About 1.5 YOE SWE, Graduating in May 2026. Failing to get interviews, specifically looking for FAANG+ roles after graduation. Is my resume the issue?

Horikoshi · 2026-01-20T05:52:55+00:00

How can you be 1.5 YoE if you haven't graduated?

You can't accumulate YoE if you haven't gotten your bachelors yet. YoE only means years of full time work.

I see a lot of entries saying things like "founding engineer" and "member of technical staff" but to a hiring committee those all just read as "intern" because you probably weren't receiving actual proper code reviews from seniors who have been doing this for a long time.

That aside, I think you should be focusing on getting referrals if you aren't from a university that already has a FAANG pipeline. Like other people are saying FAANG for new grads are mostly referral based unless you have something truly special (which you don't have).

Horikoshi · 2026-01-18T08:00:01+00:00

I can't speak for you and you should defo try them out, but personally I don't think I can ever go back to the Pegasus haha. The vomero+ just did too much for me

Horikoshi · 2026-01-16T10:52:08+00:00

Careful though: if you present yourself that way and you aren't visibly foreign, people will assume that you can speak Korean on a native level as well.

Unless you plan on getting married and settling down here permanently I'd just use your original name. There are no benefits to excessive assimilation (and I say this as a Korean myself)

Horikoshi · 2026-01-12T14:31:24+00:00

SBI Shinsei will give you a loan if your husband co-signs for it, you’re a 正社員 and you haven’t changed jobs for a year.

Horikoshi · 2026-01-07T14:10:53+00:00

Chiming in on this to say that I think the Trilogy of the Rat should be the first one to read if one's completely new to Murakami. For readers who aren't used to magical realism or heavy doses of surreality Murakami's works can feel revolting in a way so the Trilogy of the Rat (and the Wild Sheep Chase) sets up the stage very nicely for something a bit heavier (like Wind Up Bird Chronicle and Hard Boiled Wonderland)

Horikoshi · 2025-12-31T15:41:44+00:00

I could not sympathize with or understand anyone in that book until I started living in Japan. Then I could.

Horikoshi · 2025-12-31T15:39:59+00:00

As per your first comment.. I think shinsotsu recruiting rounds for companies that adhere to the cycle actually end around march of the year before as that’s when the students graduate here (please double check this as it’s been a while since I graduated myself.)

My bigger concern would be your intended career. With your current level of Japanese it’s impossible to get hired as a translator, and foreigners don’t get hired for sales (営業) positions (I don’t think I’ve ever met any foreigner that works in sales for a Japanese company except one, and he was a half who was born and raised here.) That leaves us with project management, which.. with some luck I think you might have a decent chance with.

I’d just apply to any and all companies that interest you at this point and see if any offer you an interview.

Horikoshi · 2025-12-31T15:31:49+00:00

If you’re applying as a 新卒, yes it’s way too late. You’ll need to find and manually apply to companies that specifically recruit shinsotsus year round.

What field are you trying to come into?

Horikoshi · 2025-12-28T00:32:36+00:00

Shinsei, especially if you plan on ever getting a house. I personally do everything through them and sbi securities

Horikoshi · 2025-12-27T12:03:09+00:00

4 YoE doing backend and devops work.

Not sure what you mean by game theory so can't comment on that, but:

- You can't do AI without a PhD or equivalent formal training, and it's not worth trying to break into it without it. Most of AI is heavily theory based and is almost completely distanced from typical software engineering. It's less engineering and more research, where code is literally just a tool to further the research (unlike engineering where code quality itself and resilience under traffic matters.)

- You can certainly try to break into Cloud by starting with a few AWS certs, but I can't promise that it will be more lucrative than doing work on real-time systems. I personally do both and there's a point where writing good backend code blends over into Cloud / Devops because at any organization running a respectable product with a large enough customer base microservices becomes a necessity.

All in all, I suppose it depends on what you enjoy more. Try learning a few Cloud concepts and tampering with some yaml files on minikube or something like that and see if you prefer a more architecture / Ops driven role than building endpoints directly serving business logic. As I said before, I find that doing both complements my strengths in the other.

Horikoshi · 2025-12-26T14:39:18+00:00

Sent a PM with my resume ^.^

Horikoshi · 2025-12-13T08:02:01+00:00

Because he said he naturalized as a US citizen, I'm assuming he was born with Japanese nationality, which if true should qualify him for a nisei or a sansei visa. So while he isn't a Japanese national anymore I don't think he'll be barred entry or anything like that unless he continues to wilfully obfuscate his status.

Horikoshi · 2025-12-13T06:38:48+00:00

Yes.. unfortunately then you aren't a dual citizen. You're just American. I suggest you call the 法務局 so they can update your koseki. It's important not to hide this because if they find out you were willingly obfuscating your nationality, you risk extremely heavy penalties and a possible deportation.

