• Of the six companies I interviewed with, three reached out to me proactively, two responded to my online applications, and one was a referral.
• Definitely not Ivy League :)
• Definitely no patents!

I think I conduct myself well in interviews and I knew my stuff pretty thoroughly. I’d love to pick the brains of my interviewers one day (I’m connected with a handful on LinkedIn still) about what they thought.

People definitely get breaks throughout their lives, but it seems a poor strategy to assume that accomplishments are always due to shortcuts. I think in my particular case it was just a lot of hard work.