I just wanted to respond to this to let you know that I feel you and that you aren't the only one. I was a SWE let go in the Apr/May RIF, and it is as though none of my 20+ years of experience, contributions, etc. matter at all.
I suppose I'm not surprised. I just completely failed a phone screen in which I had to know several formulas from advanced trigonometry. This wasn't even Leetcode Hard (I've been practicing easy and medium); it was something more than that. I just have to emphasize, this was the first phone screen.
Am I now expected to pull out my old high school / college mathematics textbooks and study those? What about distributed services, performance engineering, compilers, kernel development, etc. etc? I'm sort of lost, as I simply can't study everything... and yet, somehow, there are people who are doing well in these interviews.
So the question is... for those of us who enjoy software engineering, tinkering, etc, who aren't recent grads, how and what do we do to "pass" these examinations?
Is it even worth it? Should I go to trade school and become an electrician? These are the things floating through my head.
The crazy thing is, we were F5ers! We were working on some pretty innovative / advanced stuff... and it's all gone.
Personally, I'm trying to take the Theodore Roosevelt approach and just keep trying. https://www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org/Learn-About-TR/TR-Encyclopedia/Culture-and-Society/Man-in-the-Arena.aspx
But at some point, I'm going to need to consider trade school / something to pay the bills.
You aren't alone. Maybe we should all create a startup.