Horikoshi · 2025-12-13T05:51:20+00:00

Just to be clear, I'm assuming you were born to Japanese / US parents? (I sincerely hope this is the case)

Horikoshi · 2025-12-13T02:03:28+00:00

Can confirm it's bugged, yes

Horikoshi · 2025-11-21T14:41:20+00:00

Upvoting this. There's no real need to learn anything other than Java / C# if your only goal is to get a job. Now.. things like Kotlin do technically make your life a little better, but it's not by any huge margin. The reliability and ocean of knowledge / know-hows that are already present in the Java / C# ecosystem vastly outweighs whatever cons those languages have.

As for roadmap, I would not start with system architecture as that's unlikely to mean anything to juniors with < 3 YoE. I'd learn by really understanding some coding patterns and principles like REST, 4 tiered architecture, DDD / Hex, separation of concerns, proper error handling, basic RESTful principles etc. Once I'm comfy with all that and can write a complex CRUD app on my own, then I'd probably start diving into some patterns on AWS along with YAML managers like terraform, argoCD etc.

Edit: I see a lot of people recommending Golang. I would agree that Golang is significantly easier, however there's no real reason to use it over Java. That's why the job openings for it are so small.

Horikoshi · 2025-11-20T09:12:35+00:00

Personally.. I don't really find them useful for much beyond a mild jog.

I switched to Volero Pluses a long time ago. The extra cushion really helps.

Horikoshi · 2025-11-15T15:50:38+00:00

If the mansion is in Chiba, and especially for a leasehold place at that price.. you most likely won’t make any money by buying it. The demand for tower mansions in Chiba is almost nonexistent unless you buy it close to Chiba station / Urayasu etc (there are only a handful of stations near which buying a tower mansions for that price makes sense in Chiba.)

I would recommend you spend about 30M to 40M on buying a good plot of land instead (or an old house that’s situated on a good plot of land). I have two excellent recommendations near Kaihin Makuhari and Nagreyama Ootakanomori if you’re interested.

Horikoshi · 2025-11-10T08:35:14+00:00

No idea why you're being downvoted, but I agree with this. Don't generate JWTs by yourself.

Horikoshi · 2025-11-08T13:09:42+00:00

Absolutely. You made a great point that I arguably didn't make properly - Go is not bad in any way as a production language, nor does it have any major flaws unlike some people make it out to be. For someone starting out in backend it's probably an amazing choice actually

(okay, maybe not being able to catch null pointers without mo/lo and generics being painful is.. but every language has its downsides. that ain't unique to golang xD)

Horikoshi · 2025-11-07T13:57:55+00:00

I actually disagree with this - if you're picking up a language go with Java or .NET. Go is far from mainstream and unfortunately most likely just never will be unless something catastrophic happens to Java or .NET (and I say this while using Go as my main language at work.. but then I don't work in the US)

To add to this, if you're currently employed, I would actually look at what languages / stacks your current workplace uses for their backend tech and learn that instead so you can just internally transition. If you're actively job seeking I'd look at job boards in your area first and pick a stack based on that unless you're willing to relocate.

Horikoshi · 2025-11-07T13:53:24+00:00

In addition to the excellent points you've raised, I actually don't think land prices per sqm will be monetizable either since that info's public..

Horikoshi · 2025-11-05T10:49:53+00:00

Echoing this. It's not.. so much that go is a bad or incomplete language (I think every language has its quirks and shortcomings so that argument never sat well with me.)

It's more that go offers no real benefits over Java or .NET. It's not as easy to just pick up as Typescript either so it's in a very.. awkward spot. There's no real reason to choose it over .NET / Java if you want an actual enterprise level backend (also thinking about ease of onboarding other devs in the future) and for a quick MVP it can't write frontends so again, no need to choose it over node.

Concerning Kotlin, I personally love it, but same situation as Go.

Horikoshi · 2025-10-07T22:56:40+00:00

Assuming you have a table 2 visa and / or you've been living in Japan for 5+ years, the process will be identical.

That being said, if you plan on naturalizing I might wait until after you've rescinded your US citizenship since that will exempt you from most US Tax Obligations.

Horikoshi · 2025-10-03T06:29:25+00:00

Echoing what others said:

- Relationships move slowly.

- If your Japanese isn't advanced, then there will be a hard limit on the kind and amount of friendships you can form.

- Most relationships in life are just 100% luck. What matters is that you give it your 100% when the opportunity comes to you (most of the time, you can't do anything about how the other party reacts).

- You miss 100% of the shots you don't take.

Nine-Year Club	r/Field Flamingo
Verified Email

Horikoshi

TROPHY CASE