Don’t Look For Career Cheat Codes

I am often asked to create a video explaining how to beat the system design interview. I have probably written and discarded over ten drafts on the subject. What happens is that I try to go into detail, and the script becomes way too long. So I try to simplify, but then I cut too much, and it stops being useful. "With coding interviews, there's always a right answer, an optimal algorithm that you either get right or wrong. On the other hand, getting good at system design interviews requires deep experience that may take years and many hours of study in system design." Simply saying that would be a 30-second video, and it breaks one of the cardinal rules of educational YouTube: you need to make the viewer feel smarter by the end. So the script sits in my graveyard of half-formed video ideas.

Yet, the requests continue to roll in. And then I realized the real reason why people continue to ask for this video. They want a cheat code to get past an obstacle on their way to the next level be…