Ask HN: Has anyone been hired by the big 4 companies from outside the US?

7 points by employee123 9 years ago | 14 comments

I wanted to know if anyone has been hired by the big 4 from outside the US. How did it happen? what was your experience with the interview and most importantly what role? I want to know if this is possible or I should just forget the idea.

A little about me:

I am a front-end dev, with strong front-end skills currently taking courses in Data structures and Algorithms and bought the book Cracking The Coding Interview, been doing one question every day since. I have worked for a number of European startups as a remote front-end dev, but I've always dreamt of going to the valley. I live in Africa.

guessmyname 9 years ago |

I have interviewed with two "Big Corp" companies and during the interviews I asked about the possibility of an immigration sponsorship considering that I live in a South American country, and they have always assured that once the interviews are done and the company extends a job offer they can help during the immigration and relocation, not only to North America but also Germany, Scotland, Japan, Canada or any city where they have an office.

I wouldn't worry about that, just be sure to study a lot to improve your profile as much as you can, every skill counts considering the fact that they receive tons of resumes all the time, you have to differentiate yourself from the others.

PS: Since you mentioned being a front-end developer, I want to give you some advice with respect of your current learning strategy. A couple of days ago I interviewed for a position in the web development team of one of the "Big 4", my background is mostly on back-end development. After reading several articles from people who interviewed with the same company I realized that most of the questions they were asked were related to algorithms and data structures, so I decided to refresh those skills, bought the latest edition of the CtCI book. The day of the interview I was surprised to find that all the questions were regarding the DOM, basic CSS concepts, and new features introduced in the latest specification of JavaScript. During the ~40 mins of the interview I was never asked one single algorithm question.

employee123 9 years ago | |

Interesting, thanks for sharing this. Actually, I've been reading up a lot on front-end technologies and I'm pretty vast with them. I made it a habit to read one JS book every two weeks, and later moved to CSS. I only recently added data structure and algorithm to the list because of similar reasons.

ThePawnBreak 9 years ago |

Probably at least 20-30% of big 4 employees are or were on H1Bs. Getting a job is very simple, but not very easy:

1. Get a good resume. They're not very picky here, if you have a couple of years experience programming professionally, it should be enough.

2. Apply online.

3. Get an interview.

4. Pass the interview (hard).

5. If you get an offer, you'll need to get an H1B visa to go to the US. It's ok, if you're unlucky they'll probably offer you a position in a different country, and you can transfer to the US after 1-2 years.

NhanH 9 years ago | |

For the last step, if what you truly want is just coming to the US, please don't do it for your own sanity. Waiting 1-2 years working outside the US and then come to the US on H1B/L1 is something potentially quite stressful (not to mention the follow up is anything but pleasant).

Of course, if you just want to work for a big 4 co. anywhere on the world, then it's different.

ThePawnBreak 9 years ago | | |

I have several friends who are doing the Microsoft Vancouver -> Seattle visa dance, and they're ok with it. I also have a friend who got a green card while working at Microsoft.

I think you don't realise how much better the US is for a software engineer than any other country in the world.

employee123 9 years ago | | |

why is waiting 1-2 years outside the US unpleasant? kindly explain more.

emilburzo 9 years ago |

Can't help with your question, but I was wondering how did you get in touch with the European startups you worked for?

employee123 9 years ago | |

I checked out remote job boards, found a couple of listings and applied. Did the interview (most of them took up to a month) and got the offer. You have to know that I have about 4 years experience coding, started while in college and have worked for a firm in my country that contracts out software devs to work as remote devs for startups abroad. So I have a lot of experience working remotely.

emilburzo 9 years ago | | |

Thank you.

I actually have 6 years of experience working remotely, but I guess I've been doing something wrong recently when applying.