In my experience, LeetCode and exchanging mock interviews is enough for DS&A interviews. You can also find many DS&A mocks on Youtube. System Design is more complex, has less straightforward answers, and it's harder to find mocks on Youtube. It could be worth it to buy a paid service for System Design mock interviews, depending on the price.

I don't trust any bootcamp to teach software engineering. Even university was not useful for that. It simply takes way more time than a bootcamp can give.

I used to use interviewing.io for DS&A when it was cheaper, but in retrospect I didn't need it. Discipline for doing LeetCode problems is more useful. It's actually surprisingly difficult to do a single LeetCode problem daily. I would be at 1,000+ problems if I did a daily LeetCode problem.

Interview preparation is mostly about dedication and time. I am certain that if anyone did 1,000 LeetCode problems, they would be ready for DS&A interviews. There is a similar story for System Design. Few of us actually have that kind of mental capacity though.

Software Engineer @ Code Obsessed (Ex-Amazon)

Danny E.

I was in a similar situation earlier. I decided to prep full time and hold out for a job that I would want to stay at for a couple of years. I regret it because the market is a lot harder than I though it would be. You never know when that new job is going to show up. It's a lot easier emotionally and financially to look for a job if you already have something reasonable. Job searching full time made a lot more sense before the tech job market crashed. 

Entry-Level Software Engineer [SDE 1] at Amazon

Pasted from my linkedin [post](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/software-dev-danny_softwaredevelopment-softwareengineering-activity-7146628780491423744-TMkk). Big companies might have some internal mentorship site to match people. Amazon has one. If not, I would reach out to people on your team and other people that know you in the company. Find a mentor that is 0 - 2 levels above you so that they are still connected to the requirements at your level. The technical stuff is online, but there is a lot more than that to getting promoted such as relationships, how to pick a team and making sure your work is visible.

There are mentors online but many things are org and company specific. General mentorship is helpful but having someone that has worked at the same company and understands how promotions works can be really valuable. Videos can only go so far. Being able to get feedback on a specific problem is much better than an online video.

Also you can checkout [Taro networking](https://www.jointaro.com/networking/).

> Here is an obvious secret about mentorship in corporate, that can boost your career as a software engineer.\
> \
> Software engineers need to mentor others to get promoted. They want you to get promoted, so that they can list their mentorship on their own promotion app. Many engineers simply enjoy helping others even if it doesn't help them get promoted. It's a nice break from coding, meetings and design docs. It's not hard to get advice and mentorship. You just need to have the drive to look for it and implement the feedback.

I got laid off from AWS with 2 YOE. The job market for junior engineers is **terrible**. I am having 5 - 10 times more difficulty getting a job than when I graduated even though I have 2 YOE at AWS. 