Hey 👋 hope you’re having a great week! This week’s Haystack Digest is brought to you by Tillo.
We’re redefining loyalty with the most comprehensive API in the digital gift card industry. We connect the world’s most popular retailers to our partners, with an unrivalled user experience across 34 markets and 16 currencies - seamlessly and securely integrating rewards into customers’ own products and services.
Before we created the Tillo platform, brands and partners would have to manage each partnership manually - which took considerable time, resources and lots of spreadsheets! Our platform makes incentivising and rewarding a delight from start to finish.
Are you looking for your next tech opportunity? We’re hiring for more than 10 roles! Join our team and be a part of an exciting growth journey. 🎉
💛 Haystack x Treehouse
We recently announced some exciting news that we’ve teamed up with Treehouse, to help make learning more accessible and help techies uncover the most exciting tech opportunities. 🎉
Head over to Treehouse to accelerate your learning and enter the code ‘haystack’ to receive 50% off your first three months of courses subscription 🚀
📲 Big Tech & Startups
Image source: Refinery29
Social media quite often generates a love-hate relationship in society. There have been many occasions when popular platforms have been blamed for the rise in mental health issues and for opening up the black hole of comparing our lives to others.
So, do we really need any more social media platforms? The answer is yes, yes we do - and here’s why ⬇️
The newest platform on the scene is the BeReal app, which is proving popular amongst GenZ 🤳
If you’ve never heard of it, we’ll give you a bit of a breakdown:
Get a notification 📩
Take a picture of exactly what you’re doing within a 2-minute window 📸
See what all of your friends are up to! 📲
Unlike other platforms, which have caused controversy, the BeReal app promotes spontaneity with ‘no filters, no likes and no followers’ - just an in-the-moment snapshot to share with your friends! 👏
Let’s hope other platforms can learn a thing or two and encourage more people to show the ‘real’ version of themselves.
🔭 Science & Futuristic Tech
Image source: The Verge
“Alexa, grow a tree.” 🌳
The voice assistant is capable of a lot of things, but actually planting a seed to grow a tree isn’t one of Alexa’s many talents.
Amazon has recently announced a new voice command that is allowing US customers (for now) to donate $1 to plant a tree - customers will also be able to keep a track of how many trees they have helped to plant in their Amazon Pay account.
The tech giant is set to donate $1 million to the environmental charity ‘One Tree Planted’, a non-profit charity with a mission to help global reforestation efforts. The donations will initially go towards four different projects based in the US and India. Amazon’s environmental footprint has been growing considerably in recent years, so is this their way of making amends?
🚀 Twitter Spaces
We recently hosted our very first Twitter Spaces and, because it went so well, we thought why not host another!
Our next Twitter Space will focus on interview tips & tricks for developers ⬇️
Reply to our tweet or drop us a DM, and our guest speakers will answer your questions during the Twitter Space. 📩
Remember to follow us on our social media platforms to be kept in the loop!
🧑💻 Dev, Data & Design
Prepping for your first tech interview? We’ve got you covered.
You’ve put in a lot of hard work to get your foot in the door - years spent in education, countless hours spent perfecting your portfolio and honing your coding skills. Now for the final, and oftentimes most daunting, step - you just have to prove to the person on the other side of the desk that you’re the right person for the job.
We know this is often easier said than done, so we’ve put together this guide to help you go into that interview prepared and land that dream role 👇
Do your research 🧐
Prepare accordingly 🤓
Be on time ⏰
Ask questions 🙋
Stay calm 😎
Use your skills to your advantage 🧑💻
Practice makes perfect! 💯
⚙️ Miscellaneous
giphy
Elon Musk ditches his invitation to join the Twitter board 🗑
Amazon’s failed attempt at drone deliveries 📦
Driverless car outsmarts the police 🚓
The real reason why we shout on Zoom 🤦
📚 Developer Stories
What does an Engineering Manager do?
Meet Joe, Engineering Manager at Tillo, who started studying architecture at university but quickly realised it wasn’t for him and he discovered programming; he’s worked in a number of different engineering roles before joining Tillo.
I remember at the interview being shown this great big diagram of all the connections between the various components - how brands will connect to us, how partners will connect to us. It was basically a big old diagram with boxes and arrows. And that just sold it to me because my main interest in engineering is making systems talk to each other.
As an engineering manager, it’s more about what you enable the team to do. So that takes a bit of getting used to. It’s a bit of a change in mindset; you’re more focused on the big picture.
Testing is a very important part of marking sure it’s fit for purpose. So you’ve always got your testing hat on:
Does it do what it’s supposed to do?
Or does it do what it’s supposed to do, but inadvertently break something else that was working?
Is it really complete?
Although the code might be done, is it well documented?
Do we have everything we need to put it live?
Find out more about Joe’s career journey, what a typical day looks like and advice he’d give to someone starting out in this kind of engineering role.
🎯 Highlighted opportunities
Hiring for multiple opportunities including Senior Support Engineer
Hiring for 5 opportunities including Senior Front End Engineer
📌 Crisp
Hiring for 2 opportunities including Python Developer
📌 DfE
Hiring for 4 opportunities including Senior Interaction Designer
📌 Fatsoma
Hiring for a Senior Software Engineer
📌 Geeiq
Hiring for a Node JS Developer