remember seem to be endless!

If anyone here has gone through something similar or has strategies that helped them juggle full-time work and interview prep effectively, I’d really appreciate your insights!

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(3 comments)

1
Karthik Gurunathan
•Mid-Level Software Engineer at Walmart
18 days ago
Context switching is a huge distraction. I'd break down any big task into smaller tasks (say a leetcode problem into several smaller problems) and do a serious DFS on every aspect of it - till that point where I understand everything. And celebrating small wins, allows your brain to accept the dopamine and that helps you deter context switching too much. I also personally hate multi tasking, so I just stick to what I have to do and deliver.

Get an accountability buddy. Have them reinforce that you need to finish your basic minimum goal (from point 1 above) and keep doing this every single day

Consistency is key. Have sessions with your accountability buddy everyday

Here's how I did it (2 months for resume tuning, 2 months for personal projects, applied to at least one job everyday for 9 months, LC 2 months, SD 1 month - got my offer at the end of the 9th month after 8 failures)
0
Alex Chiou
•Tech Lead @ Robinhood, Meta, Course Hero
20 days ago
I highly recommend this thread: "How to balance interview prep with a job?"

Some other thoughts from me:

Try reducing to just 1 stack - Can you go after just 1 of front-end or back-end instead? As a mid-level engineer, it's better to have focus.

Don't study (yet) - Are you drowning in interview opportunities? If not, I recommend playing it more by ear and focusing on applying. A common failure mode I've seen from engineers is they preemptively study a bunch of stuff they never actually use.

I recommend the overall job searching course too: Ace Your Tech Interview And Get A Job As A Software Engineer
0
Elliot Kang
•AI/ML Eng @ Series C startup
18 days ago
Lots of topics here.

Try this:

Give yourself a hard stop from work at 6pm and go eat some dinner. This lets you recover that mental bandwidth

Do one thing at a time. Go front-back from the resume review to the interview process.

Get your interview-generating machine churning out 3-5 interviews a week.

Review technical concepts.

Practice DSA.

Practice System Design.

If you're stuck at step zero (no interviews), get a laser focus on exactly what type of role you're looking for. This not only keeps you grounded, it gives you a very specific goal that makes the rest of your job search easier.

By knowing exactly what you want, you only need to prepare for 1 type of interview process. Then you only apply to 1 category of job, and that will net you wayyyy more interviews than an unfocused resume.