That time I could not finish a tech challenge
Tags: career, beginners, codenewbie, devjournal
Published: 2022-06-16 07:56:49

#<h1> Hola Mundo! </h1>
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Maybe at this moment you already know -or not- that I have a little storytime series called "Jr. Dev: Do not give up" if you haven't read it I encourage you to do so 🧐.

But well, basically the series is me trying to convince you to not give up when you feel like to 💪🏽. Because well...I've felt that and sometimes I still do but is good to have a reminder that we can feel certain way but we can overcome it.

###Now...let me tell you about that time I could not finish a tech challenge.

I was fresh out of my bootcamp, applying to anything that I could remotely fit, and let me tell you, playing the interviews game is **hard**😫, maybe one day I can write about that but I was mentally exhausted, I was already being ghosted 👻 from a couple companies, moving forward in **really** long processes and getting rejected from some others.

But I received a call from a company I met in a networking activity and was sooooo excited about it. They did me a little phone interview and asked me if I wanted to do the tech challenge I was like YES PLEASE❗.

___
###The challenge 💻

So, it was a React challenge💻, but it was something I have never had done before plus I had to use Typescript which I haven't used before. 

I also had to use a database that was in Docker 🐳 and I didn't even knew what tha was, so I spent too much time trying to understand it 🤦🏽‍♀️ when the only thing I needed to do was to type `docker compose up`.

Thing was that after one week working and doing some of the things they asked for, **I was not able to finish the challenge 💔. **

I did a part, found a good tutorial that explained the other part but honestly, I didn't understand a thing 😫. It was like the tutorial was explained in Klingon and I just didn't get it.

I had two options: not sending the challenge or sending an incomplete challenge 🤔.

___
###The quitting point 😵

For me, this was a hard decision. I felt pretty dumb and such an impostor for not being able to finish it 😢. 

The only thing I was sure about was that I **wasn't going to send a code I didn't understand ** so doing the tutorial stuff without getting it wasn't part of the plan 🙅🏽‍♀️, because that goes against everything I believe. 

At last I remembered something my mentor said to me: "You already have a no. So, there's nothing to lose" and well...that's true✨.

I wrote down an amazing Readme 📑 and added a little extra comment stating that I appreciated the opportunity, that I've learnt a lot and listed my favorite things of the code ✨ plus other things that I was willing to learn as a result of the exercise.

Long story short: I was called for a tech interview. My surprise was that they LOVED my take on the code, I was told they liked how I approached the unknown, how tidy my code was and the way I documented it 😮‍💨😳. They also appreciated my Readme and my honest take to it because showed that overall I was willing to learn. 

___
###The outcome 🌈

The moral of the story is that **you never know** what the other is looking for, so why not trying?. My mentor WAS right, the "no" is already there so we have nothing to lose.

![Yoda gif saying "Impossible to see the future is"](https://dev-to-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com/uploads/articles/0iva5z4rc4wln0466243.gif)
 
Btw, they gave me an offer to join the 📱 mobile team 📱 where I work right now, so after many noes this was my yes: not with the perfect project nor with the perfect code but it was my yes and **I almost closed this door to myself!**

But even before having the received the offer 💫 **I felt that I had won** 💫 because I had the interview and actually, learnt a lot in the whole process and I overcome that paralyzing fear of not feeling enough

___
Have you had any similar experience? Let me know and if you haven't see it, check on my ["Jr. Dev: Do not give up"](https://dev.to/silviaespanagil/jr-dev-do-not-give-up-15pa) series 💪🏽.